BubblesandBugs.com - Travel and Scuba

Nicaragua…my first time…

…this is Cindi’s 2nd time. We barely made it however….more on this in a bit.

So at the time of last update, we were in Copan Ruinas, Honduras. A beautiful little town with cobblestone streets. We stayed at a small place call Hotel Guest House for 2 nights. It was ok…but we didnt’ have water. Bastards…I know they had water in the sistern…but they were playing games turning it on and off to our room. Not sure when they thought the ideal time for a shower was…but we obviously didn’t agree on this matter. For 16$ a night…you think water would be included.

The Ruins were spectacular. Below are a few pictures. We spent about 4 hours walking around the structures and taking pictures. It was a great first time Ruin experience. Cindi said she appreciated it more the 2nd time around…but maybe only because she had been to 6 or 7 sets of ruins the last time she came to Central America. Mom, I think you would have loved this place.

We tried to find a place to take tortilla making lessons, but failed miserably…so we just decided to get on a bus towards southern Honduras and make a pit stop at the highly recommended Pulaphanzak Waterfalls. We were also told about a cool Hostel/Brewery called D and D. American owned…this place was supposed to serve great Home Brewed beers and offer good tour service. It was ok…I got a cot for 2 nights and Cindi was sleeping on a couch….for 2$ a night. There were no other hostels or hotels anywhere clost. The owner was kinda rude at first…but they said he was relapsing on Dengue fever…guess that could piss anyone off. The food was great…and after the first day the owner offered to show me his collection of handmade honduran guitars and Mayan pottery. He took me into is Marijuana hot boxing room…i could only tell because I couldn’t see him 2 feet away…but he did play slide guitar amazingly. I had to get out of there quickly. The beer was extremely tasty..but after 7 or 8 home brews you should be singing to the birds…we weren’t. I guess it was really weak.

He set up a bird tour for us on Lake Yojoa. It blew. Don’t ever take a bird tour here. Birds are boring enough…without the shitty boat, non-english speaking tour guide, …for 4 hours? Who does that? Maybe this is why he smokes so much pot. Cindi got a good picture of the boat all 5 of us sat in…

So by this time, we are frustrated with the place and these waterfalls better be worth it. Holy Shit they were. I would say this is one of the top 10 things I have ever done in my life…a few slots behind running with the bulls in pamplona. They are about 160 feet tall…and roaring. Looking is an experience in its own. They a young guy on a bike asked us if we wanted to see the cave behind the falls. Only 5$ per person. People…this is by far the best 5$ I have ever spent in my life….It was 30 minutes of crazy, chaotic, scary, insane, and fun. He takes us to the bottom of the falls…only in swimming trunks and strap on sandals…and climbs over a few rocks…then gone. Where is he? Oh just jumped down 20 feet into the falls…and now he is smiling and waiting for us. Oh yeah…for about 30 minutes we made our way through the falls amidst the pounding water, crazy mist in your face (i lost a contact lens), and rocks you can’t see. We then powered our way under the main stream (all while making sure you don’t go over the edge to your death) to a small cave. Cave was lame…but getting there and back was awesome. If you are ever within 3, 6, 9 hours of this place…come…enjoy, you won’t reget it. Here are a few pics:

From the falls, we took 4 cabs, 5 buses, spent some time in Tegicigalpa, and a night in Managua…we are now in Granada, Nicaragua. Crossing the border by bus showed us some beautiful scenery and Hillary Duff in Cinderela story.

And yeah…we almost didn’t make it across the border. They were claiming we overstayed our Honduras Visas…I know we didn’t. The guy at the airport in San Pedro Sula wrote that we had 60 days on our passports and visas…we stayed about 50 days in Honduras. The guys at the Nicaragua border wrote over the 60 days and made it 30 days. And now they are telling us we might be stuck here…and maybe we have to pay more money. After some help from some Miami based americans…we were allowed through the border into Nicaragua. The entire bus had to wait for us for about 30-40 minutes. Hopefully we will be ok when we go to leave Nicaragua…who knows.

Ok…off to explore Granada.

later jason

Moving on….

After a long day of riding the Utila Princess, a cab, and 2 bus transfers - Jason and I have found ourselves in the lovely city of Copan Ruinas, Honduras.  We thought long and hard about going to Roatan for a few days before heading south - but decided to change our pace and discover some of the mainland.  Plus, from what we hear, Roatan is expensive!

