we sped out on a hydrofoil to the reef today. i am not a strong swimmer, so i was not sure what i would be capable of. i tried snorkeling for the 1st time in fiji and loved it, but if i ever felt uncomfortable or unconfident, i could always just stand up as the water was very shallow. not the same out on the reef! it was about 15 - 20 metres deep. i thought i'd be majorly freaked-out, but not only did i snorkel for hours in 2 reef spots, but i also skuba dived!
there was an offer on, and if we paid for the skuba before we got on the boat, it would only cost 10 dollars for the 1st introductory dive... bargain! the way i overcame the snorkeling fear (at extreme depths) was because i took a magical swimming aid with me. god bless the noodle. what a savior. no effort required to keep your self afloat. here's a pic:
then the skuba. well, i guess you don't have to be able to swim. sounds weird, but underwater moving is very different than moving on the surface of the water. we got a 5 minute chance to try out the equipment and let them know if we wanted to proceed (dee got out at this point). a small group then decended - 3 guests and a guide. we rented an underwater camera for the trip (which we got for free as they forgot to charge us) so we got some amazing pics. we took about 350 pics, and most of them are a blurry mess, but a small selection came out great.
when snorkeling at the 2nd reef i spotted a sea turtle. he was swimming around and through the reef, so i swam right along side him and let him lead the way (he seemed to know where he was going). it was an amazing experience. i got loads of pics of him, most of them of his arse, so i decided to speed up and swim past him to get a pic of his face. just after i got one, he changed direction and all of a sudden he was directly below me - he must have been no more than a foot away from me. got a pic of that aswell.
all in all, i had just as much fun and saw as much wildlfe when snorkeling as when i was skuba-ing, but i guess it was a different experience; the whole, "i should be drowning, how come i'm still breathing" thing.
flying to singapore tomorrow at 1pm. 9 hour flight. 3 or so days there to shop till we drop. i hear the singaporians are crazy about their gadgets, so i may pick up a mobile phone when i'm there.
