The One Where It’s Time To Go Home

As most of you know, my time in Mexico has come to an end. I’m writing this blog a little later than usual, for which I’m sorry. But, since it’s a little late, it’ll also be a little longer. Just because so much has happened since I last wrote you.

The Movies

On Tuesday Traina, Vale and I went to the movies. First of all: I don’t know why I ever go to the movies in Belgium. It’s SO expensive. Seriously, it’s cheaper to buy a ticket to Mexico and go to the movies over there.

Anyway, we got A LOT of food. I’m deadserious. There were three of us, of which two are little Mexican girls. We had nachos with cheese and three different flavours of popcorn: caramel, nacho cheese (why is this not a thing in Europe??) and butter. Oh, also, there was “one” sprite for the three of us. How is a two liter cup considered as “one drink”. You can feed a village with the amount of food we had. I ate air for dinner after that popcornfest.

After we bought our army of food, we went to see our movie. And since I was with two Mexican people, we were 15 minutes late, so we missed the beginning of the movie. Oh, did I mention it was a French movie with Spanish subtitles? Yes, exactly, WHY? My French is not THAT good and my spanish is worse, so it’s safe to say I got at least 35% of what was being said.

To make a long story short: weirdest movie ever. Have you ever watched a movie and wondered why you wasted two hours of your life because absolutely nothing happened? Well, I have. It’s name is “Médecine de Campagne“. My advice? Go for Star Wars.

The Pit and Dos Ojos

On Wednesday I was supposed to go to a cenote with Wil and his friend but there wasn’t enough space in the car. Result? I ended up going to two different cenotes with a customer: the most amazing cenotes in the world (note: this is my opinion so don’t shoot me if yours in different, thanks). I went to ” The Pit” and “Dos Ojos“. I tried getting some pictures, but it was too dark to really see how mind blowing the experience was. To compensate, I did include the links: just click on the names above and you’ll see some amazing things.

The Pit is a little puddle of water, the size of an average back-yard pool. Once you descend, you see how big in really is. It goes on under the “ground” so you swim into the dark. When you look back, you see the beams of sunlight coming through the pool-size opening. It’s hard to describe, amazing to witness and impossible to ever forget. Our guide showed us the entrances to the caves and down at the bottom, there’s a dead tree. It reminded me or the tree of Minas Tirith in Lord of The Rings. Just incredible.

Dos Ojos was up next. It’s called Dos Ojos because it was two entrances: the two eyes. You can dive from one Eye to the other. Note: I said dive, not swim. If you try it and you die, it’s your own fault for being downright stupid. Dos Ojos has two routes: the Batcave or the Barbieline. When diving in cenotes, you follow a line, for safety reasons. In the barbieline, there’s a barbiedoll in the line. It’s a really creative name I know. We ended up choosing the Batcave, where you get to surface in a cave full of bats. Again, really original. Despite the lack of original names, it was a great dive. The entire cenote is “decorated” by stalactites and stalagmites. There’s just no explaining how amazing it is to see the years and years of history in a place like that.

The Last Week of Diving

There was a lot of diving in my last week in Playa Del Carmen. Of course I’m not complaining. Diving is life.

The week started out with a sharkdive. An awesome sharkdive with Gian, Triana and Elena. The only thing I didn’t account for was doing a second sharkdive, instead of a shallow dive. I don’t mind at all, but my computer was less enthusiastic. I went into decompression and had to do a 20 minute safety stop. This means I hung at 5 meter for 20 minutes. That’s a lot of minutes. A lot of boring minutes. Thanks to Gian and Triana who hung with me, time seemed to pass a teeny tiny little bit faster though.

Like I told you a couple of weeks ago, I thought I would only see the Mama Vina wreck once. It turns out I went there twice this week alone. Once with P.O. and once with MYSELF. Turns out there was a miscommunication with the Divemaster that was supposed to guide, so when she didn’t turn up, the shop asked me to guide instead. MY FIRST JOB AS A DIVEMASTER! Luckily, the diver I had to guide was really experienced so everything went really smoothly. In the afternoon of the same day, Vale and I went on another sharkdive. We saw 5 bullsharks at the same time = AMAZE BALLS! What an awesome day.

Gian and I ended up going to Cozumel on Saturday. What a world of difference with the diving in Playa. Don’t get me wrong, the diving in Playa is really nice. But Cozumel is just amazing. The reefs are so big, we got to see Nurse Sharks and Turtles and big-ass Barracudas. It was an amazing day with Gian and P.O.. Except this brully picture of myself, I sadly didn’t get any good pictures of the day. I did get amazing video’s, but you’ll have to ask me in person to see them.

