Recent Highlights

          So a few days ago I went on my second dive at Aggressor. It was super pretty and we saw a really cool yellow ray. The dive follows a slopping area covered in corals. I had a little trouble popping my left ear on the way down son that was a little annoying, but overall it was a great dive.

yellow ray

            Yesterday, we all made our second trip to East End Village. I felt like the hike there was easier this time but the hills are still unnecessarily steep. Once we arrived at the village we decide to wait at a little beach for the school teacher to arrive. Unfortunately Sandra fell out of a tree and scraped up her knee. Lauren was to the rescue though with some band aids so it all worked out. 

cool sign at the resort

Trees near East End Village

             Later that day while snorkeling I saw a chain moray eel which was pretty scary. I had gone down to check an anemone and as I was looking around I saw it's head poking out of a hole right beside my face. It looked kind of angry so I chose to quickly swim away. I also saw the usual assortment of fish and octopuses, which are always a pleasure.

Octopus we found on a snorkel

                The really cool moment of the day occurred that night when everyone was sitting out on the dock stargazing. Ben noticed some flashing light in the water and upon further investigation we discovered that the dock was surrounded by squid flashing at each other. If you watched closely you could see the females flash first followed by the males. It was amazing to watch.

Blog post 2: Electric Boogaloo

A lot has happened on the first week on the island, but I’ll try to summarize: Ben almost died, we met nadine (pictures will follow), I went snorkeling a lot (and took a lot of pictures, Ben almost died), the others went on an…interesting hike to the fishing village and back (Ben almost died there), we’ve had three lectures, Ben almost died, I started my PADI open diver certification (3 confined dives and 2 open dives down so far), Ben almost died, we had smores, Ben almost died, we went on a night snorkel (I got stung by a jellyfish on my lips and ankle), Ben got sick, we watched Jaws 3 (it was awful), and Ben almost died. It’s really nice here, like tropical paradise level, even with internet limited to the bar and no AC. Snakes, scorpions, crabs, and the like abound, along with the more verminous bugs like mosquitos and sand flies. Overall, I like it here.

Note: Ben almost died three more times than mentioned in the above summary (I think)

Another note: The above summary may or may not be in chronological order or comprehensive, due to the author’s awful memory

Another Another note: I’ll add the pictures eventually (Probably)

Generic Title of Blog Post 1

So, I wake up at 4:30 A.M and start panicking in a vague, half-awake way, since I have no idea what in the world I’m doing. I’m packed into a car with my luggage and delivered to the airport (FLL), a short fifteen minute drive away from home. After somehow managing to check my bag and stumble through security without issue, I settle down at the gate to wait for my flight, Barely staying awake until boarding begins. After a relatively short flight, I arrive at Atlanta airport and manage to figure out how to get to the correct terminal for my next flight. Once I arrive at the gate and meet up with the rest of the group (or at least most of it), I consume my first bagel (Cinnamon raisin). It was delicious. After a short wait, we depart on a somewhat longer flight to San Pedro Sula, on which I was unable to sleep. We land and are fast tracked through customs, making it outside of the airport, where we wait for our TA for an unpleasant length of time. Eventually, she arrives and we all load into a van that carries us to La Ceiba in a rather long trip. In La Ceiba, we are bundled into the Hotel Grand Paris, where I consume my second bagel (Cinnamon raisin). It was delicious. For dinner, I have some of the worst french fries I’ve ever had the displeasure of eating. Seriously, they were bad. They didn’t even taste like french fries. I mean, they didn’t really taste like much at all. Cardboard. Or maybe foam. The point is, they were that reconstituted crap rather than real, quality french fries. I was heartbroken. Anyway, I digress. After a nice, air conditioner-cooled night of sleep, I consume my final bagel (Cinnamon Raisin). It was delicious. We then go to Honduran Walmart® (I think it was called Pais or Paix. Probably Paix, now that I think about it) where I can by hydrogen peroxide and bandaids, since I just so happened to slice a thumbnail sized flap of flesh off my right big toe while walking there. Still not sure how it happened. Ben was panicking, even though it happens to me fairly regularly. Moving on, we loaded ourselves and our luggage into a van, which delivered us to a rather dinky boat. To make a long story short, the ride was long, wet, sunburny (I don’t care that it’s not a word), and all around awful. Ben almost drowned (in the boat; he was splashed a lot). I had to bail out water with a plastic bag (it was up past my ankles) and the boat stopped twice to fiddle with the gas. We managed to make it to Turtle Bay Eco Resort on Cayos Major, but all our luggage was some degree of wet. Yay. At least its beautiful here.

