Location: Sommer's Beach, Tortola
Today was a great day for sleep. We didn’t have to wake up until around 7:45. After everyone woke up, Andrew, Alicia, Rooks, Rhiannon, Mireille, and I decided to go for a morning swim. While we were swimming, Niko and Scott started breakfast. We had some amazing coffee cake and scrambled eggs! After finishing breakfast, everyone relaxed on the motor over to Sommer’s Bay. When we arrived, everyone set up their gear for the navigation dive. Rhiannon, Mireille, and I were worried we wouldn’t make it down for the dive, but luckily, we all got down and completed the dive. Lucas and Simon discovered a “new” species of sea robin with a green pattern on its back. We had a bit of time to relax after the dive while Scott and Niko cooked up some cheddar broccoli soup which was outstanding. After another great meal, we did a surface exercise. In this exercise, we did egresses.
Specifically, we focused on the lifeguard exit. For this, we had to lift the unconscious diver’s hands up onto the swim platform on the back. Then while holding their hands on the platform, you had to get up on it and pull the unconscious diver up onto the platform. This was a fun practice, and we all had a great time during this. When all the practice was done, we had some free time. Alicia, Andrew, Rooks, Rhiannon, and Mireille continued swimming during this break, and everyone else got out for a bit. A little while later, it started pouring down rain, and Rhiannon, Mireille, Andrew, Rooks, Trey, Shay, Lucas, Alicia, Simon, and I decided to go swimming in the rain. This turned into a freshwater shower time using the rain. While the rain was coming down and purple rain was playing in the background, we saw a couple of dolphins swimming between our boat and Good Times. They kept surfacing, and everybody freaked out. After drying off from the rain and swimming, it was time to get ready for the barbecue. Unfortunately, we were not able to use our dingy, so we needed up being one of the last boats to shore and had a bit of a line to wait for food. The options for food were hotdogs and burgers with potato salad, pasta salad, and beans. It was a great night. A lot of the boats came together and played some football and catch. Then right at the end of the barbecue, we all started doing some of the shore carries that we learned about earlier that day. Everyone was a fireman carrying each other and running around. We were driven back to the boat, where we did our squeeze, and I wrote this blog. Overall a really good day with lots of excitement and fun.