whats going on...

Hello to all!!!!

so sorry that this took so long to put up but i got to it!! and its kinda long... good reading. :]

I am so sorry that it has taken me such a long time to give an update. So for those who don't know the first 2 weeks that we were down here we started our SCUBA diving classes. Our instructor Andy is a great teacher as well as his jr. instructor. we all hit it off really well and from what i have heard the last dive teacher they had down here wasn't all that great. not a real people person. so i am glad we got a good teach. everyone learned really quickly and got quite used to being under water. and i must say that i miss it greatly. some of the things we did out in the big ol' blue is...
dove to 45ft, 60, 70-80 ft. and 100ft. now as scary as 100ft sounds it really felt the same as 45 ft. and in my opinion less interesting. when you dive that deep you can only stay at depth for a short amount of time. no more the 13 min i think is the time limit before you run the risk of decompression sickness aka the bends. when you are under water at any depth 30ft and lower nitrogen enters your blood from the pressure around you. when you ascend you need to ascend slowly to give the nitrogen a chance to exit the blood stream so it doesn't form bubbles. if you don't ascend slowly that is when you run the risk of getting the bends. any way. the reason we went so deep was to see the tongue of the ocean. kinda like the dropoff point in Finding Nemo. the ocean floor just drops to 6000ft. crazyness. we weren't allowed to go that close. :( unlike the first group. they got right up to it. i wanted to look out over the edge and see the blackness. i could just hear Dory singing just keep swimming just keep swimming what do we do we ssswwwiiiimmm!!!! lol. i like 45ft-70ft dives. you can stay down a bit longer and see more life at that depth. although i couldn't really tell a difference. the water was so clear that no matter what depth we were at we could just look up and see the surface. yes even at 100 ft! lets see animals we saw... a couple nurse sharks, a morea eel (you know the ones that Ursala has in the Little Mermaid) lots of star fish, sea urchins, lots of fish that i don't know the name of, sting rays, crabs, barracudas! those always scare me cause they eat Nemos family! but i got used to them and actually started to swim to one instead of away. so he swam from me! yeah! umm lets see what else...we went on a night dive which was AWESOME!!!!!!!! oh my goodness nights dives are the best!! i didn't see anything interesting just being under at night was just awesome. although we dropped right into a swarm of jelly fish and we all got stung up really bad. but once we got past 5 ft it was all good. we got in a circle at one point and turned off our lights and there were so many sea pearls!! they are really pretty. they look like a strand of glowing pearls! i can't really remember what else there was that i have seen. needless to say diving is amazing! being in a world that we weren't meant to see was a little foreboding but the majesticness of it all just pushed all other thoughts out of my mind. God is sooooooooooo AWESOME!!!!! its a whole nother world down there.
now that is over although we can go on dives we must pay $25 and have a dive master with us. luckily there are a few down here so hopefully we can get a few dives in before we have to leave. any way we have started and finished a bonefishing class. we learned how to fly cast which was fun and hopefully i can find someone back home to take me fishing now that i know how!
we are half way through our marine ecology class/geology class(grades will be for the same class) for ecology we have lecture for about an hour maybe two then we go and snorkel to look for some of the things we are studying. today(sat) we got to dissect a squid which was awesome because it reminded me of 5th grade when we dissected squids in class!! for geology we took a field trip to a cay(pronounced key) called pigeon cay and walked around that. we got to go into a blow hole if we wanted and of course i jumped at the opportunity. it was awesome cause you could walk out into the water. so you go into a hole on the cay and walk out to the actual ocean. granted you were already up to you knees in h2o when getting in the hole. but fun all the same. something interesting about the cay is even though it is on a fault line the line isn't making it move closer to Andros Island. it is the breaking down of sediment on the windward(side the wind blows on) and that sediment gets moved to the leeward(side wind doesn't beat upon). thus making it move closer to the main land. its crazy cool!!
those are the classes that we are in right now. oh and we are starting wind surfing very soon.we were suppose to start today but the weather wasn't cooperating. :(
kayaking...we took a little excursion to an oceanic blue hole. now blue holes are normally inland. they are a huge hole filled in with fresh water at the surface...a hundred feet or less below it turns to salt water. the hole is created when the ground above fell in to the miles of unexplored cave system under Andros. that is why the bottom is salt water because the caves lead to the ocean so ocean water occupies the deepest part of the hole. now a blue hole in the ocean is where fresh water is shot up and is quite cooler then the ocean water. it kind of shimmers as the two types of water come together. humm oh it is like the heat rising up from the road on a hott summer day. that kind of shimmer. but it was really interesting to see the hole and dive down(only 6-8ft) and see all the fish and invertebrates. oh i like to make the invertebrates go back into their cases like in the Little Mermaid when Ariel swims past the little guys on the rocks and they all pull back into their protection. so we are all back in our boats and getting ready to leave. most of the group is around the cay and heading back to Andros i am sweep(i being up the rear) so im waiting for the last person to get set and go. when the instructer kayak bob comes around the bend and says hey check this out. i look over to my friend Shay and see a couple fins come out of the water. DOLPHINS!!!!!! I yelled it. they were so close to Shay that he could touch them with his paddle. they were swimming away and i asked kayak bob if we could chase after them said of course so i turned my boat around and we took off after them. they slowed down a little and we were able, only after a very fast sprint, to get with in 8 ft. of them. it was amazing. they are such graceful magnificent animals. if i had just stayed in the water for 10 more min. i would have been able to swim with them. i never thought that i would be so close to wild dolphins. there were some the other day but i didn't see them and i asked God to let me see them. i had no clue that He was just waiting for a more opportune moment for me to have my dolphin experience. although my favorite marine animal is still the Killer Whale. it was truly amazing. after that sprint though i was so tired and we still had to paddle back to Forfar (the field station that we are staying at)
well that is about it oh today for marine ecology we went back to the blue hole and there were sting rays chilling under the sand so all you could see were their eyes and tail. well today there was only one as yesterday there were at least 7. but today this ray got real agitated. i wasn't swimming to it i was just swimming by but a lot of people were looking and taking pics. so when i was going by at least 6 ft away from it to be respectful it started to move. i figured it was just going to swim away but it started to come towards me. so i started using my hands to back me up instead of my fins. i figured that big purple fins waving at the ray wasn't the smartest idea. so i got over the blue hole and the ray kinda turned away from me. i followed to watch it at at least 7 ft between us. this other kid, Drew came over and was watching it with me. its tail was twitching and his fins were all twitchy and agitated looking. finally it found a new spot and settled under the sand again. it was scary awesome.
now i sit here after sat. night taco night and i will probably go watch a movie. a lot of people are going out tonight but im not in the mood. i normally end up playing babysitter since i don't drink much. at one bar he gives a free shot for when we all get there called fire in the hole. apparently it is suppose to burn as it goes down. i had it for the first and last time last weekend and it didn't burn at all. hum but im not a fan of alcohol. i prefer bottled h2o since the h2o here is kinda stale and not cold. i tell you what nothing is like a nice cold bottle of h2o. :] as most of you know me i luve to get drunk on WATER!!!! hehe.

toodles