Diving

Yesterday while Lenny and Evelyn were scuba diving, I was snorkeling off the boat, watching schools of various small and medium-sized fish. As I swam back towards the boat I saw a huge dark triangular shape in the water below me, and recognized a large manta ray. When the divers came back they were very excited because it wasn't just any ray: it was a pelagic manta ray around 18 feet across -- all black, also called a devil ray. Here is Lenny's photo of it from underneath. Obviously, I had underestimated the size and thought it was closer to me than it really was. After the second dive, the ray caught up with the boat again, and we looked down to see it in the water from the boat, while the dive guide and one of the divers went in to snorkel with it.

Today we returned to the perfect beach near the boat harbor, taking a long walk along the tide pools and through the woods to one of the ancient fish ponds that's part of the national park. I stepped on the shore of the pond and sunk into muck above my knees. Luckily I easily washed off the muck in the gently running ocean waves.