honeymoon: part four

we went snorkeling!

todd had been talking about going snorkeling for as long as i can remember. i told him a long time ago that if we ever got married, i would go with him. i hoped he would forget i said that. no such luck.

on thursday, the captain of the snorkeling catamaran picked us up from our hotel and took us to the marina, where we boarded the "traveller" and headed for icacos island. the guide said the reefs around this island would be a good introduction to snorkeling, and practice for what was coming next.


the water at the first reef was probably only 12-15 feet deep, and (amazingly) it wasn't too traumatizing for me to swim along the outer edge of the reef with open ocean to one side. i actually had a lot of fun! the water was incredibly salty, so floating around the top of the reef was almost effortless. none of the fish came near me, and they were all relatively small. (that helped.)


the second reef we went to was off of a private island, lobos. the water was so deep, probably 20 feet or deeper... and i actually got in it, even after seeing a 2.5-foot long barracuda (ew) swimming right by the boat! i didn't like being in such deep water (and kept gagging on the seawater), so i didn't stay out for long at the second reef. i went back to the boat and worried about todd being eaten by six-foot spotted eagle rays.

for those who do not believe that i would ever voluntarily enter the fish-infested water of a lake, let alone the ocean, i now present the evidence of my having actually snorkeled:

{ heisman! }

and this awesome shot is brought to you by the flotation device strapped around my waist. i was trying to stay submerged long enough to take a picture, but the floaty kept pulling me right back up:

todd really wanted to see a ray or a dolphin, the guide said her snorkelers had seen both in the past week, but none were around that day. i must say, i wasn't too upset about that. i probably would have mistaken a dolphin for a shark (and panicked). and rays would only be slightly less traumatizing than sharks.


we didn't see any large marine life, but we did see a variety of fish. the most common fish seemed to be the blue flat ones-- hundreds of little dorys (from "finding nemo"). todd even saw an eel!


his favorite trick was to "play dead" by floating motionless at the water's surface for several minutes so the fish would come suck at his fingers and eat bread out of his hand. this was not my favorite trick.


when the boat pulled back into the harbor, we saw dozens of iguanas sunning themselves on the barriers. i was happy to be off the boat and out of the sun, but also proud of myself for doing something that scared me.