I have always loved water. I love water sports. Being in water. Being around water. Drinking water. Washing dishes. Maybe not that last one. But in general, water has always been a big part of my life. So it was really not a surprise that I wanted to work on a ship. I can easily do my job on land somewhere, but why would I? It only takes one glimpse beneath the surface of the ocean to realize how amazing it is.
One of my favorite islands to visit is Barbados. I haven’t explored much of the island, but there is a beach I love and I visit every chance I get. A few weeks ago I was told that a short walk along the shore from my favorite spot was a great place to find sea turtles. Barbados is know for its turtles and I had seen one in the water while I was walking along the boardwalk in town over a year ago, but I had yet to see one up close or swim along beside it.
I mentioned to a couple of my friends that I wanted to swim with the turtles on this particular trip to Barbados and it just so happened that one of them knew where to go. He also told me that there were really cool shipwrecks in the area as well. We got to my favorite beach early, but the boys wanted to take a nap and then play volleyball before our snorkel trip so I tried to patiently wait. I was so excited though! Finally an adventure and not just going out in port to find internet and update my blog. **wink**
Around noon we set out for the turtle spot. There were several tour boats about 100 yards from shore. If you pay the $50 or so you get dropped off right over the turtles. We swam it…for free. My friend that knew where he was going, Emilio, led the way and Jorge and I followed. We had been swimming along for awhile when Jorge stopped swimming beside me and I saw the turtle that was beside him. He thought it was another person from one of the tours until he looked over and saw the turtle! Now these aren’t the gigantic turtles you see on the Discovery Channel, but they are still quite large. We saw several and they were probably the size of my torso. The water is so clear that as we were treading water and talking to each other you could see a turtle approaching. One of us would yell, “There’s one right there!” We’d all scramble to get our masks back on and our snorkels in our mouths so we could get another look.
After playing with the turtles for a bit we decided to swim to the shipwreck. This was located probably three to five times the distance we had already swum. Swam. Swimmed? Let’s just say we had more swimming to do.
Emilio told us we would have to swim to the red buoy and it was right around there somewhere. We swam, er, I mean, we had been swimming for awhile when he realized the ocean was getting much deeper and darker than he remembered. We looked around and saw a couple tour boats anchored with lots of people snorkeling a few hundreds yards away so we decided to swim over there to see what they were looking at.
Before we could reach them we had to swim through some very dark water. Typically the darker the water is, the deeper it is, so not really the best place to be. However, it was cloudy that day, so we told ourselves that was why. At one point on the swim when it was particularly dark, the three of us held hands and swam through it. Aren’t those the kind of friends you want? First of all they are crazy enough to jump in the ocean without lifejackets and swim half a mile with you to see some turtles and a ship put there by a careless captain. Then to top it all off, when things get scary they don’t bail, but reach out and take your hand so we all get through it together. And the reward was definitely worth the swim through dark waters.
As the water was getting lighter I saw what looked like boards on the ocean floor so I hovered over them to take a picture. As I was doing so Emilio reached back and tapped my shoulder and pointed ahead. I looked up and saw the ship. Now, I’ve been told before while snorkeling in the islands that I would see a shipwreck. The “ship” always turned out to be a boat. Trust me I know the difference. Not this time. This was unmistakably a ship. I do kinda wish I was on one of those paid tours because they probably told you what ship it was and what it was doing at the bottom of the ocean. Oh well. It’s probably in a book somewhere I’ll look it up. Do people still do that, look things up in books? I’ll Google it- that sounds much more 2011. Anyway…back to the ship….
This ship was amazing. The front had a mini-mooring deck, there were compartments open to the inside of the ship, and the back had beautiful grid work still fully intact. I had never seen anything like it. To top it off, there were more tropical fish than I have ever seen while snorkeling. It was beautiful. I’ve included pictures here because there is no way I can accurately describe what it was like. These pictures won’t even do it justice. Jorge took a video of me swimming the length of the ship so I will work on posting that as well.
I had wanted to swim a bit further because more people were snorkeling over there so I presume there was another wreck. However, we all still had to swim back and I was hoping to make another stop at the turtles. So we left my new playground and headed for land. It sure seemed to take a lot longer to get back than it did to get out there!
We stopped in the turtle spot again and there were more this time. I got to see a couple of them up close and even touched one of them! Watching them swim is beautiful. They glide so effortlessly!
I have to do more snorkeling and hopefully more diving very, very soon. I’m trying to do a dive this weekend. If that doesn’t wor
k out, I will be snorkeling. I’ve never had a disappointing snorkeling day. The ocean is too amazing for that to happen!
All in all this Barbados day has been the best day of my contract so far. Hopefully it is the beginning of so much more! The whole day was great: waffles and french toast for breakfast, a swim in the ocean, nap on the beach, amazing time snorkeling, delicious Barbados hot sauce on my lunch, a nap, fresh linens and a vacuum from the Keeper of all things Linen (true story, not just a cheap call back to last week’s blog), and a tiny bit of work which actually consisted of doing the twist and filming other people doing the same. Life is beautiful!
