Didn't I tell you, I'm training for the Olympics?

So remember that time I told you that people wanted to swim to Klein Bonaire?  Well, I did with seven other students and it was the most amazing adventure, ever.  Just for some background info, Klein is off the coast of Bonaire and it is about a half mile away from Kralendijk, the city we live in. 

Usually I wouldn't write two blog posts in one day (that's a little excessive, I know), but I will make an exception for this adventure.  So, we grabbed all of our gear (wetsuits, snorkels, masks, fins) and went down to the dock where we do all of our diving and swimming and whatnot.  One of the guys at Yellow Sub was making us feel all doubtful about the swim, saying that if he needed to come rescue any of us we'd owe him a case of beer, each.  Anyway, his words of discouragement did not deter us, however, and we set out.  It was quite the swim, but it wasn't so bad.  If I didn't have all of my gear, I'd have so much more trouble.  Took us about 35 minutes to make it there.  When we were approaching the island, the water was getting really shallow but tons of corals were everywhere!  It was really different from our usual site at Yellow Sub.  As we dodged the fire corals and long, waving gorgonians (thing of fluffy, huggable sea fans and feather dusters), we got to land!  Land ho!

The island is another desert like Bonaire, made from ancient coral reefs, and had tons of pretty and large shells along the coast.  While we were making our way to the beach that was in the distance, several of us saw a woman snorkeling who looked like she was in distress.  We went into rescue-mode and went in the water to try and help her.  When we got to her, she said she was fine and was only signalling to some people on the boat nearby.  That was frustrating because we had just finished a long swim and had then physically exerted ourselves thinking we were going to have to save this woman's life. 

Aside from that excitement, more excitement followed!  When we made it to the beach, we hit the water for a nice snorkel.  Let me tell you, it was the most incredible snorkel because we saw so many hawksbill sea turtles (and tons of other cool things, but nothing compared)!!!  I am absolutely in love with them.  I was smiling and making my typical excited high-pitched "Eeeekkkk!!!" sound the entire time.  It's actually quite difficult to smile with a mask on because you get water in your mask and it's just bad news.  I have to work on that.  The cutest thing was when one of the turtles made its way to the surface, popped its little head out of the water for air, and then went back down.  They are so graceful and peaceful.  Several were just chillin under some corals and, of course, we frightened them so they came out from hiding to glide away.  Two of us followed (I guess you could also say, chased) one turtle into the shallows and were following it about.  At one point, we had kind of cornered it so when I turned to my left, there it was, about three feet from me!  AAHHHHH!!!  So adorable!

When it was getting late, we decided to head back to the "mainland" because we didn't want to get caught swimming in the dark, what with boats and scary sea monsters.  Heading back was a little more difficult than getting there (getting tired, ya know), but we all made it back, safe and sound.  When we got back to shore, we were a little ways from where we first started (we did that on purpose because it was actually a shorter distance to shore that way than the first way we went).  We then just snorkeled up the shoreline to Yellow Sub.  We saw some cool palometa swimming about and a huge school of caesar grunts chillin' under a dock. 

So yup, coolest, most spontaneous, amazing afternoon ever.  I'm pretty sure I killed my shoulder swimming (hard core) and I still have readings to do for class tomorrow, but it was totally worth it.

Anyway, tis time to hit the books (it's not all fun and games around here, ya know).

Yours truly,
Catalina

P.S. I totally felt like a mermaid today, too.  Schools of fish were surrounding me and I swear they liked me.

Bonaire.  That lil' island to the left was today's swimming destination, no big deal.  This picture can also give you a perspective of where we live, it's basically the area in front of where you see Klein Bonaire.

Klein Bonaire.  We swam from about the very right of this picture to that little stretch of light-blue-ish in front of Klein.  Yeah, we're hard-core.  Looks a lot farther from this angle than it felt.  Yikes.