| Do you know why I started diving? Well, originally it was because one of my instructors was drop-dead gorgeous and anything he was selling, I was buying. But after I got over his rugged good looks, great bod, gorgeous eyes and hot tan (hmmm, maybe I'm not quite over this ...) I found that the real reason I got into diving was to appease my adventurous ego. When I became a diver, I knew before I even took my first breath underwater that I wanted to be a dive instructor. Because MY instructors were soooo cool! I wanted to be seen as one of them an adventurous spirit who was fun to hang out with. I wanted to travel, meet people, explore the depths and experience the world. And guess what? Eighteen years later, I'm still every bit as much in love with my dive lifestyle as I was when I only imagined what it could be like.recently met a kindred spirit during Society's Third Annual Total Submersion Dive Festival and found that my reasons for becoming - and staying - a diver were not as unique as I thought they were. While I was proudly proclaiming t be the Dive Princess, this woman laid claim to the title of Dive Goddess. And a dive goddess she is.Lucy Llewellyn Byard is a talented freelance writer and PADI diver whose wit and humor filled our days of Total Submersion with laughter. Accident-prone in a funny, Sandra Bullock kind of way, Lucy had some of the most amazing things happen to her while hanging out with the gang. (We're still trying to figure out how that crab got inside her wetsuit.) After her return, Lucy took a few moments to jot down some of her |
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| ... a simple dive trip. But trouble started just moments after I landed on the island.My friend Mabel, who normally thinks I?m crazy, had endorsed the idea of my going alone on the PADI "Total Submersion 2002" dive trip to Grand Cayman."Think of the guys you'll meet,"she said, but then remembering my marital track record, she quickly added,"Don't get married " except to a big Cayman bank account!"Gotta love that Mabel.Palm fronds swayed overhead in the evening's tropical breeze as I wheeled my luggage curbside at the tiny Cayman airport, looking for the PADI people. Greeting me with big hellos, they helped me board the Sunset House shuttle bus that was piled high with luggage, dive bags, newlyweds Mary and Terry Sutton, and Tony Noto and Michael Edwards, all from Northern California. Plus a lone wolf: Ty Sawyer, editor of Sport Diver magazine from Winter Park, Florida.With talk of the Suttons? nuptials, the conversation quickly degenerated into totaling the number of marriages for all onboard the bus. Sawyer overheard me mumble, "Better to ask how many times I've been divorced," and he quickly spearheaded a campaign to torture me into revealing how many times I'd walked down that marital green mile.I ignored their taunts.My room, spacious with a tiled floor (good for dropping wet gear), looked out onto the sparkling turquoise Caribbean Sea. I was eager for the first dive.At breakfast I paired with dive buddies Michael Edwards of the Northern California troublemakers and MaleneThompson, a PADI Instructor. It?d been a while since my last dive so I was happy to buddy with an instructor.At the after-breakfast meeting the entire group of 60 was divided into teams: Purple, White, Red and Blue. Each day was to consist of a morning two-tank boat dive, afternoons of unlimited shore diving and evenings of barbecues, dinners and tomfoolery.My Team Blue consisted of the newlyweds, a female judge, an electrical physicist, a father and his 14 year-old son, a lesbian couple from Indiana and two guys from Kansas. Our divemaster, Jamie, was one of the few Americans on staff. Most were Brits and cute, blue-eyed Welshmen.Loved that.The first dive was to a maximum depth of 60 feet. I followed my buddies down the descent line and all was going perfectly: My ears were clear, my breathing was slow and the visibility - I could see to Cuba. Fish darted in and out of staghorn coral. Their neon blues and yellows, and pastel pinks and greens, were mesmerizing. With my buddies taking the lead, we explored the coral reef at a Zen-like pace. Michael glanced over his shoulder and gave me the OK signal. I signaled back and then adjusted the air in my BC. Mistakenly, I hit the wrong button, inflating the BC instead of deflating it. |
