Days 50 and 51:
November 20th and 21st
Máncora, Peru
Stayed at Palosanto Hostel

Dear Obiwan,
Well the next two days your Mama was very sick and in bed. The only photos I took were of these cute hostel pets!

On Wednesday (November 21st) I started to feel better…but now Margaux started to feel sick. I really hope I didn’t give what I had to her. We concluded we contracted our illness from our 15 bus ride to Cuenca, especially since the windows were up and there was no air for many hours.

On Wednesday I finally was able to get out of bed! I walked across the street to the only dive center in Máncora, Spondylous, and got information about the certification! The diver at reception was from Venezuela and was so nice and helpful. I then paid and planned to start my 3 day course tomorrow!

After this I grabbed some take out pizza for me and Margaux. We ate and went to bed early.

Day 52: Thursday, November 22nd
Stayed at Palosanto Hostel

Obi the day has finally come, my first day of my diving course! I was feeling about 90% which felt like a super hero compared to how I felt 2 days ago. Margaux on the other hand was feeling worse and worse. She planned to go to a clinic today and assured me she could do it on her own.

I headed to Spondylous and had to watch hours of videos. After a few hours of pretttty boring videos (but important!) I was off for my first day in the pool!

Here was some of my lunch today, fried cheese and a Coke while looking out at the street, very pleased!:

After lunch I met my dive instructor, his name was Juan. He seemed around my age, maybe younger? He had longish blonde hair and was from Chile. He was friendly and very excited!

I also met another woman, July, who was at first just going to do her first Discovery Dive tomorrow, but in addition decided to get her Open Water certificate with me!

However, I think it is because I have already dived TWICE now, but she had a lot of trouble in the pool. She would come out of the water and kept saying she couldn’t do it (the few tests we had to do). Eventually with Juan and all of us cheering her on, she did the tests!

The pool tests are: 1st you need to be able to handle your goggles filling up with water. And there are 3 ways you need to do it.

1) You need to fill your goggles up half way so you can still kinda see. Then you need to empty your goggles by tilting your head back, then firmly push the mask where it lays in between your eyes, and strongly blowing with your nose until all the water empties out from the bottom

2) You need to fill your goggles up ALL THE WAY with water, then open your eyes under water and empty your goggles by lifting up the bottom of the mask and strongly blowing all the water out with your nose

3) You need to REMOVE YOUR MASK COMPLETELY, open your eyes, put it back on, and clear the water out whichever of the 2 ways you just learned

Obiwan Kenobi, the first two tests I could do after a few tries. But the third test was SO HARD for me at first. It is completely counterintuitive at first because you are breathing the whole time underwater with your regulator. This is one of the hardest things I found to get used to. I realized through the pool training that I still breathe through my nose while under water, but with the mask on, you’re just sniffing the rubber and tightening the mask or doing nothing.

BUT with the test I quickly discovered that I needed to train myself to ONLY breathe with my mouth. And it took me are least 15-20 minutes to do this! I would be under water, looking at Juan and he motions me to move my mask. I then remove the mask and the moment I would breathe I would inhale through my NOSE AND INHALE TONS OF POOL WATER. Then it would go back to my throat and therefore be in my regulator now and then I would FREAK OUT and jump up and rip my regulator out and breathe air and cough out the water.

Juan was so patient! He also was direct and explained how important this was to master and he really emphasizsd that I had to STOP getting out of the water. That I needed to figure it out UNDER WATER because in reality the surface won’t be that close AND YOU CAN’T just swim up quickly, you need to decompress before going to the surface!

After lots of water in my nose and throat, I did it Obi! I finally trained my self to stop breathing through my nose but MORE IMPORTANTLY to STAY CALM and NOT freak out!

The last 2 tests in the pool were:
1) Bouyancy test, where you play with your BPD vest, which is your vest full of air. You go under water and have to make it so you are perfectly floating right above the bottom of the pool- IT’S INCREDIBLE

2) You need to practice taking your regulator out, and you must always have bubbles coming out (exhaling), then put it back in and clear the water from the regulator. It wasn’t hard!

After this I went back to the hostel to see Margaux, who was doing a little better! She said she went to the clinic and they were gonna charge her a bunch of money so she left. But after the day she was doing better!

Here is a photo of our awesome hostel workers (yes, one is a dog, he owned that chair!):

We then went out and had Italian food for dinner, it was delicious!

What a great day Obi!

Well off to bed,
Goodnight my lamb,

Love tu Madre,
Carly