Tomorrow we will head to the Copan Ruins - Jason has never seen any ruins, so we are looking forward to it. 

We left behind a lot of great friends; 2 Israelis, a few lovely Brits, and some Irish, Danish, German, Canadian, a Peruvian, Australian, Honduran, and of course American people…..and we hope our paths will cross again.  

We hope to head back to San Pedro Sula Tuesday to visit a National Park with a huge waterfall and by Thursday we’ll head to Granada, Nicuragua where we’ll veg on the beach at Lake Nicuragua and visit the volcanos and just enjoy all the colonial goodness Granada has to offer.  We will then head to a beach town in Nicuragua and then cross to Costa Rica where we are excited to welcome Julia, Travis, and Willits. 

Hasta Luego!

We are Divemasters!

After 4 long, hard (if you call 70 dives in 4 weeks hard) - Jason and I have completed our divemaster training!  That’s right, you can now refer to me as Cindi Davis, DM.  We are down to our last 2 weeks on Utila before heading to Costa Rica to meet up with Julia, Travis, and Willits. 

We have also moved apartments.  Our landlady was going to charge us a ton to rent for 2 weeks instead of monthly, so since our dear friend Kelly departed last night - we have taken over her place.  This place has 2 huge perks - 1:  it’s right across the street from our dive center rather than the 15 minute walk we’ve been doing and 2:  CABLE TV BABY!  Tonight we are taking full advantage of watching TV, getting some Seven Seas takeout and doing nothing.

We completed our snorkel tests - congrats to the new divemasters Rachel, Dan, Helen, Jason and I.  Here are some new pics of Jason pre-test and the group afterwards:

Later!

Back to Good

Last Sunday night we did the craziest, most chaotic dive I’ve ever done. We did a night dive to the Haliburton wreck. It’s a huge ship sunk about 100 feet. We went with all the Utila Dive Centre staff (mostly DMT’s, which are Dive Masters in Training like ourselves) - we left shortly after 6:30 PM and by the time we got to the wreck and underwater it was pitch black. Jason loved this dive - I was a complete wimp and decided at 29 I am still scared of the dark. Glad I did it, but on the next one, I’ll be sitting out.

The next morning Jason and I headed to the dive center. He was feeling pretty crappy and when we got there it just seemed to get worse. I got him a ginger ale and we sat in a hammock for awhile before heading home with no dives. It was only the 2nd day in 3 weeks that we hadn’t dove.

He continued to feel crappy and had a fever - so we sat out Tuesday as well. Then came Wednesday. His eye started hurting, but the fever was gone. Come to find out - 3 of the contacts he brought were ripped (brand new straight from the manufacturer!). So now he is on his last pair of contacts. I think Jason’s mom will try to send a box or so to Julia in hopes she can bring him some to Costa Rica.

Wednesday night he was feeling better - so we went to dinner with some friends. Suddenly after eating I felt completely miserable. I headed to the restroom and puked up everything my stomach had in it. On the way home we stopped for some ice cream thinking that may help - nope, puked that up too. And all the water I drank.

The next morning we had to go diving to complete our last open water course. I drank a sprite before hand and after the first dive, I puked that up too. I couldn’t figure out why I was so sick - and if you have a weak stomach, stop reading here………

Jason went to our locker at UDC and noticed the loaf of bread we had in there had a huge hole in it and there were mice/rat feces all over the locker. I am pretty sure I touched something in there and it somehow made it to my mouth. I know, I know - disgusting! The thought alone still makes me want to hurl - but today I am feeling MUCH better. I had a cup of noodles Thursday night and it stayed down.

Friday was July 4th. We finished our last course and went out our first fun dive in 5 days. That night we went to RJ’s for some BBQ and as we were walking over the bridge to Tropical Sunset - we saw a huge fireworks show from the other side of the island. It definitely made my day. I LOVE the 4th of July! All of the obnoxious Americans sang the Star Spangled Banner and all the Brits rolled their eyes. It was entertaining to say the least.

We completely our Emergency Assistance Plan and our Mapping - so now we just have to complete a lead in the next day or so and we will become official divemasters.

Last night Jason played chef and cooked up a bunch of banana pancakes for dinner - YUM!

