Journey to the 2nd World, Part 11 - Snorkeling

[jamesq]

The resort had snorkeling tours available for an additional cost. It wasn't much, just 20 CUC. You had to sign up for it, then they'd take you out for about an hour. This was actually the second snorkelling tour we had heard about. The first was more expensive and took about fifty people out. Ours was just five people from the resort's beach.

We went to talk to one of the lifeguards about this and learned a few things. They (the lifeguards) could take you out and back, but they couldn't do it if it was too windy. As it generally got too windy in the afternoon, they would only really be able to do it in the morning. Which was weird because the resort told us to sign up before noon for the 2 pm tour.

We signed up with Julio, who informed us of the weather-related issues. Would you like to go out right now he asked. After a bit of a scramble to get everyone interested assembled, that's what we did.

We piled onto the wee little catamaran and Julio sailed us a couple of klicks north of the resort. We ended up about midway between Cuba and a small island with a lighthouse that we could just make out from the beach.

Physically, this placed us about as far north as we'd been during the whole trip. The Tryp Peninsula resort is very near the absolute northern point of the Varadero peninsula, which is the northern-most of Cuba itself. This makes it a popular spot for Cubans who don't want to be Cuban to make a break for the USA.

garething: What's the deal with the lighthouse on that island out there?
Julio: That's a Cuban naval base. It's where they intercept refugees from.
garething: What happens to them?
Julio: They get taken back to Cuba.
garething: No, I mean are they punished or something?
Julio: You get your name taken down, but other then that, no one get's punished.

We got the impression this meant that there was no overt punishment for trying to escape Cuba, but at the same time, don't go asking the Government for any favours in the future.

Julio stopped the boat, dove down with the anchor and secured us so that the boat wouldnt' drift away. You could still see the bottom, but it was far enough down that I didn't try to dive down to it. Ten meters? Twenty meters? It was on that order.

He had placed us right over a mini reef and we were then set up with goggles and snorkels and just enough instructions not to drown ourselves. Then we checked out the fish!

Julio had brought along a bag of day-old bread from the buffet. The procedure for checking out the fish was simple. Hold a chunk of fish in your hand, stick it in the water and wait for the fish to notice. They would swarm your hand and ripped into the bread like it was fried chicken. Some of the dumber fish would bite the hand that feeds, but would back off when the realized that your skin was many times tougher then soggy bread rolls.

We saw many varieties of colourful fish that none of us could identify. It was a lot of fun and surprisingly exhausting. We were out there for around an hour when I suddenly realized that I was dog-tired. I went back onto the boat and was soon joined by everyone else. We sailed back and I realized i felt a bit nauseous. I figure that my overbite prevented me from getting a decent seal on the snorkle, so I ended up swallowing quite a bit of sea water (in dribs and drabs - I certainly wasn't going to suck back a mouthful of it). It took me the rest of the day to recover from that.

Also discovered that the ladies were checking out Julio. I was not surprised by this revelation - Julio was basically the ideal cross between the stereotypical Latin lover type and a lifeguard.

I am mildly curious to know how much of the 20 CUC each we paid made it back to the hotel. Given there was five of us, I'd be surprised to find that the lifeguards weren't skimming at least a little.

(yeah, this is a little late to post. I've got at least two more Cuba posts to make just to put the whole thing to bed. After a few days, I'll change their effective post dates to more closely match the trip)

Comments

[oblivions.livejournal.com]

I did the scuba diving in Mexico... same idea, signed up through the resort. It was rockin' cool! And I ended up with some cool pics with an underwater camera. See any neat wildlife? Get any pictures?

[jamesq]

I hit "return" in the wrong field and it posted way before I was finished writing - as you can now see, there's a bit more to read now.

No pictures, sadly, because none of us had an underwater camera. It does give me a lame excuse for going back.

Next time I'll take SCUBA lessons prior to the trip so I can check out more.

[oblivions.livejournal.com]

Actually the Scuba lessons were included there, and it's certifiable if you want to continue it here. I was in Puerto Varata, and so the lesson was in the ocean in a little bay across the way then we continued with the dive around the rest of the bay. Very very cool. Got to hold a puffer fish. It's was about 2-3 hours all told.

[jamesq]

My memory is good, but short.