Diving Day One (yay). A few about the country that I will mention. Sunset comes at about 6:15, give or take. Sunrise starts about 5:30 am. Costa Rica is actually on CST with no DST, so Austin is one hour ahead. So of course I left the curtains open, and Nancy and I both woke up at 5:30. Nancy actually GETS UP then. I got up at least 3 times during the night, my usual trip non-sleeping experience. We just hung out until the restaurant opened at 7 am so we could obtain our free meal that we paid for. It was pretty yummy with fresh fruit (papaya is DISGUSTING, stay with the dried kind), the pineapple was sweet, juicy and I could eat all I wanted because it didn't give me heartburn! Yum. And of course watermelon and sometimes cantaloupe. The buffet also included an assortment of 6 hot dishes of scrambled eggs, beans and rice, potatoes, quesadillas, fried plantains, french toast, pancakes, a couple types of sausages and bacon plus pastries, cereal and juices. There is also eggs and two skillets ready for your request. Breakfast with not be complete without cafe con leche (heated, of course). Mmmm.

We headed down to the beach to catch the 8:30 am dive boat. I went with plenty of waterproof sunblock as I was still peeling from tubing the Guadalupe (which COMPLETELY flooded and tore down houses while I was here). I had my dive skin and also rented a wet suit, as the water temperature was in the 70's, and I freeze in the 80's. Our first dive was at Key Largo and my group was with Sylvia from Spain. The other group went with Lorenzo, aka Lencho. I saw my first real sea horse, a pregnant male. That just made the trip right there. Also saw an octopus, a stingray, plenty of puffer fish and scorpion fish, and of course morays, morays, morays, green, spotted and striped. Mean looking little fellas. Also saw a jelly fish as I was ascending.

I lost my group on the second dive when I stopped to look at a pretty star fish. I looked up and saw fins, and followed them, and realized fairly quickly it wasn't my group. Everyone thought I was Keri, which took me a while to realize as I thought she was at the front of the group, which turned out to be Nancy when I finally saw the long braids. Uh oh! Deb even checked my air for me. :) So I just hung out knowing that I would find my group and Sylvia's pink fins again. Meanwhile, everyone is passing around a starfish and Warren tried to hand it to me, and I figured it was dead. Why else would they be touching the marine life? I wouldn't take it, so Warren just put it back down. This was also the trip where the other group saw a shark (Keri didn't care for that), and their dive master likes to pet the octopus, and everyone else got to as well. Hmmm. :( I found my group again, and that's when Chris left our group and then he went with the other group. Again, lots of morays, a stingray, and puffers, puffers everywhere. On the ride back in, we had the discussion on orcas, as Warren had seen one on a night dive on his previous visit ~7 years ago.

We returned to the beach about 1 pm, and hoofed it back up the hill to the hotel, showered and changed. Nancy and I met back up with James, Penne, Chris and Lance, and we walked back down to the beach for lunch at the Pescado Loco (Crazy Fish). I treated myself to a coke and casado con carne. "Casado" is a "marriage" of beans and rice. It was quite tasty, especially with the homemade tortilla. We went to the dive shop so Lance and I could pay for rental equipment. It is a beautiful house that is their temporary dive shop until their new one is built. They had a shop at the bottom of the hill on our trek to and from the beach, but the hotel kicked them out and made it into a little snack store. We hung out with one of their daughters, their dog and their cats. We made our way back to the hotel vai the beach. Chris and Lance stopped back at the Hotel Velero, ordered uno cerveza and made themselves at home on the hammocks. The rest of us made our way back to the hotel. My room was on the third floor on the west wing, and in the center is a sitting area with cushion couches. There I planted myself with my book for several hours until the sun set. I think the others were napping... Nancy and Penne joined me for the sunset, then we made our way down to the beach for dinner (I was hungry again!). We found Chris and Lance still at the hammocks, and Keri, Warren and James had joined them. Nancy and Penne wanted to try something different for dinner, so I walked down with them to the Aqua Sports restaraunt, surveyed the menu and made my way back to the drinkers. :) Upon my arrival, I obtained cerveza orders, made my way to the bar, said hello to the others who had sat down to dinner, and ordered our cerveza of choice, which was Imperial. No mas. What? Chris and Lance, with a little help from James, Keri and Warren, had depleted their stock of Imperial. So I ordered Pilsen, and brought it back to the group. The depletion made their day, and Chris and Lance called their trip a success. :) We stayed there and discussed the trip so far, and eventually made our way (less Chris who stayed on the hammock) to the restaurant area for dinner again at Hotel Velero. This time I had the chicken parmesan, and was it tasty! We got our bill and Lance was first to look. So the quiz of the day was "guess how many beers we ordered, price is right rule". I did some quick calculations guessing it was in the 30's, but with the price is right rule, I said 29. On the nose! 29.

Back to the hotel; James and I walked, and the lazy-bones took the shuttle. :)