No pictures here

2nd dive

Just some pictures from our second dive at Aggressor.

Views from the bottom, (top) our boat the Melissa and (bottom) a shoal of fish

Bluebell Tunicates

The mooring for the boats

Some feather duster worms

Here are just some pretty views of the corals 

No underwater adventure is complete without some mishaps

          The other day we went on the first of ten (10) dives that I’m doing while I’m here. The day was cloudy so we were surprised that the water was as calm as it was. When I got in it turned out that I had a self-inflating BCD so I had to disconnect it and control my buoyancy with just my lungs. The dive site was called Lion’s head (known as chicken butt by the locals) and it had beautiful columns of coral that are 20 feet high and form beautiful archways. 

We saw a lot of cool stuff but the highlight were two yellow stingrays and some clearer shrimp. 

Yellow Stingray (Urobatis jamaicensis), have to look very closely 

            Later that night we went on a night dive and I didn't know if I was shaking from the cold or from fear. As soon as I get into the water I run into a squid (one of many) and float there, admiring it, and it suddenly inks at me. And then it just attacks my flashlight. Those 4 inch bois are ready to fight. At night it's so much easier to find sea stars and brittle stars. There were also urchins everywhere. At one point we ran into a giant puffer fish roaming the seagrass. We also passed several porcupine fish and a burrfish. On our way back I spotted a nudibranch, most likely a lettuce slug, so cute. Sadly Lauren, who always wanted to see one, missed it.  

          On the topic of jellies, this morning while we were scouting for anemones

Giant Sea Anemone (Condylactis gigantea)

we ended up swimming through clouds of comb jellyfish and a chain of egg/worm looking things that we had no idea what they were. It was stressful, we were against the current, everything was slimy. Although, we did find a scorpion fish a new octopus den in the process. 

Stingray count: 3

Octopus count: 7

Nudibranch count: 1

Trunkfish count: 3

5 legged spider, first actual dive, and other terrifying things

        I would like to start off this blog by talking about the unnatural amount of insects on this island. during one night of studying a lovely five legged spider decided to emerge from the depths to attack Lauren's backpack, though Ben may have pushed it that way. Eventually the spider ended up running after us continuing to make everyone super uncomfortable and scared before our hero, Nika swept the spider away. I think it was just really funny because we were all tired and scared.

The demon that is a five legged spider (this dude could run)

     
     The amount of scorpions is also unreal. I'm pretty sure we are up to five in the scorpion count and for some reason they must love Lauren, Sandra, and I because they are always on the steps and wall by our room. Whenever the scorpions are on the wall, they are right at your ankles so when you walk by you just feel like you could actually die at any second. At one point I was walking up the stairs with a flashlight and Sandra warned me there was a scorpion on the stairs. so I'm like ok cool no big deal. Of course when my light hits it and I see it I jumped like a foot away before having a mini heart attack and running up to the room.
           I also recently went on my first actual scuba dive. We road a boat out to a site called lion's head. I was pretty nervous but it was honestly so fun. I got to roll in off the side of a super tiny boat. Once we got down there we did a swim through of a huge arch of corals. everything was so pretty and colorful. We saw yellow rays, shrimp, and a ton of fish that I don't know the name of. I had a great time and I was grateful that the rain held off until we got back to the island. I didn't actually take any photos on the dive because I wanted to just enjoy the experience so here are some pictures from snorkeling instead.

