Now THAT'S diving

First of all,  the dive boat has low stools at the back where you sit and put on your fins while a crew member gets your heavy tank and gear and puts it on your back. All you have to do is stand up and then giant stride into the water. Love it.  ❤️ 

Then,  you're in the water and take a look around.  You can see! I mean really see.  The water is clear,  you can see the Coral heads (bommies) on the bottom and the white sand in between them.  As opposed to many of our sites in BVI where you'd jump in and see murky water.  You had to trust that if you descended far enough there was a bottom down there. The water is 84 degrees,  warm and wonderful. 

Then,  the wall! After a bit of swimming over the sand and around the Coral heads,  it just drops off.  Like being on the edge of the grand canyon,  it's a vertical wall.  But unlike being at the grand canyon it's OK to go over the edge.  It's like flying but even better.  So you go over the wall and descends a bit more you can reorient your body to a vertical position and just link of drift as you inshore the Coral,  sponges,  and critters that live on the all. 

Captain Robynne playing kissy-face with a friendly grouper

Then, my favorite! The dive master guides us into a recess in the wall,  like a cave.  Once inside the cave you see that it continues.  You just follow the fins of the person in front of you as you make a turn in this tunnel.  You see the light at the end of this tunnel and keep going.  What an adventure. 

As we make our way back to the boat,  we've acquired an escort. A very friendly grouper. He especially seems to like Jim,  but he gets close and personal with all of us.  You want to reach out and let him. I bet he would like a scratch under the chin, but we have been advised not to touch! I think there's something about about our hands that would wipe off important oils from his skin,  so I satisfy myself with taking my regulator out of my mouth and blowing him kisses. 

Oh ... and the name of this dive site?!? Marilyns cut! So,  you betcha I left some of her down there to play with the grouper. 

This is diving the Bloody Bay Wall on little Cayman. Some of the best Wall diving in the world. 

Day 1 Little Cayman

We got in mid afternoon on Saturday after a flight from Miami to Cayman Brac, then a boat ride from Brac to Little Cayman.

We unpacked,  had dinner and got all settled ready to go diving in the morning.  But ... come morning the weather was just not cooperating.  They canceled the morning dive and said to plan on afternoon dives instead. 

Aaaah, no problem. With my kindle app on my phone I had plenty of books to choose from so I went back to one I had abandoned a while back "Utopia for Realists" and settled in to read in bed. It was luxury.  

About 10 we decided to go for a bike ride.  The resort provides the bikes.  We didn't go far,  because there isn't far to go! But it felt good and I even bought a pair of pretty earrings at the Seahorse Boutique.

After lunch everyone else went out to go diving,  but Jim and I had already planned to do our YouTube show #280 - celebrating 10 years of our show! We had pre recorded it rather than going live,  but we wanted to be live in the chat,  and do our after show with our members.  It went great! It feels so good to accomplish something. And to do it while on a Caribbean island is even better!!

Then we had the afternoon to ourselves.  We sat in the hot tub,  had a couple drinks at the bar,  and now I'm stretched out in the hammock down on the beach. 

OH MAN LIFE IS GOOD

Fourth of July at Toastmasters

 We get up at 6am every Thursday morning. I HATE getting up that early. 8am is more my style. But Thursdays at 7am is when our Toastmasters club, Earlybird Toastmasters, meets. We've belonged to this club since the early 90s. It used to meet at the local Denny's in their back room meeting space. We got to know the other people and have become lifelong friends with many of them.

Ever since the pandemic, starting in March 2020, our club has been meeting over Zoom. So, even though we have to get up at 6:30, we don't have to get dressed and drive anywhere. As long as we have a nice top on, we can just wear shorts and we have a seat in our respective offices and we're in the meeting. As much as I hate getting up, I love being there. The stories from the other members, and the opportunity to tell our own stories is just priceless.

This morning was no exception, and the highlight of the morning was Jim's humorous speech about the 4th of July. Also thanks to Zoom we have recordings of every meeting, so we can remember his speech forever, and you can enjoy it too!

Google, girlfriends, and good flights

As a Google product expert, they fly me somewhere once a year,  put me up in a hotel,  and put on a conference for me and all the other product experts. It's something I always look forward to.  Meeting up with all the other experts, some of whom I see every year, and some who are new to me.  We party and we learn. There's a welcome reception/ party and a farewell party.  Food, drink, music, dancing.  SO much fun.  Then all day we have breakout sessions on different products. This year it was in Austin, Texas. 

I was very disappointed this time that there were no breakout sessions on Google photos,  but I still enjoyed learning other things.  Like how to sell products on your Youtube channel and how they deal with spam in Gmail, and what improvements they've made to the pixel camera. 

I feel so lucky to be a part of this team.  It gives me a relationship with Google as well as a relationship with other product experts all over the world. 

The summit was just one evening and one day. I almost always splurge for some extra time.  For Austin I paid for one night before and one night after, then I invited Melinda to fly out from reno and join me. Sleepover!!

