After way too long without being able to scuba dive, we jumped right back underwater as soon as we were back on island! We were able to do several dives over the few weeks we were on island, all with the great team at
Octopus Diving :) We did the family discover dives I posted about in the previous post, we did some exploration dives, and some wreck dives. I also was able to get Nitrox Certified!
By far the best moment on any dive (ever, not just this trip) was 5 minutes into the first dive at the Fuh Sheng wreck, a dolphin showed up!!! It did some circles around our group, played around a bit, left and then came back again for me to get the perfect picture with it!! I tried so many times to see a dolphin on a dive when we lived on island, going whenever dolphins had been spotted frequently, even once people on the boat saw them but we didn't underwater. So it was such a highlight to see a dolphin 5 minutes in on the first dive back at our island home!
That same dive, between dolphin appearances, a black tip reef shark came to check us out. On the Porpoise wreck, we saw tons of huge lobsters, barracuda, a sting ray, a turtle, lion fish, puffer fish, and trunk fish. On the exploration dives, also our first drift dives, there were so many corals and fans, a couple of swim throughs, lobsters, schools of fish, and we saw a few cuttlefish! Owen enjoyed the exploration dives the most.
It was great to be back underwater, one of my favorite places to be :) I miss living on a tropical island, being able to scuba dive with friends whenever we want. Thanks Chris and Sally for always providing a great dive experience! Wish we were on island still! As always, I've included a few pictures and posted more at
SXM Diving. Enjoy!
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| Favorite diving moment/picture ever! |
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| Black Tip Reef Shark |
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| Owen with the shark in the back |
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| Pufferfish |
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| Stingray |
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| Trunk Fish |
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| Hawksbill Sea Turtle |
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| Barracuda |
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| Flamingo Tongue Snail |
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| Lion Fish |
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| So many lobsters hiding out together |
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| Cuttlefish |
After our truly wonderful trip to St Maarten for graduation, we headed
back to Connecticut for a couple of weeks to wrap up everything before
moving to Baton Rouge, Louisiana. We had a little graduation/going away
cookout with our family, neighbors, and friends in Connecticut who were
not able to come to St Maarten. We spent a little time at the lake house
and even water skied in the cold water one last time. Hung out with
friends and family. And for the first time in 5 years, packed up all our
stuff to actually bring with us! It was a bittersweet, whirlwind of a
time. We are thankful to have had the spring in Connecticut and time to
really spend with family and friends there, before leaving again. Here
are some pictures from the last bit of our time living in Connecticut
(before and after St Maarten).
