Location: The Bight, Norman Island
Hello everyone, it’s Henry, the skipper for today. It is hard to believe that it is already day 19 and that we will all be on our way home in just two days. It feels like we just got on the boat for the first time yesterday. Today, we woke up with fruit all over our boat following the pranks that occurred during the night while mega rafting with five other boats. However, we weren’t the only boat that was pranked as others had cereal and milk all over the cockpit, and one had Gatorade powder sprinkled everywhere, which the skippers were not a huge fan of. Almost everyone was tired following the late night, talking with the other shippies on the rafting boats, so we had a relaxed sail to Road Town, which was helmed by Riley and Cahan. We arrived at around 1030 and had a few hours on shore to get food and stock up on supplies for the final few days. Aria and Charly bought a very large pack of Oreos that everyone was eager to eat.
We then headed to a dive site called Santa Monica, which is popular for its nice reef and wide variety of wildlife. It was quite difficult to set up our dive kits, however, as the waves were quite big and the boat was rocking back and forth. My dive group included Matt, Brie, Hanna, Charly, and Lily and was led by Gordon. Before the dive, we were briefed that sharks were spotted here in previous dives, so everyone eagerly kept their eyes peeled to hopefully spot the first shark of this session. We started the dive and descended to around 80 feet and were amazed by the variety of coral and fish. As we swam around, Gordon signaled that there was a shark ahead! A nurse shark was sleeping under a rock which everyone was so excited to see. We thought this was the highlight of the dive until we turned around and saw a massive reef shark slowly swimming around the reef. Lily was especially excited to see it, given the fact that we could all hear her scream into her regulator when she spotted it. After surfacing, Avery and Alanna, who were in the other group, said that they had seen a spotted eagle ray, which made our whole group very jealous. After the dive, we sailed to the Bight, where we were staying the night. After some quick showers, the staff left for a meeting, and they gave us our phones for our third and final phone time before leaving.
Friends and family were called, and many TikToks were filmed. Kellen and Riley made Cheddar Broccoli pasta, and we ended dinner with my squeeze question: “What was everyone’s favorite memory from the trip?”. Answers ranged from people slipping off dinghies and night dives but it was nice to reminisce on the fun memories experienced together. We finished with dishy pit with music blasting and people dancing. Tonight is perhaps one of the most emotional times of the trip other than leaving day, as we are writing notecards to all the students and staff for them to read once they have left AQ. Although a sad moment to think about leaving your friends who are so close, reading them brings so much happiness and good memories, which makes it one of my favorite parts of the program. Today was perhaps one of the most enjoyable days yet and definitely one of, if not my favorite dive because of the shark sighting. We have our final dive tomorrow morning. Sending love back home to Mama, Papa, and Ollie. Peace out!!