Buceo

The main purpose of this blog is to try to get some pictures posted on my blog. Because the security / crime situation here, I'm wary of taking my camera with me when I travel around for fear of someone putting a gun in my face and taking it. As such, I haven't taken as many pictures as I would like. Nonetheless, this past weekend I completed my scuba certification course. A group of six drove about an hour and a half North-West of Caracas to a small beach area with some marine life. The weather was perfect and once out of the city, the drive was spectacular. For about a half hour, we drove through mountains high above the coast line with a spectacular view of the Caribbean. The roads went from paved to dirt, to paved with no lane marking, to one side of the road paved and the other not, to the entire road being covered in re-bar for a paved road that will eventually be built. Fortunately we went in a colleague's four wheel drive truck.

The road out of Caracas can be perilous at time, and is unadvisable to

take after dark. The slums of the city flank the outskirts of the city, with makeshift box homes stacked on top of eachother, climbing all the way up the sides of steep mountains. They have no running water or sewer and most everything just drains right back down the mountains. These are the hotbeds of Chavistas, (those who keep Chavez in power), but also the epicenters of crime in Caracas, which is now the number two most dangerous city in the Western Hemisphere, after Juarez. At night, crooks hijack motorists on the highways, robbing, kidnapping, or just shaking downs anybody they can stop. During the day though, we just make sure the

doors to car are locked, windows up, and we don't stop for anybody.

The dive spot was a small inlet along the coast. There is a small fishing village that has sprung up there that is invaded by local beach goers on the weekends (and the occasional foreign diplomat). Along the beach, there are a number of shacks and a few shells of buildings that are rented out daily to people wanted a party spot for their day at the beach. One of the hovels is a dive shop that is fairly rudimentary, but provides all of the dive necessities. As you walk in to the mostly open air building, there are showers lining one wall and benches lining the other. Further, there is a small office with rental equipment. We got wet-suits, vests, regulators, weights, and air tanks, then suited up. The cost to rent everything was about $30, so pretty decent. Over two weekends there, we did four dives, doing drills each dive. The first dive we went down the 40 feet, then practiced filling our masks up with water and clearing them, pretending to run out of air and grabbing the emergency regulator off of a partner diver, sharing air with a single regulator, and making emergency ascents, by swimming directly up to the surface all while exhaling to ensure that our lungs don't explode. The second dive, we

went down to 60 feet, where we practiced throwing our regulators away then finding them and taking our masks all the way off and then replacing them. Moreover, we swam to an underwater grave marker for a scuba diver who perished there about 5 years ago. I think the instructors intentionally didn't tell us about this until our second dive, just to ensure that no one would be terrified to go under the water. On the third and fourth dives, we practiced taking all of our gear off and replacing it while on the surface of the water, as well as did underwater drills with a wrist compass, swimming under water following certain coordinates to meet up the a waiting instructor.

In the meantime, between the drills we got to see the aquatic life. We saw a lobster, squid, eels, blowfish, coral, cow-fish, puffer fish, and myriad other rainbow color fish. It was exciting to be able to experience a completely different world. I've been snorkeling before, but that only gives a small taste of what its like to be up close with the sea life.

After the dives, we got cleaned up and drove to a local fish restaurant right on the water. While the food was good, a little mental preparation was needed before digging in. See below...

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