Day 1
Finally back again in Virgin Gorda. Last night after a long day of travel, travel that included two flight delays, we arrived at the always lovely Guavaberry Resort. We were assigned to our rooms and I returned to the cottage “Plum Tree” with fellow Marine 2 guys Tucker Reed, Joe Wengierski, and Guy Harris. The rookie Nick Byrne is also joining us in the two bedroom, two bath humble abode. After a quick game of hangman we retired to bed.
First full day began with an early morning rise at 7. We packed for the day in our newly issued red backpacks which were placed in our cottages upon our arrival (along with a large red water bottle). We waited by the cattle guard, our meeting place below the hill, for Glen to come pick us up in his taxi. Around 8 the pick up truck-turned bus arrived and we boarded to go to class.
Breakfast awaited us at the Virgin Gorda Inn. We stuffed our faces with eggs, sausage, fruit, and muffins. Thankfully there was plenty and we snagged some seconds. After breakfast, the Dive BVI crew re-introduced themselves. Casey McNutt, Jeff McNutt, and Laura from England were veterans with the Jesuit Marine Bio program and it was great to seem them again. Last year’s Brian the Irishman unfortunately moved to the Pacific, but we were fortunate enough to have plenty of new staff. Caitlyn and Jeff (married) as well as interns Fernando and Pablo introduced themselves. They seem like wonderful people. Casey then proceeded to go over rules and guidelines with us which seemed easy enough to follow. After that we introduced ourselves to the staff and were bestowed with cool Dive BVI shirts. Then the real surprise came when Casey and Jeff gave all the Marine 2 guys state of the art underwater cameras. They can go down to 200 ft and have video recording capabilities as well. This was extremely awesome of them-its kindness like this that made us want to come back and spend a week with them. We will be incorporating these cameras into our diving throughout the week.
Laura then taught us about the topography of the island and fish identification. It was mainly a review of the kinds of things we saw last year and will continue to see throughout the week. From reef sharks to elkhorn coral to queen angelfish, we hope to identify numerous marine organisms during our one week hiatus. After a 15 minute break we had some lunch. This included sandwiches, salad, and fries. This meal was key to ensuring our strength and awareness for the afternoon dive that would soon come.
Glen the driver then took us to the marina where we were re-educated on safety measures as well as tank assembly. It didn’t take too long for us to re-grasp our skills and we quickly assembled our gear and boarded the boat. Marine Bio 1 and Marine Bio 2 were seperated onto two boats. Today Marine Bio 2 rode on “Sea Monkey”, but will be utilizing “Sea Dragon” for the remainder of the trip. Our dive instructors are Casey, Laura, and Jeff 2 while Jeff 1, Caitlyn, and the interns will guide the other boat.
We then left the dock and drove over to our dive site. This dive was a basic check up dive to tune up our skills. We all were a bit rusty but we ended up finishing well. My group consisted of Guy, Tucker Reed, Chris Wengierski, Joe, Christian Koeijimans, and Buck Lyon. Luckily our leader was the always wonderful Casey. It was great to get back down to diving. We saw numerous marine organisms: elkhorn coral, finger coral, squid, squirrelfish, morray eel, fairy basslet, blue chromis, and many more. The dive was about 45 minutes long and the deepest we went was about 40 ft. After the dive, we disassembled our gear and headed back to the marina.
When the dive trip concluded, we headed back to Guavaberry where we chilled until about 6:15. We then walked to dinner at Mad Dogs, a quarter mile from our cottages. We munched on some pizza and ice cream sundaes. It was a delicious meal and hit the spot. It was a great first day in the BVI and I can’t wait to start tomorrow.
