The day began with our normal house routine, an abrupt wake up then swiftly going down to attend breakfast. Today we were treated with eggs and bacon to fuel us for our 5th day of diving. After breakfast we were herded into two vans in order to drive to another dock. Rom this dock we were easily able to reach our first dive site, the USS Kittiwake. The Kittiwake was a 271ft long submarine rescue ship that was in commission from the 1940s to the 1990s, while in service it saved 1 sub and sunk another. This site was very enjoyable for me I was able to take a picture while holding the steering wheel of the ship, also we could look through the smoke stack and see a water gun that was mounted to the ship. After this dive we traveled to another shipwreck called the Doc Paulson. This was a 90ft long cable laying ship that was used during the 70s to lay the inter island phone lines. After it served its purpose it was sunk off of 7 mile beach. It’s named after the first dive doctor on the island, he gave free medical care to all of the islands dive masters, and he brought the first hyperbaric chamber to the island. This is used in helping people who get decompression sickness on s dive site was beautiful, after making a pass through the surrounding reef we returned to the wreck. The coral growth was incredible, most of the ship was coated in different corals both hard and soft. We were also treated to the sighting of a very large spotlight parrot fish. It is distinguished by its bright green and orange coloration as an adult, and by red brown and white scales as a juvenile. These fish are what create the white sand beaches that we love to lounge on, they do this by eating coral and the algae that lives on it with their human like teeth. Due to their diet the feces of the fish becomes sand. After a short break we were back at it again, this time at a beach for a small cleanup. After finding many cans and bottles my group was able to collect the largest amount of trash out of the group, winning us a great shirt. Tomorrow is the last day and I’m a little sad as this has been an amazing trip.
