If there ever was a day made for a camera, today was it. And for the record, as if there needs to be one, pictures
were taken to both such events—though sadly neither camera caught any of it. Argh!
However, the always dependable Kathy was able to capture a few interesting things
with her camera. Thank goodness for
Kathy. She woke this morning to find another
interesting scene--she's developed quite a knack for daybreak developments. This morning it was a guy driving a truck up to
the beachfront--the beachfront that reportedly was riddled with explosives. He stopped and parked and she claimed he took
our photo. So she decided to take one
of him:
Not too long later, on another stretch of the same beach,
two more trucks pulled up and this time let out a dozen or so workers:
A surprising and unexpected place to use a weed-whacker. Just glad they've all got safety helmets on, that should keep them safe don't you think?
Sometime after that another truck pulls up at a totally different spot and two guys get out of the car and get to work with this machine:
These guys seemed a bit smarter. They're obviously scouting the beach for things that go boom but if you look close they're not wearing safety hats. The guy in front is wearing a floppy shade hat. I think he realized the only thing a hat is gonna protect him from in this situation here is the sun.
The boys went for a morning snorkel. Mark had a little fish friend that decided to
imprint on him and follow him the entire forty minutes I watched him out
snorkeling. His little buddy was fairly
loyal up until the point where I got in the water and it decided to imprint on
Keith then later me. It hung out with us
for quite some time.
That's his little buddy right there in all his blurry splendor at the bottom center of this photo:
A ray:
I snorkeled out to the point with Keith so I could see for myself if there really were any bombs in the water. Mark and Connor followed in the dingy. Along the way the water began to get really shallow and murky--two things I hate. I feel like shark bait in water like that. I just always feels creepy and a surefire way to get misidentified as food.
As we swam further, the water began to clear. Luckily Keith brought his trusty ol' underwater camera because sure enough he was able to find and point out several white bombs resting on the ocean floor. They were a good size too. About five feet in length. The problem was, they were all in shallow water. I had assumed that the day before, when Keith had spotted these things, that they were in deeper waters. It was a bit intimidating to discover they were just under the surface in only in 3 to 4 feet of water. It you weren't careful you could accidentally knock one with your fin. Or perhaps with your dingy prop if you're Mark and surveying in the comfort of your little boat.
Keith took lots of pictures of them, and Connor and I even dared to hover in a tad close for a photo op so one could get a good idea just how big they were. But we risked life and limb for naught. When we got back to the boat the only photos on his camera were of the great ocean spaghetti feed. This was one time there would be no re-takes thankyouverymuch.
So much for a back-up photographer. Looks like Kathy and I are the only ones to be trusted with a camera.
After that hair-raising experience we weighed anchor and headed for the other side of the island. Our dingy was running on fumes and we were in need of gas.
On the way we hit some pretty good rollers and except for Captain Keith who was behind the helm, the rest of us amused ourselves out on the trampoline:
The trampoline by no means is a bouncy toy like the one in your backyard. It's just a lattice like material stretched across the bow of the boat to let water in and out. It makes a fine place for a nap or a thrilling splash zone during high seas. But as you can tell, the swells were good enough that we were able to get some air off them.
It was a nice day for sailing:
En route Mark decided that he'd precariously climb in the dingy and unlock the the gas tank so we could take it in to shore and fill it up with gas. It didn't take long for him to discover the lock had been soaking in salt water for most of its life and it didn't really matter if you had a key, it was not going to open.
Mark found some WD40, every man's friend, and set to work trying to force the rusty old thing to give way. He spent an hour in the dingy, swaying back and forth as if it was a hammock, working on it. Keith by no means eased off the speed and took this as a great opportunity to speed up the boat to add more drama to the situation.
But our hero prevailed:
We set our anchor and hoped the little dingy had enough gas left to get us to shore.
The boys carried in the gas tank and called for a cab to take them to the nearest gas station which was clear over on the other side of the island. It cost about $25 for the taxi to get $20 of gas.
While we waited for the cab to pick them up we all went over to a little beach front cafe called Bananas. We'd eaten there during our Christmas trip back in 2007. Peter, Cassandra, Mirjam, Chey, and Mitch were all there and we kept thinking about how fun that trip was with them. I took this photo to remind them of the place:
I wish I still had those pictures on my lap top cause it would have been fun to post the pic we took years ago of the older kids posing in this hokey Bananas cutout.
Finally the taxi showed up and took the boys:
Kathy, Chloe, Connor, and I waited at the cafe while they took the cab across the island. It was hard to wait in the shade and music of that cafe sipping on chocolate shakes and fruit drinks. Later Connor and I walked the beach though it was getting awfully hot and Kathy and Chloe found some great shopping.
With the boys back, the dingy full of fuel, we headed back out to find Mosquito Bay.
The area just outside the bay was beautiful. The boys found these cool caves to explore and snorkeled over to them.
Connor found another perfect beach in which to body surf:
We were all really excited to be back at Mosquito Bay.
One of our favorite spots on Vieques is this Bay. Although it doesn’t sound that appealing when you type its name on a blog post, you'll have to trust me. In my opinion, the poor bay just got a bad
name. Someone should have named it “glowing bay” or “really cool sparkly bay” but nope,
“Mosquito Bay” is the name. What
it is, is a bay boasting one of the highest concentrations of bioluminescent
dinoflagellates. Yes
DINO-FLAGELLATES—just a stinky way of saying glowing water plankton.
We ate another great meal cooked by Kathy and waited for dusk. Once it came Keith and Kathy got in the kayaks and the Skillmans headed for the dingy and we all paddled our way into the bay. It was just as amazing as we remembered. I even brought my camera. But in a devilish turn of events that can only be attributed to bad karma for making fun of Keith's earlier photographic blunder, none of my photos or videos turned out. It seems those little plankton are camera shy.
Yep, no pictures once again.
It's really too bad because its just so hard to describe how spectacular this little bay becomes at night. Every swath of the paddle leaves brilliant green streaks as if a giant glow stick had been poured into the water. Fishes big and small, and widespread schools of them all create glowing green flashes in the water.
We discovered that the inside of the bay didn't seem as concentrated as it was right at our anchorage so we paddled back to the boat and played with the water from home. Keith and Kathy stayed out in their kayaks and Kath followed a jellyfish around the boat.
When you splashed the water and it would sparkle like green pixie dust and then slowly fade away. Connor and I jumped in and waved our arms and legs making glow angels as if it were camping out on green snow. I didn't tell Connor until he was back to the safety of the boat that earlier in the year a girl had been nibbled by a shark while swimming in the same bay. Swimming in the stuff was well worth the chance...and I figured we'd see a giant green streak heading for us before we were actually bit. All I'd have to do is get out of the water faster than Connor!
Another amazing day! And most sadly not a cool picture to show for any of it. You'll have to come to Veiques and check it out yourself.
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