7/12/16
We landed in the BVI last night around 9 pm and after a short boat ride to Virgin Gorda I quickly unpacked in my cabin and fell asleep. After an early start this morning the other members of my cabin and I discovered a chicken walking around our porch and spent about 5 minutes just watching it walk around us. Afterwards we joined the rest of the group and were driven by our taxi driver Glen down to the marina for breakfast. I had the cheese omelet and it was pretty good. The group was then split up into two smaller groups and boarded two separate ships named “Sea Dragon” and “Sea Monkey”. I was part of the Sea Monkey boat and our diving instructors were Cassie, Beth, and Ben. Each instructor took a group of guys and I was part of the group with Beth. The first dive site we went to was George Dog Island. I was informed by Cassie that Jacques Cousteau thought the rock formation at the end of the island look like the head of a horse. Once we got in the water and down to the ocean floor about 20 ft down my instructor Beth reviewed with my group different diving skills that we all needed to be able to do such being able to grab my regulator and put it back in my mouth incase it were to fall out for any reason. After everyone did the various skills we followed Beth around and she pointed out various species of fish and coral. My favorite at the first dive site was feather duster coral which is a coral that looks like a ball of fur and if you make any noise or touch it it shrinks in on itself for defense. We then went to our second dive site which was called “The Chimney”. It was called this because in the dive site there was a thin crevice that ended with and arch over it. At this dive site our instructor just had us swim around and show us various species that were not at the previous dive site. My favorite from this dive site was a particular squid that seemed to take an interest in us as it followed us around and got much closer to us than any other fish. We then went to lunch and had fun on the beach for awhile before we went snorkeling to a spot down the beach called “The Baths”. They are a system of granite boulders that form caves from years of erosion from the waves. It is called the baths because when the British were colonizing the British Virgin Islands they would bring over slaves and on Vigrin Gorda they would take the slave to The Baths to clean themselves before they sold them at market. Afterwards we climbed on some of the rock formations near The Baths and then had a race back to the beach we were originally at. Now everyone is in one room at the hotel office using the limited wifi to wright their individual blogs. After we are finished with our blogs we will have dinner and then explain our research projects to our dive instructors.
