I'm back...finally

So I'm back. The last year has flown by and I can't believe it has been that long since I have sat down and wrote anything. Basically sometime in April of last year my laptop stopped working while I was in Bonaire and I didn't get it fixed until late in the year when I had returned to California. Starting just after my last post I did a divemaster internship in Bonaire that culminated in early June when I became a diving instructor. Right after that I visited home for two weeks, returned to Bonaire and started teaching diving. What a life it was. Good friends, good diving, and ok beer. I feel like I could write a book about all the crazy times and experiences just from that little rock. I was forced to leave in early October due to the fact that I had become an illegal immigrant. Really. I had overstayed my visa and because I had not formally obtained a work permit I needed to return to California. It sucked to leave because I had made so many good friends and was really enjoying diving there but no worries, I will return someday.

So after I came home late last year, I started looking around at different options. While I was idling I was able to stay with my sister and her family and spent some amazing time with my loved ones. It was great to live with my nieces for a while and get to see them everyday and tuck them into bed. I really needed that time. I'm very lucky to have such a great family. So late in January I contacted a dive shop in Catalina and after catching the ferry over from Long Beach I was able to get a job teaching for the summer season and staying on the diveboat. It worked out perfect and I couldn't wait to get over here. Then a week later I met an amazing woman and spent two really great months getting to know her. We both knew from the start that I was coming here but she was totally supportive and I couldn't ask for a better partner. So the day finally came when I had to say goodbye to my family and friends and head south again, back to sea.

I've been on the island now for going on 3 weeks and it has already been one adventure after another. We left onboard the Prowler, a 44 foot sportfisher out of Marina Del Rey that belongs to one of my Dad's buddies. It's an awesome boat and I am grateful to Leon for giving me a lift over here. I was able to bring my spearfishing kayak and my dinghy over so that was killer. I moved onto the diveboat and the next day my girl arrived. The plan was to spend my first week on the island together with her, doing some camping and hiking and getting used to diving here. She braved 60 degree water with me for a week and completed her Open Water course so now I have a hot blonde for a dive buddy. Sweet huh? Of course, our week finally had to end and she had to go back to the mainland but we had a great time. Since she took off I have immersed myself in trying to learn the new boat I'm on and all the ins and outs at the dive shop. I have managed to get a little work in but the island is still slow. I'm ready for it to pick up. In my spare time I have been cruising around to different dive spots and doing fun dives on my own. I'm trying to toughen myself up to the water temp. I grew up freediving here but I have become a spoiled sissy from diving in 80 degrees for the past couple of years. It's getting easier though. The white seabass are showing up so we have the spears out and as soon as this weather we have passes on, it will be early morning hunting for the croakers. Last weekend we had a few full days of technical diving off the boat which was super cool. We did deep dives on Ship Rock on Friday and then Saturday we were off to a secret set of GPS numbers where a squid fishing trawler sank about 4 years ago. It's 165 feet so it's not really that deep but it was a great dive. I did it twice on Saturday using a single tank and was able to get the helm out of the wheelhouse. It's a great dive and I'm looking forward to being able to explore it properly with a bunch of bottles so we can have lots of bottom time.

The day before yesterday was incredible. Early in the afternoon I was going to head into town and I walked out on deck to get into my dinghy and found that I had a surprise guest. A sea lion pup had pulled itself up on the skiff and was enjoying a nice nap in the sunshine. It was just snoring away. I popped a few pics of the little dude. When I got into the boat he barked at me but stayed in for a little while as I headed towards town. He finally jumped off and I had to laugh. What a trip. But then later in the afternoon, I decided to make a dive before sunset so I zipped around to the east and dropped into the water. As soon as I descended a pair of dolphins rocketed right past me. It was truly awesome. I have snorkeled with dolphins before but I had never seen them while on scuba. Less than a minute into the dive and it was already bad ass. Then during my cruising around I found two sailboat wrecks. One in 60 feet and one in 30 feet that is really eerie looking because all the running rigging is floating around it and kelp is growing around the entire hull. I peered through one of the holes in the hull and found a bunch of lobsters hiding in there so you can bet that when lobster season rolls around, I will be diving there again. After an hour I surfaced and climbed back on board my dinghy. This crazy looking dude came up in a really shitty old skiff and introduced himself as "Skooter". He was just staring at me and smoking a cigarette. I asked if he was alright and he asked me "how do you like my dog?" I looked to where he was pointing and in his lap was a freaking sea lion pup. He was petting it like a dog. It was nuts. He said he woke up in his boat and the thing was inside. It had climbed up the rear and into his cabin. So the kook was taking it back into town to see if the Harbor Patrol guys would take it. As he pulled away, the thing dove off his boat and swam to mine and jumped aboard. He literally climbed over my dive gear and onto my lap. It was nuzzling me and staring at me with big brown eyes. I couldn't believe it. We got it back onto his boat and the thing did it again. After offloading it a second time, Skooter sped off towards town. I was talking in town with some people and it seems that maybe a couple of pups have been left behind or lost from their family and are freaking out here in the harbor. We'll see what happens with that.

So for now that's it. I will start posting as things happen. I have a couple of dive boat trips this weekend so I will try and get some pics up from that. I'm waiting for the nice weather to return so I can do some hiking into the interior of the island. Right this moment, we are getting hammered with gale force winds and it's cold. Sucks. Come on sunshine.