We talked and talked,  and walked all over Austin. It was wonderful.  I got caught up on all the changes in her life and told her my deepest secrets! We reestablished our sisterhood.  

Then,  my old friend Marty, who lives just outside of Austin,  saw my post on Facebook and made arrangements to drive in and hang out a bit, then drive me to the airport. What a delight she is,  and this was another walk down memory lane.  I don't get a lot of girlfriend time when I'm home or traveling - it's just me and Jim. These two were nourishing my soul. 

Then for the flight home I snagged a window seat and enjoyed the scenery. 

Feeling very fulfilled. 

Welcome Home!

A week diving in British Virgin Islands

We signed up for a trip with our USADiveClubUSADiveClub. It's an easy one. We pick up a flight right in Fort Lauderdale Airport,  just 15 minutes from home.  It's an hour and a half to San Juan,  Puerto Rico,  then just 30 minutes to Tortola,  BVI. We get off the plane,  our group is picked up on a bus that takes us to the boat.  It's one of the Aggressor fleet of liveaboard dive boatsAggressor fleet of liveaboard dive boats,  we've been on several before so we know the drill. Get your dive gear out of your bags and set it up on the bench provided.  That's where it will be for the rest of the week. You take off your shoes and put them in a basket.  You pick them up at the end of the week. 

Then you take your empty dive gear bag and whatever clothes and personal items you brought and find your way to your cabin.  We signed up late for this trip so we got the worst cabin.  We lived in a small RV for 14 years, and now travel in an even smaller RV. Nothing compares to how small this room was.  And no window, not even a porthole. Now we know ... if this is the only room available in the future,  we will just say no. Oh well,  your room is not the most important part. 

The first night is a nice cocktail party where we meet the crew,  some of whom are newbies,  all are sweet and delightful - and throughout the week they worked very hard for this group of very experienced,  but also very old,  divers! 😅🤣 Some of us have been diving together for over 40 years! 

We are in the British Virgin Islands,  a gorgeous collection of over 60 mountainous islands in the turquoise Caribbean sea.  We had beautiful,  sunny weather all week.  It was paradise. 

The first day started with an easy,  checkout dive to make sure you had the right amount of lead weights.  A few of our group had recently lost a lot of weight which means they need less lead to keep them down.  This is a good problem! Each day you could go on 4 dives each day. The first one was at 8am then 11, then 2 or 3 and the last one was late afternoon,  or after dinner - a night dive. A total of 22 dives was possible. Jim did 16 and I did 9 because I caught a cold on the first day,  just a simple head cold (happens a lot when I travel) but it makes it hard to dive.  It's easy as can be to just float weightless in the sea when there is little current and lots to see but just getting your gear on,  getting in the water,  getting back out - takes a lot of of you.  

Every dive boat operation has slightly different techniques.  This one was about the worst. Some liveaboards are in areas where the big boat - the one were living on - can anchor right on the dive site. Then it's up to each diver to gear up and just jump in the water.  Most liveaboard boats have to anchor a ways away,  then have tenders/zodiacs carry the divers to the actual dive site.  Here's where the rubber hits the road.  In the Maldives they had a whole separate dive boat,  called a dohnnie. All dive gear was in the dohnnie.  Everyone who wanted to dive, transferred to the dohnnie and got geared up there. The dohnnie got us to the site and we jumped in.  In indonesia they were little zodiacs that carried 4 of us at a time. We had our gear on,  sat on the side of the zodiac and backrolled into the water.  When we can up,  a zodiac came to fetch us.  

Here on BVI Aggressor, they had two tenders,  to carry 10 divers each.  The crew put our gear on the tenders - a difficult job! - and put them in a rack in the middle.  We sat on the sides and rode to the site, where we had to be helped in to our gear before we could bankroll into the water.  The tender was tethered to a mooring ball,  so when we were diving we had to pay attention to directions so we could find out way back. Each group of 10 divers had one dive guide in the water with us,  but we didn't always stay together.  Some dives were easy,  no problem.  Some dives were total clusterf...

Jim took his Pixel phone underwater in a housing that has a gel surface so you can use the touch screen like normal.  See our Fun with Photos video #22 about underwater photos. He got some great photos and we went to some iconic dive sites like the Wreck of the Rhone that I've heard about for years. Although not a dive site, I also remember heating from my mom about a favorite place of hers called The Baths at Virgin Gorda. I figured this was a good place to leave some of her ashes.

If there's one thing divers share is an ability to deal with complications.  The crew was always cheerful, helpful. The food was out of this world.

We got off the boat early in the morning and had the whole day to kill before our plane left, so the organizers got us an island tour of Tortola. Just gorgeous.

We stopped at the only remaining Rum Distillery on the island - Callwood Rum Distillery. We got a tour and then tasted 5 Rums. We liked "Panties Off" the best!