Friday morning’s routine followed the same pattern as Thursday with an early breakfast, a 7:45am pickup, and out to the marina and on to the dive boat. We were on the bigger boat today with a total of ten divers and two dive masters, Jorge and Steve. The first dive site was Palancar Caves, and I was last to get into the water. Luckily, Steve had waited at the surface to see how I got on, and spotted that I was close to losing my weight belt. He grabbed it from me and took it back to the surface, where I had to get out, put it back on, then get back in the water. After that drama, it transpired that the rest of the dive group had moved on, so Steve was stuck with Ishbel and me which turned out to be fortuitous. We saw eight turtles over the course of the dive, including one huge loggerhead. The group of divers who chose not to be delayed by me didn’t see any turtles at all. (Incidentally, today’s title is taken from Happy Together, by The Turtles.) This was an amazing dive, which also included my first ever swim-through. Back on board early again, but the excitement of the weight belt drama accounted for a load of my air use.
We then headed to our second dive site of the day: Chankanaab Bolones. Yet another amazing dive, this time with two encounters with lobsters. One of them was in a typical spot, tucked into a rock and looking out at passing divers, but the second one we surprised on the sea bed as he was out for a mid-morning constitutional. We also spotted an unusual form of marine life: a submarine.
There’s a small pleasure submarine that takes people underwater for little cruises. Apparently, one of our fellow divers at some point in the past mooned the submarine, much to the consternation of its passengers. Luckily, no such misbehaviour was recorded this time. Back on board first again, but only just! Another couple came to the surface at pretty much the same time as us, so things are improving. Thus ended our Cozumel diving experience and we headed back to the marina.
After being dropped at the hotel, the day repeated the events of Thursday. By this time, I was exhausted and decided that a siesta would be a good idea. My loving wife did me the great service of setting an alarm to go off an hour after I fell asleep. Waking up to an alarm you didn’t set is a confusing experience. Waking up and finding that none of the electrical devices in the room work, even more so. While I dozed, a power cut had wiped out electricity supply to the whole of the Yucatan Peninsula. I got up just as Ishbel returned from yet another snorkelling adventure and we both got ready for dinner, despite the fact that we weren’t sure whether the hotel would have the wherewithal to prepare a meal during the outage.
It turned out that they have emergency generators for just such a contingency which support the food preparation but not the air conditioning. We had a hot dinner, in every respect, then decided to take a walk along the road to La Internacional again. We couldn’t bear to think of all those delicious craft beers being cold with nobody to drink them, so we decided to help out. The bar is one floor up with an open terrace overlooking the road so we sat there watching the town get darker as the sun went down. Eventually, power started up again, so we had street lights to light our way back to the hotel that evening.
Cozumel was lovely. I haven’t had the opportunity to explore many dive sites, but I can see why this one is so popular. We would certainly come back and dive here again if the opportunity arises. Tomorrow, we’re off to the mainland!
World After Work 