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| I shot to the surface!Shocked, and nervous about the affect on my body from the rocket ascent, I dove back below the surface, wondering if I should continue the dive. Jamie hand-signaled me to stay put at the decompression trapeze, which hung 15 feet below the boat. I did as ordered, embarrassed as hell, and grateful I hadn't been deeper longer."Where did you go?" hollered Michael. "One instant you were waving like the Rose Bowl Queen, the next you were gone!"So much for anonymity, pride, bravado. The second dive was calmer. We swam with giant tarpons and finned through a labyrinth of caves. Jamie and my dive buddies stuck to me like suckerfish.Over the next few days, we dove walls and shallow reefs, saw giant purple fan coral, fire coral, pink, waving anemones, tiny drum fish, hefty lobster, turtles and nurse sharks. We weathered a tropical storm that cancelled diving for a day - Sawyer and I took our cameras to the brink of destruction as we captured images of the giant walls of waves and sea spray.During the storm days I toured the island with the newlyweds, the Indiana couple and Sawyer. I drove. On the left side of the road."Think left," Mary said a dozen times even before I turned on the ignition. With my heart pounding at record speed, I pulled the van cautiously into traffic. It was surreal: Cars sped toward us on the right; bicyclists ambled along on the left. It was upside down, but we made it safely to the island's famous blowholes, to Pedro St. James "castle" the first three-story home built on the island at a time when most Caymanians lived in tiny, thatch-covered homes. We braved a Cuban cigar-shopping spree in George Town, the island"s bustling port city, and sneaked into Queen Elizabeth II Botanical Park (25 minutes from George Town) at closing time. Promising park authorities we'd only stay a few minutes, we saw jaw-dropping flowers and plants in a blurring, whirlwind tour, a mere taste of the park's 65-acre beauty.Nightly, we hit the island's fabulous dining spots. My favorite was Bed, the restaurant. Imagine: I went to Bed with five men and four women and troublemaker Sawyer caught it all on film. There were lots of bed jokes, laughter, famous Cayman Tortuga Rum and dive stories. Even the waiter, dressed in silk pj's, joined in the fun.On Day Six of the weeklong trip, Bob Talbot, the famous marine mammal photographer who was at Total Submersion to judge the underwater photography contest, dove with Team Blue. Ever playful, and seemingly forgetful, Talbot prepared his gear next to mine. I watched in amazement as he put his BC onto the tank upside down.Knowing that he has more than 10,000 dives under his weight belt, I started giggling hysterically. The great Bob Talbot "adorably human" made me promise that I'd never, ever tell a soul!What was a girl to do?I promised. But I never have been good at keeping husbands, or secrets.The wildest dive was the last one, at Stingray City, a sandbar off the northwest end of the island.Diving in 15 feet of water, we were to circle around divemaster Jamie, who carried an underwater bucket of bait."Stingrays feed by smell," he told us. Other fish feed by sight, so we were warned to keep the bait, pieced out to us by Jamie, hidden in our hands. "There's a 6-foot moray eel named Psycho who, if hungry, will make an appearance," he said. "I'll feed him, but don't you." No problem! "Circle your hand overhead, with the bait inside, and the stingrays will follow you anywhere."Easier said than done.Psycho showed up immediately - at my side - ready for lunch. Luckily he took off after bait-toting Jamie. When I finally got a chunk of bait, stingrays clamored around me for the goodies.With five stingrays overhead, I relaxed for a mere nanosecond. Big mistake. I looked down to retrieve my regulator and saw Psycho, the green monster, between my legs.What was a girl to do?Stingray City was the dive of all dives. Everyone came up wounded and you couldn't hear for all the laughter and war stories being shouted out, for all the "My-hickey-is-bigger-than-yours!" bragging. Dive buddy Michael said I was swallowed by stingrays. He could only see my flippers flipping.That night at the last barbecue, when the PADI Travel people surveyed who wanted to go on the next PADI excursion to Roatan, Honduras - another simple dive trip - everyone cheered and raised their hands. |
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