Today is a new day

4/14

Well after the debacle of yesterday's dive, I woke up ready to try again.  What they call prebreakfast is just toast and tea, and then we headed just a short distance to Batu Laut.  It is super frustrating because we can't communicate with most of the staff since they don't speak any English.  The boat hands aren't terribly proficient or organized about handling the gear, which is creating long delays, and we had to go back for one diver's mask because that was left on the boat.  Apparently, on most liveaboards, the dive crew takes care of everything for you related to gear and you just show up and get on the boat.  Not here.  We had to go back for Holly's mask and another time, my fins were left out. 
Anyhow, we jumped in and there was no current, so that was good. A relief, really!

And oh the critters!! A pregnant wobegon shark, Nemo and friends and family in anemone, cleaner shrimp, a Peacock Mantis shrimp - one of the planets coolest critters, orangutan crab, eel, and just amazing beautiful reef.

Now back on board having breakfast (marinated tuna, cucumbers, tomatoes, something fried that was not a cinnamon roll, sausages, and thankfully bread. They also made eggs, so I got a scrambled egg! Yay!

Soon, dives 2&3 before lunch.

Rosa's air gauge is working beautifully! Thank goodness!

Lunch included some good chicken wings! Yum! I always skip the hot sauce because it is crazy hot. The bowl of vegetables was even spicy!
I believe this is the day we went to a beach.  John, Darlene, Holly, and I went.

The island's "store"

John helping row

It was a very tidy little village

Dives 2 and 3 were out of control beautiful. We saw all sorts of beautiful coral and fish and everything. Afterwards we had a really nice long surface interval when I napped, hung out on the top deck loungers, and killed time until our night dive. 

It was probably my only night dive of the trip. I don't love them unless I can hold someone's hand the entire time.  They make me a little dizzy and disoriented.  We descended down along a rock and reef, and circled around it.  John, the third Scholl, is a total prankster and freaked out our divemaster by turning his light off, swimming way out and around, and then coming up right next to him beside his face and waited for him to notice him! He was most pleased with his reaction! :-) haha 

My favorite thing was a Spanish dancer, which we watched swimming through the water.

After ascending, we came back to the boat and the sea was truly as smooth as glass. Just a bit of moon overhead, not really many stars visible, but wow, just spectacular area. We had the place to ourself. I can't come up with enough words to describe the beauty in that bay.

Dinner was all fish and tofu and spicy so I ate tempeh, white rice, watermelon, their cakelike dessert (better than the firm coffee jello from lunch), and maybe some bread. 

Then, another deep wonderful sleep.