Today we finished our Nitrox and Wreck specialities. I returned to the Haliburton in full day light - much more my style.  We got to go inside the wreck using a reel, very cool.

We posted a few pictures on flickr and Jason has completed his first and only Honduras Beer Report. That’s it for now!

Cheers and Hope everyone had a lovely 4th of July!

still busy at Utila Dive Center

i can’t type with cindi watching….so i just kicked her out of the room.

just wanted to give some more updates:

- we found some free internet at our Dive Center…at least until they catch us

- it is still too slow to upload pictures

- we dove twice this morning…saw an spotted eagle ray, 2 turtles, a sea horse, and a huge southern sting ray

- we have the divemaster underwater stress test today at 3.  we have to exchange all of our equipment (every piece) with someone else…all of this while buddy breathing…and the instructors kicking up sand and pulling on our hoses, purging our alternates…etc.  should be fun

- they moved the stress test from 1pm to 3pm so everyone could watch the european soccer championship.  germany vs. spain…they are really into that here…some people cried at the last game - ha

- tonite we have a staff only night dive at the haliburton wreck.  she lies in about 100ft or 30 meters of water.

- cindi and I just signed up for the wreck and nitrox specialty.  only 50$ each!!

- we should have all of our divemaster requirements completed by next friday except for the snorkel test. 

- they “think” they are going to pour a bunch of straight rum down our snorkel while chanting crude american jokes …we will see

- we got skype…username is opdyckej - if you download on your computer, we can call you computer to computer free.

- all of our online security issues are ok…

- 3-4 more weeks in utila…we think we will go to roatan before we leave honduras…then looking forward to costa rica!!

later
jason

A Day in the Life of a DMT

Alarm goes off at 5:45 AM.  Yes, I know my buddies at CC CLT know this is WAY earlier than I’d wake up for anything, however, when your day is filled with diving - somehow I am wide awake.

Put on my swimsuit, grab some water and a granola bar and head to the dive center, which is about a 10 minute walk from our apartment. 

Look at the whiteboard to see which boat we are on (there are 4 at Utila Dive Center) and start working on the roll call and insurance list.  18 people on the boat @ 2 tanks a person (plus 2 spare) which means we need to start hauling 38 tanks from the tank room to the boat at the end of the dock.  Each tank feels like it weighs 100 pounds, but Jason estimates them to be about 30-40 pounds.  (I sure hope my arms and/or back starts looking a little more toned after all of this!) 

Then it’s back to the equipment room - if we are going out as fun divers we just grab our own BCD’s, regulators and weight belts (Jason and I each brought our own mask, fins, snorkel) - but if we are helping out with an Open Water, Advanced, or Rescue Class, we have to get all the students equipment together as well.

Once the students arrive and everyone is accounted for, we have a boat briefing, decide which dive site to go to, and head out.  We do 2 dives in the morning - go back to the dive center, unload the boats, clean equipment, grab something to eat and then it’s time to do it all over again (if we’re lucky). 

Since arriving on Utila, I have logged 36 dives.  Not bad for only 2.5 weeks of diving.  As a Certified Dive Master you have to have 60 logged dives, but I’m hoping to have well over 100 before we leave.  Jason said I have to do my 100th dive in the buff.  We’ll just have to see about that. 

A few evenings a week we have classes.  Physics, physiology, equipment, skills, Recreational Dive Planner (using the table and wheel) - and tests after each class.  So far Jason has passed every test, I have to retake the RDP (damned wheel!). 

By the time class and tests are done - it’s nearly 8 PM.  We head to dinner, which is another event.  Each night of the week on the island only a few restaurants are open, so it’s always a guessing game as to what place is open - and it’s a LOT of walking.  And sweating.  Bug bites.  Blisters. 

But then we make it home around 10, exhausted, we recap what we saw that day - whether it’s a giant turtle (one day we saw 3!), a school of squid, an eel, spotted eagle rays, angel fish, parrot fish, lobster, seahorses, tarpin, porcipine fish, etc.  And suddenly all the negatives disappear. 

We’ve met some fantastic friends - there are about 20 of us in the DMT program.  It’s been great getting to know them all and share travel stories, as well as getting travel advice for what lies ahead.  Places we’ve heard to not miss include Sri Lanka and Borneo, Malaysia.  We can’t wait for our travel plans in the next year, but for now are happy on this little island. 