A super cute octopus

 anemone

The dive boat that wasn't working so we didn't use

             Later that night we all went night snorkeling. It was a little scary because I only had a flashlight and glow stick and I couldn't see much because of all the little fish and shrimp. Plus I didn't really know where I was half the time, I just trusted Lauren with my life. We saw a lot of cool things like sea cucumbers and lobsters. I was chosen by a lovely squid, who I accidentally scared, who decided to ink on me and then swim away. Never fear, my little buddy came back to visit and we saw a few other squid swimming around. I honestly felt so excited to have a squid ink on me; what a great experience.

Dying on the Mountainside

Welcome back to the Blog

            What an update!  So, I am not going to do a day-by-day update because I don’t have time for that. So, to begin I finally got my camera working so I will add some not so great photos that I took of the good ol’ reef. We (Lauren, Marena, Sandra, and myself) made the hike to the East Village to see when the teacher would be back to do the beach cleanup and that was an adventure. We took the beach path on the way back because someone at the resort told us that was less of a hassle, which it was until we reached a small beach about a half mile away from the resort where we reached a beautiful beach with aggressive dogs.  Oh, I forgot to mention that we had Nadine, or Butters, with us.  So again, back to the story we reached a beach with aggressive dogs with our sweet dog and she was chased into the water by the like six other dogs and it was pretty scary TBH.  We finally got her up the ladder, yes, a ladder, to scale a makeshift rock wall that I was not prepared to scale because we have been walking for the last like week (2 hours). Anyways once we finally got up the cliff the path was like 18 inches wide and I almost fell off (+1 death counter) and poor Nadine was petrified because she was assaulted by those darn dogs L.  

Photo from the dock

candid photo of Marena during the hike

Photo from the hike that almost killed me

So, we have been snorkeling daily to observe some more of the wildlife and it has been a blast.  We have seen a few octopus near the dock, some barracuda throughout the water, some jellies that we have been trying to avoid at all cost (Cole and Marena got stung during the night dive RIP), some eels under some good ol’ coral, a scorpion fish next to my giant anemone, and finally a squid that squirted Marena in the face to get her attention OFC. 

Christmas Tree Worms

See Anemone

Octopus in its Den

        Today we put out flags for our final project to examine anemones and the wildlife that seems to prefer them.  We also placed some flags down next to the octopus dens as a side gig because who wouldn’t want to see a cute, little octopus on the daily?  

beautiful coral <3

And now for everyones favorite section the death counter enjoy......

Death Highlights:

Snorkel overfloods with water

Falling off a cliff

Snorkeling at night

Fire pit

Hiking down a hill

Falling on rocks

Close encounter with a Barracuda(s)

Death Counter 8

and a blog would not be a blog without my child, Nadine

Year of the Cephalopod?

      I've surprisingly seen a lot of octopus this year. We've definitely come across at least 6 dens, although there is another one up for debate. We found another small octopus under the dock today and this one was slightly out of its den. These are the best pictures I got of it!

I can't really identify it since I can't see its body, but it is most likely a Common Octopus.

Round 2!

Hello Honduras,
   If you thought you saw the last of me.... You're wrong! I'm back again for Honduras, this time as the TA. It's been nice so far, although some of the stuff from last year has changed. The worst of those changes is that the beloved dog, Kona, went back to the states but luckily there's a new dog named Nadine who is just as sweet.

   These are some of the pictures I took today, and I'm really excited for diving and exploring Cayos again in the coming weeks.

A really pretty banded shrimp

A neon goby

A whitespotted filefish

An octopus hiding away

An angelfish

          Honduras is beautiful. And in a way, it makes me nostalgic for Cuba. Everything is in Spanish. The airport was full of people waiting for family members. The landscape is similar to the monotonous areas in Pinal del Rio and el Oriente. The architecture in the countryside is also similar; the buildings are slightly run down, mostly just in need of a new paint job. I’ve seen a lot of the tropical fruits that are really hard to find in the US. I even found some mamoncillos for a really cheap price. 

          On the island there is the sweetest dog her name is Nadine ( we renamed her butters that same night) and she likes to play fetch with rocks and to escort you to your room.

