Alysia diving

7.00am. We’re out at the boat with some chunks of delicious banana cake from the local store. We load up our equipment onto the dive boat and move out. A couple of kilometres off the shore is a lighthouse around which the water is only chest deep. We get in and do some practice snorkelling. There are lots of exercises we have to perform underwater – including losing your regulator, clearing a flooded mask, breathing someone else’s air, learning how to be neutrally buoyant and swimming without a mask. They are all easy once you know how and the underwater world comes to me much more naturally than I expected. We never get deeper than one-and-a-half metres today but spend a couple of hours in the water. It is exhilarating and I can’t wait for more. But there’s another afternoon full of lectures on safety first.
Later, during a break we bump into two guys from Cambridge one of whom, Dougie, is an Engineer friend of mine from Jesus College. The other, Rich is a historian. They have plenty of stories to tell so we arrange to meet them later for a few beers. They plan to start to dive course too.
At the doctors, Al is told he shouldn’t have gone diving this morning before been checked out. But when he tests Al’s breathing it is a 103% normal and his manner changes. Everything is OK now and Al can dive. He has reservations of his own though – he got freaked out today by a couple of minor mistakes he made. It is shame but he just needs his confidence restoring.
In the evening we head out for a fun meal of shark steak with the boys. Dougie had all his valuables, tickets and passport stolen in Mexico so has a story to tell. This is followed by beers then a trip to the cinema to see “Lock, Stock and two Smoking Barrels” rudely interrupted by a couple of electricity cuts. The island is stinking hot and showers are the only way to cool down. Bed in the heat with the bugs.

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