On Monday I had my last four dives in Playa. Heartbraking moment, but my gosh, what a good day! In the morning I went on a sharkdive and a shallow dive with Al. We saw stingrays, a turtle and of course, sharks. On the dives in the afternoon I hung out in the back because Wil was doing a DSD (Discover Scuba Diving). On my last dive, we saw a EAGLE RAY, which are kind of rare in Playa. After that we saw a bullshark in the shallow waters AND we saw a turtle. It’s like the ocean was sending all it’s amazing animals to come say goodbye to me. Couldn’t be more thrilled about my last day diving.

The Snorketest

Okay okay, stop asking about the snorkeltest. I’ll tell you about it. As you know, I was terrified. I think I’m still a little scared even though it’s already in the past. On Saturday the big moment had arrived and Mati FINALLY got to take out his read hat. He was so excited. He loves that hat. And torturing me, of course he loves that too.

It all started out with two chairs. I know they look innocent, but they’re not. At the bar next door, there were a LOT of people. So we really had a crowd, which was nice. Who doesn’t want to see two people drink a lot of gross stuff through a snorkel with masks on their faces? P.O. even asked me if I had different clothes with me, which is when I got really worried. Was I supposed to bring spare clothes??

Anyway, the big moment had arrived. Wil and I put on our blinded masks and took a seat in the chairs from hell. The snorkels got passed on to us and I started hyperventilating. Not really, but in my head I was. We put the snorkels in our mouths and seconds seemed like days. When Satan’s drink finally arrived, I started drinking and thinking: “what is this?”, “why is it spicy?”, “oh my gosh, don’t throw up”, “just keep drinking”, “just keep drinking”, “just keep drinking”.

People were cheering, I was drinking and then, suddenly, I feel something on my leg. I don’t know what it is, but I just need to KEEP DRINKING. “Is Wil failing?”, “is he being a little girl?”, “am I in Hell yet?”, “why is there no end to this mixture from hell?”.

After days and days of drinking, I was finally done. AND I PASSED! Will did not. As you can see in the pictures, I won. And in case anyone says anyhting different, they’re lying. I kicked that snorkeltest’s ass! P.O. was right though, since Wil spilled half of his snorkeltest on my legs/shorts. It was red and sticky, so I walked around with a big red stain on my legs.

After the snorkeltest, we stayed for a few drinks at the bar next to the shop. Gian, Domenic and I went to dinner in a German restaurant to have schnitzel. Yes, there is such a thing a “German restaurants”. And the food was amazing. After the German place, we out for mojitos. It was a fun night!

The Mexico Blue Dream Family

On my last night I asked everyone at the shop to go out to dinner. We went out to “Los Aguachiles”, which is an amazing seafood restaurant. There were 14 of us and I had a blast. Five of us ended up until the restaurant closed, so we moved on to a different place to have a drink. Eventually we ended up staying until they closed too and since everybody had to work to the next day, they went home.

With a lot of pain in my heart I said goodbye to an amazing team of people, of divers and of family. The last six weeks were some of the best of my life, and I’m happy I ended up in Playa Del Carmen. More specific, I’m happy I ended up at Mexico Blue Dream. The second I walked into the shop, I was welcomed into a family and I never felt like an outsider.

Thanks to all the instructors, I’m not only a Divemaster, but a much better diver than I ever thought I would be. Thanks to all the people at the front desk for planning my dives, letting me know when plans changes and for giving me a smile every morning at 7.45.

Thanks to Gian and Wil, for being my left and right hand throughout my time here. I’m gonna miss you guys so much.

For those interested: I made a video of my trip for the last six weeks. I’m sorry in advance if it makes you jealous or if it makes you cry.

The Party

After dinner, I went back to the hostel and met up with Eric and Shitface Jesse. After six weeks, I finally went out to a club and didn’t have to dive the day after. A bunch of people from the hostel joined us and we had a great night.

When we got home, Eric and I cried a little. After four months at the Yak, he too went home to the states. We just sat there, staring at the hostel and wondering why were leaving heaven. Why did we leave, Eric? WHY? But honestly, big girls don’t cry so we kept it dry.

The Way Home

On Tuesday morning I spent 1.5 hours packing up my stuff and getting ready to leave The Yak. When the time came, I handed over my roomkey, got in the car and headed for the airport. The entire way was hell.

I never thought I would have the experience I had. I never thought I would fall in love with diving all over again, but on a different level. A way of diving every day and not getting tired of it. A way where I’m seriously considering doing my IDC and becoming an instructor.

“Do what you love, and do a lot of it.”

And that’s exactly what I intend to do.

Playa Del Carmen was my home for six weeks and might be my home again sometime in the future. For exactly that reason: I felt at home. There are no strangers in Playa, only friends you haven’t met.

Current location: Maryland, USA.
Current mood: ready for Christmas, baby!
Current weather: cold as hell.

Write you soon guys

Fi