Tuesday, January 24, 2006

Moonwalk

One of the more impressive parts of the trip were the night dives. The past two evenings, we jumped into the water with our gear and flashlights and spent a half-hour bobbing around in the darkness. The surreality of the experience was incredible; with such depravity of senses (and gravity), one could easily imagine themselves on the surface of the moon.

Up above, the boat was illuminated with floodlights, giving a glow for which we were able to use as reference. It reminded me of the scenes in E.T. - The Extraterrestrial when they're chasing after poor little E.T. and Elliot with their floodbeams through the forrest. It would have been difficult to get lost with the boat giving off such a large amount of kilowatts in the area, and the thoroughness of the safety procedure has been quite good.

The beams of light from each diver would zig zag through the water, illuminating the floating particles and giving the immediate area of faint green glow. Fish would swim in and out of the range of light, eyes dilated to make the best of the surrounding darkness. We were fortunate enough to have seen two green turtles on our dive last night, both absolutely massive - easily the size of a love seat. One had hidden themself under an overcropping of coral as to say, 'don't bother me - I'm sleeping'. The paparazzi scuba photographers strobing the scene with their flash bulbs didn't make that wish a reality.

posted by ncawthon at 1:54 PM