Remember when I said that yesterday would be the most physically demanding day. I was wrong.
The day started just as usual with an early 7:15 wake up and 8:00 breakfast. Next came two tank dives once again for our project. Today we visited Chimney and Bronco Island. Unfortunately for me, I was unable to located any sponges but I did see a lot more groups of fishes. Luckily though, the rest of my group found more than enough samples for our project. My favorite part of the morning was in between both dives doing flips off of the second floor of the dive boat, even though on the last flip I back flopped and it stung for a while.
After diving we headed back to the dock for lunch which included chips and and a jelly sandwich. Next came an hour of pure working on the project, which during this time, we got most of the project done.
Now this is the point where the day got tough. At 3:30 we headed to the cabin beach for a “surprise” hosted by the dive staff down here. The “surprise” consisted of five different events where every cabin formed a team to beat out the other. The events included completely covering one of your cabin mates in sand, pictionary in the sand, a relay race while wearing dive gear, guiding one of your cabin mates through a course while they were blindfolded, and for the grand finale a massive rely race with tons of obstacles. Up until the 5th event, our team was doing pretty well. However, we were too gassed by the end of it and we wound up in last place sadly.
After a nice cool down in the water, we ate burgers and hotdogs thanks to the dive staff which was very tasty. We then waited until after sunset for a night snorkel off the beach. When the time came we were given powerful flashlights and then headed into the water. Since it was night and different animals such as octopi and flounders are more active at night, I must say that the experience was very unique. It became even cooler when it started to rain and I looked up at the surface which looked like boiling water from underneath. Nevertheless, the night came to an end with a walk back to my cabin, a nice shower, and a chill in the commissary.
While today was tough, I honestly do feel that from the events on the beach I have grown closer to my classmates on the trip, a worthwhile tradeoff. However, I am still extremely tired, so I am going to head off to bed. Tomorrow should entail much more, but until then, good night!