But on our next leg - we are DEFINITELY bringing a laptop.  My sincere apologies for the lack of emails, posts, and pictures.  Once our DMT program is completed (hopefully by next week) - we will be better at making more internet time.  I have about 500 pictures I’m dying to share with you all. 

For now, it’s back to diving, knowledge reviews, mapping, equipment exchange, rescue assessment, classes……….

online security issues

Hello All -

I wanted to report that I am currently having some online security issues.  I believe that I may have been a victim of phishing (like an idiot)….they even had what appeared to be a valid SSL certificate.

The internet cafes here are pretty sketchy and i think my paypal may have been compromised.

Ihave taken all the neccessary precautions and have reset passwords on ALL of my accounts.  I don’t believe they will take me for anything, but I am remaining very cautious.  In that process,it seems that I may have locked out my gmail account.  Please email me at jasonopdycke[at]dot[com] …or you can email cindi. I will let you all know when my gmail is back online.

For all the travelers out there…be very wary and careful with typing your password.

We have in our possession an IronKey. This thing is very sweet and I highly recommend using one.  Basically you run an instance of Mozilla Firefox directly from the Ironkey flash drive.  This means all your history, cookies, favorites, settings follow you and your drive.  The ironkey also contains a password manager that allows you to pre-populate your usernames and passwords from a trusted computer and when visiting those sites from an untrusted comuputer, the ironkey password manager auto-fills the fields so you can avoid most keylogging.  I am sure there are ways around this…bu definately more secure than typing our password.  All data on the ironkey is encrypted with 256 bit encryption.

On a lighter note…cindi and I are doing fine….she was able to successfully clear her mask and swim maskless underwater.  She was worried about this and I a very proud to say she scored a 4 out of 5.  One step closer o divemasters!!

We also bought our first dive computers…exciting!!

take care all

jason

more from utila

thanks to laura and sabrina for the donations!!!!

we are almost done with the first week of the Divemaster program. We have done 7 dives….deepest around 110 ft. for all the divers…the visibility is amazing. at least 100 ft. finding the boat is easy here. the coral is beautiful everywhere…but the north side of the island has way more life.

Last night our dive center held a bbq….it was a fun time.

So everyone probably wants to know how expensive it is here….here are a few items.

18 Lempira to the Dollar

beer - 25 limp
gallon of water - 25 limp
dinner for 1 - 100 limp
internet - 40 limp/hr
street food for 2 - 60 limp
divemaster class - 750$ per person
apartment 400$ month plus electric.

Ok - upload speed is riduculous…so we only got a few more pics going. You can look at them here.

later jason

Safe and Sound in Utila

First things first - we want to say a very special THANK YOU to Mary Beth Melton for the donation!! You are the best girl - we REALLY appreciate your love and support!

We finally made it to Utila after a long flight to Atlanta, then San Pedro Sula - we immediately hopped on a bus (1st class, the A/C was a must until we adjust!) to La Ceiba and spent the night there. Yesterday morning we caught the 9:30 ferry to Utila and arrived! Our dive instructor was waiting for us at the pier - we easily found our apartment and started our divemaster course at Utila Dive Center.

The name for our website bubbles and bugs is perfect as I’ve already gotten about 400 sandfly and mosquito bites and we logged our first 2 dives this morning! It’s extremely humid, something I thought I’d gotten used to living in the south the past 3.5 years, but the south has NOTHING on Utila! I guess Jason will just have to deal with looking at me sweat constantly for the next year - how sexy!

I came to this island first in 2003, fell in love with it and dreamed of returning. It’s very small, tons of backpackers, and everyone comes here to dive. I am a little nervous about the Divemaster course - has anyone else out there taken it before? Tomorrow is our skills review - and I am paranoid about removing my mask, but I guess I will have to buck up and put on my best poker face.

We’ve made some friends already and Jason tried his first Salva Vida. His first beer report will come in the next week or so. The island has progressed a lot since I arrived, the internet used to be over $5/hour and now it’s just over $2/hour - however, prices on everything else have seemed to go up. If you are interested, I kept a blog on my first trip to Utila here http://islandindigo.blogspot.com/2003/04/ill-take-you-there-imagine-yourself-on.html.

We managed to upload a few pics on this slow computer - we’ll take more later. Enjoy!

More on our picture page here….http://bubblesandbugs.com/pictures/