Abi's Deep Dive

Thursday I had arrived, went for food then had an early night and a deep sleep. Friday morning I woke early and went for breakfast at a fabulous cafe I found last year, A dirty golden latte and breakfast burrito restored me! I had a quick swim, then work and my move into my new accommodation began.

In the office there are five staff. Ellie the Dive Coordinator, Kayla is Science Coordinator, Maria is in charge of the Turtle Project, Miguel: El Jefe (the boss) and Me!! We also have Divemaster interns who can stay on as Project Officers. At the moment we have Owen who is from the UK and is working through the DM qualification, and Aislinn from South Africa who is now qualified, so helps the dive team and is amazing at showing me the ropes when I get stuck! Owen and Aislinn live in the participants house so can keep an eye on what’s going on, and help participants to settle in when they first arrive. I live with Kayla, Maria and Ellie in a house that is not far from the participants house, and is within a gated community.

I have so much to learn! Day to day someone always has to be on base incase of emergencies, staff also take it in turns to be on call for 24hours 7 days a week. We organize food on base delivered by a local restaurant, pick up boat fuel every morning, organize transport for all participants, run an under 18 program and of course do all the paperwork for participants, the base, the diving and the partnership work that we do. Monday to Friday we arrive at base at 7.45am and leave at about 7pm. We have newbies arriving every other weekend and we pick them all up from a meeting place on Saturday mornings then spend the day doing all of the risk assessments, swim tests, paperwork, base tour and then take them to their house to meet the others; on this day we work 8am-6pm. After Friday and Saturday with Miguel getting up to speed, (he was also not feeling great so it was hard work for him too) my brain was so full of information! I spent Saturday evening cleaning my bedroom, getting rid of cockroach poo, and taking my things out of bags. Sunday I cleaned the bathroom and then headed to the beach in the early afternoon for a few hours. Friday evenings and Sundays seem to be when all the locals head to the beach. They set up camps with tables, gazebos, cool boxes, speakers, bbqs, cases of beer and lots of people. Children swim and play, often greeting me as I walk past with a smile and Hola! The children are so beautiful with their bright swimsuits, tanned skin, dark brown hair and mainly very dark brown eyes, they giggle and splash the family members who join them in the sea, or throw a ball with abandon apologizing when it hits you or flicks sand up near you. It is all noise and colour, laughter and dancing. The sea is turquoise and the sky so blue. It has been about 35 degrees most days and the humidity is high making it feel much hotter. A group of traditional Mexican dancers walk along the beach stopping at intervals and performing with drums and music, it looks like a war dance, they must be so hot in the feathered costumes they wear, but I love seeing it against the backdrop of modern life.

A quick food and margarita stop, I picked up a bit of shopping then headed back to the house in a taxi which costs 60 pesos. The local bus the collective is very regular and only costs 10 pesos, but as its about 23 pesos to the pound its worth the air conditioned luxury of an instant ride home!

Monday my alarm went off at 6.15, Miguel was sick so wouldn’t be in, Kayla was also ill so went back to bed, and Owen had to have surgery on an in grown toenail so was out for the week. My first week and I would be managing base! Ellie, and Maria know the ropes, but we were all a bit thrown as someone has to stay in base, and two people need to be diving each of three dives a day to make sure that the participants are completing courses and doing all of the monitoring that we have to do. In the absence of Kayla who is an instructor and Miguel who is a DM I took on extra bits on land to try and help Ellie with managing all the dives with Aislinn and Maria, who is also a Divemaster, leading participants.

Kayla was ill all week, Miguel came back for a half day on Thursday, and we had managed pretty well! All taxi pick ups and airport collections had been organized, we had fed everyone, and completed as many dives as possible with Maria also doing her turtle night shifts (10pm-4.30am). Miguel and I took the U18’s out for their turtle experience to see green turtles nesting, and Maria and I responded to a call from our partners CONANP to go and rescue some newly hatched turtles found on a beach (separate blog posts). By the end of Saturday with the new intake we were all exhausted, but my first week was in the bag.

Estoy muy feliz!!