We have had a ton of time off over the last two weeks, three days for Christmas and three days for New Years. Peter´s dad passed away the day after Christmas so he and Eric left the day after that and our class went from four to three.

We were only three for a day before Melissa and Juliana, two American girls that met while studying abroad in Australia, decided to get away from Chicago and Pittsburgh respectively and joined us in Manzanillo. These girls are a BLAST. We were instant friends and now are inseparable. We have been having so much fun, partying it up on the beach for New Years. There was a crazy ass Mexican lighting BIG fireworks (with his cigarette!!) off right next to us on the beach. This was also the night that Jo Treasure (his real name!) joined us from Australia. I immediately dubbed him Thunder (as in Thunder from Down Under) and we proceeded to get hammered together. It was awesome.

We started classes up again on Thursday, with Thursday morning being my first dive acting as a Divemaster. It was a little unnerving being in charge of getting the boat loaded and doing the briefing for our five clients but I think that I managed it. We dove Elefante and I assisted Kalen with skills for our Open Water referral and our one Advanced Student. Matt, the OW diver, and I played catch with one of my golf balls while we waited to Kalen to teach Matt`s older brother, Eddie, how to tie knots. They were really great guys and we had a lot of fun diving.

We did our second dive at the the wreck. Viz was pretty bad but we still managed to see a couple of eels and rays. The guys had fun and that was all that mattered.

Oh and did I forget to mention that...

WE SAW WHALES!!!!

Oh yes, not underwater, it was on the way out and on the way back but the humpbacks are migrating through our bay and they were coming up for air and flipping their tales all around us. When we were diving at Elefante, you could hear them singing. It was SOOOOOOOOO awesome.

We had class later on where we reviewed the areas we could improve on as DM`s (like we didn´t carry enough weight) but overall, I think everything went well.

This morning, we went out to Horses Ear, where Kiel and Kalen saw an eagle ray (lucky ducks) and we went to Huapan, where Kiel and Nathan saw a couple of sharks. The whales were singing again, closer than they were yesterday. It is so peaceful to swim around, checking out the scenery while the whales sing in the background. Jules and Melissa are so much fun, making jokes on the surface and we have some pretty creative signs underwater that crack all of us up.


Well, it`s time for class again so I better sign off. Hasta luego...