Chickens, Dive Mapping, Gift Baskets, and Nocturnal Adventures

I dont know if I mentioned it on previous occasions, but there are a bunch of chickens and at least two roosters running around this place. Additionally there are three little chicks that wander around chirping away with their ever watchful constantly mother chasing after them. I thought I should explain this as I am putting up a picture of said hen with her chickies.

So, the yesterday found me aboard one of our smaller boats (one of the two 26' boats) named Atlantis with one of the other employees and guiding two certified divers! If it was going to be the two of us and the divers I was going to be perfectly fine, but apparently they had in mind that I was going to lead the dive alone, as the other person had to stay on the boat as surface support. Obviously, as I have only just gotten here and had only gone diving 3 times, and none of them at this specific site, I was a little apprehensive, but once I got instructions from the staff, I was ready to get going... but 8:00... no customers... 8:30... no customers. Atlantis had to leave the harbour and take people across to Cooper Island (where there is another shop), so no leading a dive for Anna...

Instead of diving, I got adopted by Ria in the base shop on Tortola to help as manpower completely rearranging the shop. We moved things here there and everywhere, occasionally putting things back where they were originally, and other times moving them somewhere else completely. About a third of the way through the day, however, Mike L (who was going to the airport later that day) came to me with a very very important mission... to make some gift baskets for people hes trying to keep happy... you know, like immigration, that kind of thing. So off to the store we went! He dropped me off at OneMart a.k.a. K-Marx or some such, with a blank check with no budget and 30 minutes. About 40 minutes and $217.71 later, we left the store with lots of food, soaps and candles to make 5 tastily delicious gift baskets of varying sizes. I must admit they did look spectacular and I would be very happy indeed to receive such a giftbasket.

After making said baskets and then eating a spectacular lunch of Kraft easy mac (which i bought at the grocery store while there... i mean, why not do a little shopping myself since i was there, right?) I was off again, to go for a dive, this time to do some dive mapping...

So for a little background, there are no recent or even decent books about diving in the British Virgin Islands. There is one that was published about 15 or so years ago that has some amazing site briefings such as "Good luck finding the anchor"... so needless to say, the islands are lacking in a good dive site reference book. So, the people at the shop, are in the process of trying to put one together containing a ton of sites throughout the BVIs. Fortunately, I came and the most opportune time, as it is slow season, so not alot of tourists, but additionally because I get to help map some of the sites for this book. Which means we not only get to go diving without customers, but we get to go to sites that are not often visited during the busy season.

So, to continue on in my tale, I got to go dive mapping that afternoon. We ended up having to go to a shallow site because there was an open water student doing OW dive 1. So to Dead Chest North we went. And the site was spectacular! Corals everywhere, and Elkhorn Corals too, which arent too common. Lots and lots of fish, and a nice school of Southern Sennet. Unfortunately, I kept running out of room on my slate for my mapping, and having to move to the other side of the slate, or under where i started and in the end making an amazingly messy and uncomprehensible dive map, at least on the slate. After a redrawing of it, with what information i actually understood from it, it didnt look that shabby... maybe a little sparce, but the site was so awesome, and I had never dove there before, which made it a bit more challenging.

Moving on. So there are two things about sleeping in the BVIs that I have not yet been able to handle with alot of grace. One is the constant turning on and off of the a/c by my roomie. The other is the incessant buzzing of the mosquitos in your ears while you are trying to get some zzz's. I can deal with the a/c problem, but these mosquitos know the meaning of cruel and unusual punishment. In any case, last night was no different with the mosquitos; however, a lightening storm was moving through and the power got cut off for about 2 hours. In these two hours, the a/c wasnt going on and off and on again which was nice. I had my computer so I watched a movie and played a number of games on my computer and discovered how very very aweful at chess i really am having the computer beat me in really easy mode. Eventually the electricity went back on, and my roomie went to sleep. I went to the bathroom where i could turn the lights on and fill out my dive log with some lumination, and when i went to close the door: the biggest freakin cockroach ive ever seen! It had to have been at least 2.5 inches and his antennae were waving around sensing me in the room. I tried to get a big pitcher and capture him in it but every time i came close he scuttled his way out of the dangerzone, eventually launching himself at me with a flutter of his 'wings'. I managed to knock it into the tub, so i got a water bottle in one hand, and filled the pitcher and held it with the other. i slowly conned him into the tub and then dumped the water all over him hoping to get him down the drain... haha, yeah right! he weaseled his way back to the wall on the other side of the shower area, so i didt this move again, but this time when he was crawling away from teh drain, i thwaped him multiple times with teh water bottle until he was stunned. I then captured it and stuck it outside. And through all of this - with the obvious yelping and swearing on my part - my roomie slept.

Today I got a day off. So guess what I did... I went diving! Haha, no surprise there! One of the other staff members named Steve also had the day off so we went out in his little RIB to a couple of sites on the island which they rarely go to with customers. Shark's Point, though usually not the case, gifted us with the presence of zero sharks. Luckily there was a whole lot of other life around to make up for that, including some little gobies, a barracuda, and some big jacks. We stopped at Cooper island to eat lunch, for who can resist Chicken Roti with fries and mango chutney for the amazing price of $5. Not me. After that, I got to drive the RIB to our next dive site: Blonde Rock. This site, in addition to the amazing reef life and soft corals, also gave us what our previous dive site did not... SHARKS! We saw a Reef Shark -though only the tail end of him swimming away from us- as well as two nurse sharks, both fairly good sized... its possible it was the same nurse shark in two different places as Steve managed to scare it out of its first little hole on accident. Oh well. The current was a little strong, but when going with it, it provided a nice little mini-drift dive. It was the going against part that was the problem. That and diving too soon after eating a huge plate of Chicken Roti and Fries. In any case, tonight there is a little shindig over at Ria and Neils house to watch Boosh (apparently a brit TV show). We'll see how that goes, and if i manage to find my way over there to begin with.

Tomorrow I have another day off, so Ria and I are planning on heading to the West End and getting some grub, maybe trying to spy on another dive shop. We shall see... until then, enjoy living vicariously though me and my pictures, hahaha! tata!