But Andrew’s energy is infectious. I can already feel my nerves loosening a bit. ‘This is gonna be fun,’ I agree.
Once Miguel is ready, I walk up to the break in the railing where we’re supposed to take a giant step in. I hear Derek behind me walking Natalie through his camera set-up for the second time.
‘Always keep your eyes on me,’ Miguel instructs, ‘and remember what I taught you.’ He goes through the hand signals. ‘A fist over the head means OK. Use your fingers to communicate your PSI number so we know how much air you have left. And enter the water feet first, none of those flopping in backwards, head-first entries unless the water is completely calm.’
I nod and make the OK sign with my hand. Like I would try to backflip into the water with an oxygen tank strapped to my back. Feet first is good. Feet first is comfortable.
But as soon as I think it, I feel a twinge in my gut. Feet first is comfortable, but I don’t know if comfortable is what I want anymore. Maybe, I think, by the end of the trip I’ll have learned the head-first entry, the one with the backflip.
‘One hand on your mask, another on your regulator,’ Miguel instructs, interrupting my thoughts. ‘Now take a big step, feet first.’
I do as instructed and lift my foot, which is burdened by a massive flipper, up and off the edge of the boat. Slowly and all at once, I step into the water.
Boom. Water rushes into my ears and around my face. I breathe into my regulator, and even though I shouldn’t be, I’m surprised when it works, supplying oxygen even when I’m face down in the water. My BCD is inflated, so I pop right up to the surface and swim away from the side of the boat. I give Miguel the OK sign by bopping my head with my fist. Hugh and Vanessa are bobbing up and down a couple of feet away from me.
‘You good?’ he asks, his tone more perfunctory than caring. His regulator is out of his mouth, so I take mine out to respond.
‘Yep.’ I take a deep breath and plunge my face into the water. It’s mild, only a little cold, and crystal clear. I can see all the way to the sandy bottom. I can’t contain my excitement. I pop my head back up, grinning. Being in the water is ten times better than being confined to the boat. I take a minute to let my eyes skim over the top of the ocean, really letting it sink in that there is no one in sight, it is just our small group floating in the largest reef ecosystem in the world.
Hugh is beaming too. For the first time since I met him, he seems fully consumed by a true emotion. He’s not pivoting from sarcastic to sincere or from helpful to asinine, instead he’s full of pure joy.
It takes a minute for everyone else to jump in. Derek is last because he had to make sure his camera was set up correctly, and by the time he’s in, we’re all antsy to descend. We grab a mooring line, which stretches from a nearby buoy all the way down to the bottom of the ocean and deflate our BCDs. Slowly, we sink from the surface to the ocean floor, popping our ears along the way. We move hand over hand down the mooring line, and with each foot we descend, the ocean seems to get quieter. The only sound I can hear is my own breathing in my regulator. I’m in heaven.
Everyone takes their time adjusting their buoyancy. I have to inflate my BCD a little to counteract the weight belt, and soon I’m hovering about two feet off the ground. I kick my fins back and forth to keep myself steady. Andrew has a hard time figuring out his buoyancy and keeps floating up too fast, which prompts Vanessa to point at him and jerk her thumb downwards in a ‘get down here now’ manner. Andrew proceeds to sink and float like a yo-yo. I fight off laughter at Andrew’s blissful ignorance that Vanessa is extremely frustrated.
Thankfully, he seems to find the humour in his own difficulty, at one point throwing his hands over his head in a surrender gesture. Once Andrew is closer to the bottom, we start kicking towards the reef. Vanessa leads the way, and I stay near the back of the pack with Miguel. I’m grateful our swim towards the reef is gradual because I’m already so overwhelmed, I feel like I could cry.
The bottom of the ocean is pristine white sand littered with sea cucumbers. They look like giant slugs, but the closer I look, the more I realise they’re kind of pretty. Some have horns all over their sides, some are purple, some are green and some are spotted. We can see the reef looming in the distance. It’s massive. I’ve only scuba-dived in Florida and the scale of this reef compared to the Florida Keys is blowing my mind. It reaches from the ocean floor almost to the top of the water. It must be thirty feet high. I’m in awe.
