It’s evening and as we walk across the yard to dinner the ground is moving. We have to watch were we step. Hermit crabs. Hundreds of them. I’ve seen some before, but not this many. They come in a variety of sizes. Miniature ¼” ones up to about 3” across. From starter homes to mansion shell houses. The ground ebbs and flows like the water. In my pocket is a flashlight because the return trip is in the dark and we don’t want to harm any of these tiny little fellows.
We arrive back in the room from our 3rd dive today and in a couple of hours we will run the hermit crab gauntlet again.
The first dive day at any resort is practice day. Practice for all the divers that have not been in the water for a number of months and observation day for the dive masters to see if any of the new group of divers may need special attention. Today, our second day, we went farther afield. Our first time on the north side of the island. It looks like we should be able to dive around the entire island in a week. That is something we have only done on a liveaboard.
Coral Banded Shrimp
Three dives and we’re tired again. Utila is a worthwhile place to come diving. The reef is in good shape and the terrain is spectacular. There aren’t as many fish here as other places we have been but the fish are diverse. Have picked up on a few different animals – hog fish, decorator crab, flamingo tongue that we have not seen recently.
Utila 's Underwater Terrain
Our entire group dives together. Not our usual style. Debbie and I try to pick dive operators that cater to a maximum of 8 divers in a group, we are 12, but the divers in our group are proficient so there is turmoil.
Elkhorn Coral
Today P,K,S, Debbie and I get split off from the rest. We are all experienced and with a little bit of analysis we know which way to the boat. We find a plume of rising bubbles in the distance and we know our prey is close at hand.
The new camera with the strobe attachment is something that requires a whole lot of learning. Day one is pretty much a write off for pictures. Day two is only slightly better. Hopefully by tomorrow we should have a few more things figured out and we can get more reliable shots.
Supper again is gourmet quality and I think we are going to put on weight here. Oh well, such is our lot in life and we shall have to accept it.
We cross the moving earth twice more and again manage to navigate our way without inflicting any harm to our shell covered friends.