Day 36 - Barracuda Sunday

Finally, we go to one of my absolute favorite sites - Barracuda, in the North (usually, we go to the South of the island). I love this location because of the ripping current. Obviously, I love strong drifts only when you can fly with them, not fight against them. I have been asking to go to Barracuda since Day 1 of this trip, but for some reason it has only worked out after 5 weeks of me being here. Oh well, better late than never. Plus, the second dive is Eagle Ray City. I'm happy.

The beginning of the day was a little annoying. We had to wait for one guy at the pier for ONE hour. Seriously? It looks like he had a fight with his wife, as when they finally showed up, her eyes were all red and puffed, and although she was smiling while waving her husband good-bye, you could almost cut with the knife the negative energy she exuded. Both tourists and staff at Aldora are really accommodating, and nobody minds that you are so late, after all we are on "Mexican time" here. But I was annoyed because the guy didn't even say "sorry". Anyway, after this unfortunate incident off we go.

There are only guys on the boat. It is always hit or miss, as the high testosterone level produces two polar results: either everybody is super accommodating and nice to you, chatting you up, joking, helping you carry your dry bag to the shore, or nobody is paying any attention to you at all (kind of rude) and involved in their "male" discussion of spear fishing or hunting or grandiose business projects. Luckily, the former scenario is more common. Today is a lucky day.

Usually, only "experienced" divers are taken to Barracuda, because of the current. Sometimes, newbies also get to go though. That happened to me in summer. I was diving with the same group for several days, and one of those days they decided to go to Barracuda and, naturally, included me since we were diving together. The invitation made me really nervous - I knew that Barracuda is for divers who know very well what they are doing. And it was only my 20th dive! My first reaction was to say "no". My main concern was air consumption. I wasn't very good with it back then, and I always worried that the whole group would have to surface earlier than they could have because of me running out of air. My secondary concern was my descending. In the current, you have to descend very fast not to get separated from the group, and my descent technique was not very well polished yet either. However, upon some anxious reflection, I decided, "Well, we have been diving together for a few days, they know how I dive, so if they invite me, that means they are sure I can do it". So I went. In the morning, I felt really good and confident about the whole thing. A little nervous about descending, but not excessively. I was very happy about my attitude. The boat was filled with fun people, and we laughed our butts off on the way to the dive site. My descent went amazingly well - it took me only a minute to go down to 80 feet, together with the whole group. I said proudly to myself, "See, you can totally do it without any issues!" And then... totally out of the blue, a delayed reaction - I started an almost full-blown panic attack. I couldn't breathe and started hyperventilating. I didn't think I could handle the dive at all. I wanted to surface. In order to do that, I needed to tell the dive master - Liang - that I was going back. I started looking for Liang in the group, but in my panicking state I couldn't figure out who was who, everything was so blurry, and I still couldn't breathe... After I realized that my surfacing plan failed, I told to myself, "OK, since you cannot find the dive master now, let's go to Plan B - STOP THE PANIC! Breathe properly, nothing is fucked, everything is good, you are still with the group, and if anything goes wrong, they will surely help you." And an amazing thing happend - I actually talked myself out of my panic! Of course, I breathed half of my tank within the first 5 minutes of the dive, so the rest of the time I was trying to sip as little air as humanly possible. But after 40 minutes, I still had to share air with the dive master. Upon re-surfacing, I told Liang I was sorry about having to share air with her, and explained that I breathed all mine out because of the panicky state I was in. They were all really surprised, because apparently they were checking on me all the time, and noted to themselves how calm and relaxed I was... The human power to naturally hide things so well will never stop to amaze me. I was absolutely dying inside and wanting to jump out of my skin in my panic during the first several minutes of the dive, but what I projected to the outside world is the calm and peace. Unbelievable.

I never regret NOT turning down new things (even if I'm frightened beyond belief): they are only scary until they are not. Today was my 120th dive, and I found the current not strong enough, although all the guys were saying it was ripping:). I came up with 1,000 psi after 60 minutes. It's all about allowing yourself to do things.

The bonus dive was Eagle Ray City and this time - 16 (!!!!!!!) eagle rays together! A magnificent site!