To be completley honest, Utila took a few days to grow on me. Something about how insanly packed this place can be was kinda a turn off for me at first. But after adjusting to the energy i'm really starting to love it here.
The island is a major backpacker's location. The word on the street is that Roatan (the the next island over, quite a bit larger) is the "resorty" island, and backpackers all come here. Its filled with 20 somethings and a few thirty somethings, who mostly have heard that this is the place (its good and cheap) to learn to dive, and they come here.
The place where i'm diving, Utila Dive Center almost feels like being at camp. I'm learning a bunch (i just finished my advanced diver course an hour ago!) and diving a ton. People are really friendly and they make a real effort to create community there. I've gone on nine dives in the last 4 days! I've made some friends that i really like, and already am saying goodbye to people who i care about (Dean and Alex, good luck and safe travels!).
The food on the island, although not particularly fancy, has been pretty good. I've had a couple of really good meals actually (Disco Dave's has consistently good food and good music for about $5 a plate). Most of the decent looking restaurants are some sort of euro-bbq-caribean hybrid. Its good. There are a few bakeries on the island, and a slice of banana bread or a cinnamon roll make a great breakfast before a couple of dives.
Two of the dives we did today were really interesting. Our first today was a deep dive with a wreck at the bottom. We bottomed out at 100ft or so, and checked out this old cargo ship the Haliburton that was sunk in 1998 as a dive site. Its now commonly used by all the dive schools to teach wreck diving, as its a great ship for that (lots of big open spaces, not dangerous or scary). We saw a grouper that must have been about 5 feel long hiding in the wheel room of the ship. It was a huge fish! 100 ft is the deepest i've ever been (until completing my advanced diver training, i was only certified to dive to 18m/60ft).
Tonight we went on the first night dive i've ever done. We all take underwater flashlights and spares and dive in the dark. Its really quite an exileration, and cool experience. A lot of the sea animals wont show their faces till after dark, and tonight we saw a couple of small rays (about 7 inches head to tail, so low risk of heart peircing...), a cool sea enenemy, and lobster among others. My advanced class only had one other student in it Dean, and i really enjoyed diving with him, and our instuctor Caitlin.
I've been incredibly busy with the diving. Its taking the advanced course has taken almost all my time the last two days. Today i was at the dive center at 9:30 am, and excluding a one and a half hour dinner break, didn't leave till 8 pm!
Anyway, i've been invited to dinner and feel as though i'm mostly done here for now anyway. More to come. I miss you all!
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