Biolumiescence, cliff jumping, and MEGA yachts...where am I?

After our first week of directed research, we were ready for our Sunday off! It was a really great week though, we spent a LOT of time in the water hunting for lionfish and I caught my first one on Friday! We go out snorkeling with big nets and bouys which have our GPS units on them to track where we are searching for lion fish. As you can see below, the lionfish hunting outfit is extremelly fasionable. It insludes a rash guard, weight belt (to help keep you from floating up when using the nets), snorkel, fins, and mask. I will post more about hunting this week ...but for now this is a picture of my first catch, which I will be dissecting tomorrow!

Also on Friday was our first night snorkel. After sun set, we loaded on to the boat with our dive flash lights and wetsuits to go snorkeling in the dark! Driving the boat under the moonlight and stars, everyone was anxiously silent...with all of us in our wetsuits it felt like we were spys about to go attack some secret hide out. It was awesome! I would be lying if I said that I wasnt a little freaked at first, going into the black water. The place we went is a location we know pretty well, so being all disoriented in the dark was a strange feeling. After the initial scary-ness of not being to se ANYTHING that wasnt in your tiny flashlight space, it was really cool to see the reef in a different light. The turtles which we normally see swimming quickly away from us were not in the least bit disturbed by us being there. We could swim inches away from them and they didnt even seem to notice. There were also eels, crabs, and seastars which had come out from their usual hiding places during the day. My flashlight broke about 15 minutes into our hour long dive, but luckily I was by my snorkel buddy when it happened. It felt pretty scary to not have control over my own light, but also really cool. Probably the coolest part of the trip was the bioluminescence that was EVERYWHERE!! The best time to see bioluminescence is about a week after the new moon, which happened to be exactly when we went! We all turned off our flashlights and kicked around to make hundreds of tiny sparks of green in the water light up. It totally reminded me of Avatar!!! (or Fern Gully...haha)

Anyway, on to the fantastic day I just had! First off, we woke up to a GIANT SUPER MEGA YACHT in our backyard. Using Binoculars, we were able to see that the name of the boat was "Apoise". A quick Google search revealed that the yacht was built in 2006 and was sold at auction last year for 46 MILLION DOLLARS!!! The boat comes with its own crew and staff and is owned by a British billionaire named John Caudwell. Apparently it is the 56th biggest yacht in the world! Take a look for yourself... Yeah...note the fact that it is taller than the hills of Dove Cay right behind it!

After eating brunch, a bunch of us headed out to our favorite Sunday beach spot, East Bay. We were swimming and hanging out for a while when one of our island friends (an 18 year old kid from FL who has been living here for a while with his parents and brothers) invited us to walk to Shark Bay to go cliff jumping. Obviously, we couldn't refuse!!! It took about an hour to walk to there along the shore, but it was sooo worth it! Here we are climbing up the rocks to go jump...and here is me mid-flight!

All in all, we were walking, swimming, and playing in the sun for about 6 hours today and I am exhausted!! Going to try to get a good night sleep before we start on a very busy week of hunting and dissecting lionfish! I love you all and miss you very much. Thank you to everyone who is reading this blog...I really appreciate your curiosity into my very weird, very sunny life in Turks and Caicos...its as much for my friends and family as it is for my own personal "e-scrapbook" memories : )

T-minus 24 days until I am back in the states. Sheesh, time sure does fly!