Hail all,

Category: Travel.

Staying here for a bit.

Absolutely loving it here. Honduras and the Bay Islands have much to offer. And there's no way I can just leave here just yet. So I'm extending my stay, for an extra few months. If they offer me a job, I'll stay even longer. But I won't be in Australia for a while yet.

My best to you all.

Cheers,

Saga.

Hail all,

Category: Nature (been a while between this category and the last one, right?)

So, there I am, at CJ's Drop Off. One of my favourite Dive Sites. I'm 66 feet down, looking into the bright blue. CJ's Drop Off has a massive drop off, over 1000 feet deep of blue as bright and colourful as the sky late in the day. It's a great site, one of my favourites. It's part of Turtle Harbour too, and it's an excellent site for spotting the elusive Whale Shark, one I still haven't seen since I've arrived. I keep trying though.

Anyway, I'm leading a small group of Advanced Divers and I think about descending a little more, but I've decided to keep it here. At this height there's a few good chimneys and we may see some lobster. I keep looking into the blue, hoping to see some Marlin or Sharks, but seeing nothing except open water.

We turn a corner, and there's a turtle. Sitting there happily, not a care in the world. No more than 5 metres from us. I call to the other team and make the symbol for turtle, and we all keep watching. Suddenly, the turtle (it's a Hawksbill, about 70 years old, give or take) moves slightly, and takes a wide arcing turn away and then faces us all. I'm floating there, watching it, like everyone else, and then suddenly, the turtle heads straight at us.

I'm still floating, watching it, and then it just stops short of me, about a metre or so. I am so tempted to reach out and touch it, but I don't, stay buoyant and just watch it. It seemed the turtle than made up it's mind or something, headed straight towards me and bumped into my mask. I was shocked.

The turtle kissed me. While they aren't normally shy creatures (many of them have swum around me, near me or are non-chalant when I'm diving), they have never actually come to contact with me. I was in awe.

Rates up there with the best thing I've ever experienced underwater.

Cheers all,

Saga.

Hail all,

Category: Travel.

Finally here in Utila! It's gorgeous here, not as nice as Ambergris Caye, but still rather beautiful. The guys here assure me that only doing my Rescue Diver and Emergency First Response certification would be a mistake, that I should also go for my DiveMaster certification. I've decided to do that. So of course, I'm diving heaps. Got a bunch of books and things to review, and it barely feels like a vacation at the moment - more like an education. Still, it's giving me something to do because to be honest, there isn't much to do here other than dive. At least Ambergris Caye was larger too.

I know I sound down about the place, I'm not - it's great, but Utila is absolutely tiny, and I'm not even staying on that. I'm on Jewel Cay, a tiny cay about 5 kilometres further west and it is really tiny. But it is gorgeous. So I'll be staying here for a good few weeks, so you won't find any Hail, from ... blog posts in a while. But I'll update on how I'm going with my diving. Becoming a DiveMaster is a dream come true - never expected it a year ago, and within a month I could be supervising dives on my own. The mind boggles.

Gotta run though, more study awaits!

Cheers,

Saga.