It is soooo easy to get sunburned down here, especially for pale white men from the North. The pretty fish and underwater camera distracted me the first day, and even with < 2 hours in the water, I was crispified. Have been careful since then, but still got a little burnt last night, by a close to sunseted sun that snuck past my protective towel that didn't quite cover all of my leg. But the magical aloa vera slim healed us up, and we have had a fun and relaxed time. My $100 underwater camera from Target has worked well, as long as you feed it it's daily set of batteries. I posted a bunch of photos here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/brucewinter/2008StThomas
That first pic is actually a 4 minute video. Is a bit chaotic, bouncing between land and water cameras, but highlights the sort of fun we had. The end of that video is of a turtle we found on a night dive. You can make him out as Nick and Helen's underwater lights pass over him. Was mystical.
Found lots of fun fish. Coming back from snorkeling with Zach, I was in shallow sandy water and I saw this funny stick coming out of the sand. I was about to grab it when I saw it was attached to a 3 foot triangular object. I hesitated long enough to resolve it into the shape of large sting ray. So rather than irritate it by grabbing it's tail, I tried taking its picture, but mostly failed. It was too big to see in the cloudy water, about 5 foot from head to tail. You can see part of it in the top of this photo:
Other fun we had:
- We rented a couple of sea kayaks and went to a more remote shore with lots of shells. The choppy sea gave us a good ride. I don't think Chloe will be coming with us next time.
- It took them a few days, but finally N&Z fullfiled their lifelong ambition of catching several of those small lizards. Those little guys are lightning fast, but my 23 year old boys are faster than lightning!
- Chloe learned to snorkel. With Nick's tutelage, she did really well by the 2nd day!
- We discovered sand flies bite worse and more often than misquitoes. Actually it is not really their bite that is irritating. Zach say the itching mostly comes from the poop they leave depostied in your skin when they are done with their business. Knowing that makes the itching seem even more imperative.
- Zach taught us a drinking game. Nick and Chloe stuck with water. Zach preferred his beers, mostly so he could use his new sandals with the built in bottle opener, although he noted his beers always seemed sandy. I had this tasty drink called Alize, a passion juice alcohol. Zack says it is what rich rappers like. When I started sounding like a rapper, Helen said I had had enough.
- We sand buried Nick. He was sure he could get out in less than the 1 minute Zach bet him. Took him 10. He could have done it in 5 if he would have left is swimsuit in the grave, but his modesty declined.
Nick and Chloe left Friday and are back at school now. Zach left Saturday to visit his NY friend is in the air now (hopefully) on his way back to Rochester Monday night. We leave tomorrow, both back to loads of work. Maybe I'll forget to set the alarm clock for tomorrows plane ride :)
Bruce
