Location: Cane Garden Bay, Tortola
Womp womp womp womp womp womp . This is dubstep. For those who are not familiar with the enticing and creative sounds of artists such as Subtroincs, Skrillex, or Hedex, I recommend that you yourself bless your early mornings with some of their music; the same music we enjoyed this morning and woke up to aboard Grateful. After a much later wake up than yesterday, the group enjoyed a simple yet effective cereal and oatmeal breakfast before an early morning tank run by Josh, Player, Anzie, and Stick in order to go grab some tanks before a skill and search and recovery dive, where students were tasked with demonstrating neutral buoyancy, tank trap recovery, and buddy breathing. It was a really fun dive that ended with a group session of taking off our fins and playing around a little before our ascent. After the dive, we figured it would be best to get our last and final swim test out of the way. This test was an 800m swim with fins, mask, and snorkel. I’m quite happy to report that all of us got perfect scores and made the best times for the swim test. Sedona and Kai were able to come in first and second place; they were some speed DEMONS!!!! After that, the group had some chilling time before Kai and Anzie cooked us a wonderful quesadilla lunch. After lunch, Claire, Kai, Jake, Player, and Sally went for a “moon dive” with the staff, which consisted of deliberately overweighting yourself in a sandy area so you could take off your fins and jump around (as if you were on the moon) and play around. They had a great time doing backflips, leapfrogs, tank bull riding, and enjoying the reef. While this took place below the surface, Sedona, David, Josh, Lizzie, Anzie, and Daisy took some time to relax, recover, and get a head start on studying for the Final DM exam.
Once the whole group was backed together, we got ready for a quick and fun sail over to Cane Garden Bay. Player Anzie and Sally headed our sailing efforts while Claire, Lizzie, and Kai enjoyed a nice recovery snooze on the way over. An intense game of “spit” (card game) took place simultaneously between Josh, Sedona, and Daisy while Kai and David were nearby chatting about life. We refueled at Cane Garden Bay and picked up a mooring ball that is in earshot of a fun little festival going on at the beach, which has provided us with good vibes and good music for the last few hours! Dinner tonight was Red Thai Curry Chicken, prepared beautifully by Kai and Anzie, and Josh’s squeeze question asked each person about a role model they have in life. Tonight will be a big study and review night for our upcoming exams, and we will likely make sure everyone is feeling good about the physics and math portion of the test. The boat continues to get closer every day, and we feel more together as one unit. The combination of good company, pretty sunsets, and an unexplored underwater world continues to make each day more exciting than the last.