 Our room is the suit at the top of a hill and the walk three makes me feel winded every time. We’re gonna have legs of steel by the time we get back home. The view is very pretty though, not sure if it’s worth it.

First Days in Honduras

        To start the trip to Honduras I woke up at 5:00 am to get in a flight to Atlanta. I don't really remember much of that flight because I was sleeping the whole time. Once I landed in Atlanta I met up with the rest of the students going to Honduras and Dr. Gilchrist. The flight went by really quickly and the next thing I knew we were in San Pedro Sula and it was super hot. We then took a very interesting and slightly dangerous drive to La Ceiba where we spent the night. The next morning we all got on a super small boat to go to the island. Ben nearly drowned from all the water that came in the boat and everyone was soaked except me. Somehow I managed to stay really dry even when the boat almost sank. 

         So far the days on the island have been great. While snorkeling I saw a ton of fish, a shrimp, two octopuses and two lobster. The snorkeling is amazing and its all so pretty its hard to believe that what I'm seeing is real. I also got to go paddle boarding with Ben, Lauren, and Sandra. It was a lot of fun even if the current got a little strong. I managed to stand up for a while but eventually we were all sitting. Everything has been exciting and I look forward to the rest of our time here.

 A flower near our room

 We found a pineapple while walking around

Best view (worst walk)

Welcome to Honduras

July  1, 2018: 

 I woke up at 3:30 in the morning to catch the flight to good ol’ Atlanta which was very unfortunate considering that I have been waking up at 2 in the afternoon during the last few weeks but I somehow made it work.  Walking though the Atlanta airport reminded me of a skit off of Tru TV; people pushing and shoving, babies be thrown to strangers(?), and a lot of questionable smells. The flight to Honduras itself was pretty good if I didn’t focus on the fact we were just over a massive body of water but even if we crashed I’d be fine because I got my snorkel with me (That’s normal right?).  The Honduran airport was quite hectic maybe since I forgot how to speak any coherent Spanish?  

The drive to la Ceibawas scary at the best.  I learned that lines don’t actually exist, and pedestrians do not actually get the right-a-way.  The lush mountains were very refreshing to see after being in "mountainless" Florida for the majority of my life. Staying in La Ceiba was very nice: the dinner was good, the room had AC, the water in the shower was hot, and there was decent WI-FI if you positioned yourself the right way.  I admittedly had the urge to drink some water but decided against that after a quick google search.

La Ceiba

Good ol' Travels 

July 2, 2018

I forgot I was in Honduras. I woke up at a fresh 7:15 and headed down to meet up with everyone for breakfast but found out quickly that no one was down there so I decided on a Cliff bar to get me through the day.  We walked Paix a Honduran Walmart, and after fixing a broken toe, got some water, diet coke, some coconut and banana soda.  We headed out to the island soon after.  

Getting to the island was an adventure.  The drive, like the previous day, was scary and the boat ride almost killed me.  The boat ride took us from a port in La Ceiba to the Turtle Bay Resort  but the water was really choppy due to all the wind and the water was not excluded to the ocean; I do not think I will ever get the taste of the salt water out of my mouth.  Thankfully, unlike me, my backpack which had my computer in it stayed dry. 

Once on the island I was met by a new friend, a lab-mix(?),  she likes catching and bringing rocks to you which was the highlight of my first day. The room that I was put in is very nice although I wish there was AC but I can live without it. 

We went snorkeling which was a lot of fun even though I forgot fins L.  We saw some different reefs, a scorpionfish, and an eel which kind of scared me since I have never seen one in the wild like that but thankfully my toes are all still intact.  

Dinner consisted of tacos and carrot cake and I am not complaining.  We went out to the dock after dinner and did some stargazing which was amazing. You don’t realize how much air pollution ruins visibility until you are somewhere like this and see everything.  Going to bed was kind of hard since it is so hot in the room, but I managed to go to sleep rather quickly. 

The doggo we named Butters

Some Bridge to the room

Photo from the top of the resort

The water 

Death Counter l

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2017 blog info

Students for 2017 have been posting to my alternative blog at http://pritzkercoralreefers.blogspot.com/ if you are interested in following along this year.