Open Water Diver, in a Center Parcs, fo’ real man!
Door: Evert
Blijf op de hoogte en volg Evert
09 Januari 2011 | Trinidad en Tobago, Charlotteville
Day 19, December 30th, my bed, CoralCay Cottage, Charlotteville, TT, 7.15pm local time.
Finally some time to write this diary in what seems an endless series of dives, chores and other little jobs that have to be done. They are too many to mention and washing dishes, cleaning laundry and diving-gear is not interesting, yet an impressive part of the time you spend here.
Basically, our lodge is a building in a holiday resort which offers toilets and laundry services next to the building alone. It can be compared to a Center Parcs resort, although the building is not that beautiful or the resort that big. On the other hand, you get the Caribbean Sea on 10 footsteps of your terrace and you get REAL tropical fruit-trees just outside. Today, I ate a fresh grapefruit, some limes and a shake of banana with milk-powder and chocolate powder, all put together in the blender to make a great shake. In the 16 weeks that remain me here, for sure I will learn to make the best smoothies, blends and others.
People who know me well, know my love for mangos. In fact, today was the day on which our, almost daily, fruit-hunt resulted in -yet quite unripe- mangos. Mango-season is supposed to begin in a little more than a month, but many people talk to us about the effect of climate change. Due to Il Nino, the effects of it are magnified round here. Consequences are huge hurricanes, like the one that occured a little than a month ago. On that occasion, the CoralCay diving-boat sunk. It has been recovered by the most experienced divers here and since then, it is in repair just outside the house. Due to the raining-season in general and, more specifically, the hurricane, a huge amount of run-off entered the Charlotteville-bay. Lots of silt and sand are still floating in the water or covering the coral reefs, resulting in visibilities underwater of less than 2 meters, sometimes even less then 1 meter. It is easy to understand that all these particles make it very dark underwater, while coral reefs need bright sunshine to make a living. This is a direct link between global warming and the survival of one of the richest eco-systems in the world. Hence, the biodiversity and amount of energy which is absorbed by a coral reef is comparable to the properties of rainforests.
Unfortunately, I have to go now. There is a knowledge review on buoyancy, a topic on which we will do a specialty-dive tomorrow. It counts as the first dive of the Advanced Open Water Diver-degree.
Finally some time to write this diary in what seems an endless series of dives, chores and other little jobs that have to be done. They are too many to mention and washing dishes, cleaning laundry and diving-gear is not interesting, yet an impressive part of the time you spend here.
Basically, our lodge is a building in a holiday resort which offers toilets and laundry services next to the building alone. It can be compared to a Center Parcs resort, although the building is not that beautiful or the resort that big. On the other hand, you get the Caribbean Sea on 10 footsteps of your terrace and you get REAL tropical fruit-trees just outside. Today, I ate a fresh grapefruit, some limes and a shake of banana with milk-powder and chocolate powder, all put together in the blender to make a great shake. In the 16 weeks that remain me here, for sure I will learn to make the best smoothies, blends and others.
People who know me well, know my love for mangos. In fact, today was the day on which our, almost daily, fruit-hunt resulted in -yet quite unripe- mangos. Mango-season is supposed to begin in a little more than a month, but many people talk to us about the effect of climate change. Due to Il Nino, the effects of it are magnified round here. Consequences are huge hurricanes, like the one that occured a little than a month ago. On that occasion, the CoralCay diving-boat sunk. It has been recovered by the most experienced divers here and since then, it is in repair just outside the house. Due to the raining-season in general and, more specifically, the hurricane, a huge amount of run-off entered the Charlotteville-bay. Lots of silt and sand are still floating in the water or covering the coral reefs, resulting in visibilities underwater of less than 2 meters, sometimes even less then 1 meter. It is easy to understand that all these particles make it very dark underwater, while coral reefs need bright sunshine to make a living. This is a direct link between global warming and the survival of one of the richest eco-systems in the world. Hence, the biodiversity and amount of energy which is absorbed by a coral reef is comparable to the properties of rainforests.
Unfortunately, I have to go now. There is a knowledge review on buoyancy, a topic on which we will do a specialty-dive tomorrow. It counts as the first dive of the Advanced Open Water Diver-degree.