When we reach it, we swim around the wall slowly. There’s coral everywhere. Mushroom, staghorn, bottlebrush and brain. Some of the staghorn coral is a brilliant, electric blue. I’m so overwhelmed by it that I pause to stare, and Miguel has to nudge me to keep up with the group. Vanessa shows everyone a type of coral that retracts its bright purple petals when she claps her hands in front of it. It looks like a magical underwater show made just for us, and I’m thrilled.
There are bright yellow, pale pink and neon shades of green. It feels like every surface is a different type of coral. My brain can’t make sense of the amount of texture it’s trying to take in – some corals are soft and spongy, some are spiked, some have sprouted circular orbs that dangle on the edge of what looks like tentacles. There are shelves of coral that look like interlocking spiderwebs. There are forests of coral whose branches look like dozens of trees. There are rolling fields of coral that look like swaying sea grass.
We swim over a giant clam that’s as long as my body. It’s cracked open, and I can see the water slowly pumping in and out of its purple membrane. We pass an anemone, and two orange-striped clownfish guard it. Miguel sticks his finger towards the anemone and one of the fish swims at Miguel with what looks like anger. I giggle, releasing bubbles that float up towards the surface.
We continue swimming in a giant circle. Derek is looking at everything through his camera, which I feel must take away from the experience. I see Hugh give Derek a couple of looks and wonder if he’s thinking the same thing. Andrew and Pippa are excitedly pointing things out to one another, their hands flailing in all directions as they take everything in.
We stop at another giant wall, comprised of all different types of corals, and everyone seems to find something different to focus on. For the first time, I force myself to look at the fishandthe coral. I am overwhelmed in the best way. I can’t remember the last time I felt like this.
I pull out my camera and look for the butterfly wrasse, which frequent staghorn coral. I try to stay as motionless as possible, and I watch as fish dart around me. There are tiny butterfly fish that have yellow stripes down their backs and flit around so gracefully it seems like they are dancing. There are angelfish, swishing their broad dark blue bodies, cardinal fish and cod. I see my personal favourite – the humbug damselfish – which is black and white striped, half-heart shaped, and ridiculously cute. Plus, who doesn’t love a fish named humbug?
I don’t spot any butterfly wrasse. They’re distinguishable from other types of wrasse because of an extra fin they have on their underbelly, which helps levitate them just off the coral, so that they can feed off the coral’s mucus. They are purple, with a yellow stripe down their back. And Millie said they are small and fast. I try not to get in my head about not seeing one. After all, it’s only the first dive. And they might not even exist.
I manoeuvre myself in a circle to check out what the other divers are looking at, and as I turn around, I bump into Hugh. He has been hovering right behind me. He recovers his balance faster than I do. I make a mental note to tell him that he needs to stop getting in my way.
I move my hands in front of me frantically like I’m a bad synchronised swimmer until I regain my balance. If he was trailing me to spy on my diving quality, I’m not doing a good job of proving that I’m the marine biologist I say I am. I’m glad he can’t see me blush. Despite the chill in the water, I feel heat radiate through my body.
I swim by Miguel’s side as we slowly turn around, heading back towards the boat. On our way, we interrupt a school of blue tang surgeonfish (better known as Dory inFinding Nemo). They flash their fins in a vivid cloud of bright blue and yellow. I notice that Hugh’s regulator isn’t spouting bubbles anymore and I wonder if he’s holding his breath too. There is an incredible magic to the ocean. I’m not ready for this dive to be over. It seems like everyone feels the same way because we’re swimming back slowly, drinking in every coral we pass and every flutter of fin that passes us.
I don’t see a butterfly wrasse, but the dive doesn’t feel like a loss. I’m proud of myself for how many fish species I recognised and how much I remembered about the different types of coral. Maybe everyone will believe I’m a marine biologist after all. Maybe Millie was right, this will be more fun than India. I grab onto the mooring line and deflate my jacket in preparation for the slow ascent. The last thing I want to do is leave the water.
Chapter 9
Eight dives to go
We pop up above the surface. Everyone is grinning from ear to ear.
‘Wow,’ we all say to each other and to ourselves. ‘That was incredible.’
