very simple

I’m getting better. It has only taken me one month to sort through my photos and get them posted on the site. Pictures from my diving trip to Roatan are now available for viewing. In addition, I shot some underwater video on my camera, which I’m including here. The first part is just your general diving experience, getting to sound like darth vader. The remainder is from the dolphin dive that I had the opportunity to do. which was pretty awesome.

Two weeks later, and my photos are finally going online. I downloaded the trial version of Photoshop, which lets you try it out for 30 days, and went a little nuts cleaning up the pictures. In any event, they’re here. I’ll post later to point out some of my favorites, but they’ve got some descriptive headings if you want to take a look right now. Needless to say, as cool as these pictures are, they don’t begin to compare to what the actual beauty of the place is.

I’m home (as if you couldn’t tell from the random flurry of new blog posts that are not actually from today). I had an excellent time (other than the part where I had to fly for 26 hours in each direction), and I’m completely exhausted. I’m going to be working on cleaning up the photos from my trip for a bit (which may involve purchasing some sort of photoshop product), but in the meantime, I thought I’d share one of the coolest things ever.

There is this lake in Palau that many many years ago got cut off from the ocean, isolating a population of jellyfish from any of there natural predators. Over time, these jellyfish, not having any predators, lost their ability to sting, and live in a symbiotic relationship with the algae inside of them. They basically survive through photosynthesis, even though they’re animals. Which is just really really cool.

Even cooler? you can go swimming with them. Upwards of 16 million of them live in this lake (they were all but wiped out from the temperature changes from El Nino a few years back, but the nodules or eggs that they laid in the walls of the lake managed to survive and repopulate the lake).

Hit play to check it out for yourself.

Got to Palau Monday night (Palau time), to find my brother waiting for me at the airport, which was a nice surprise (he told me he was going to send a taxi for me). At 8 the next morning, we were already waiting for the boat to take us diving. Did two dives on Tuesday (Blue Corner and Turtle Cove), which were pretty amazing, and two more on Wednesday (Blue Holes and New Dropoff). These were really stellar – I think every single iconic scuba image has been photographed here. Oh, and on Tuesday we also went to Jellyfish lake, which was totally amazing and surreal. There are millions of these jellyfish that have been cut off from the ocean (and natural predators) for so long that they’ve lost their ability to sting. They evolved to survive via photosynthesis with the algae that lives inside of them. Pretty awesome.

Today’s a day off (and my brother had to go to work), and I’m just going to relax and nurse my sunburn, which only exists on the back of my neck and the backs of my arms from my elbow to my shoulder. So not only does it hurt, it’s incredibly silly looking.

As far as pictures, I’ve taken a bunch, but I may wait to upload them until I get home. They have wifi in the lobby of the hotel, but I swear it’s a wifi router hooked up to a dial-up connection – very very slow. According to my brother, the lowest level of DSL service you can get on the island, which has a speed of about 36.6 kbps (yes, slower than most dial-up these days) costs about $700 a month. Something about the scarcity of satellites over the region and whatnot make it incredibly expensive, and incredibly difficult to hook up. Needless to say, I’ve got better things to do than sit for several hours watching my photos upload.

Anyway, having a great time, wish you were here, blah blah blah…

How’s this for a vacation destination review…

From 1,000 Places to See Before You Die

Palau: One of many island constellations in the Pacific galaxy that is Micronesia, Palau’s 343 islands are surrounded by spellbinding waters that many cognoscenti say offer the best diving in the world. The meeting place of three major ocean currents, these waters support more than 1,500 species of fish and four times the number of coral species found in the Caribbean, and are known for their extraordinary drop-offs and wall diving: the Negemelis Drop-off is widely considered the world’s best, a technicolor reef that begins at 2 feet and plummets vertically to more than 1,000 feet. The legendary Blue Corner is one of the planet’s most exciting sites for the sheer abundance, variety, and size of its fish life – and those schooling gray reef sharks! More than fifty WWII shipwrecks – the remnants of an aircraft carrier attack – rare and exotic marine species, and visibility that can exceed 200 feet add to divers’ wonderment.

And that’s just the beginning. The book recommends two places to stay, and they happen to be the same two places that my brother booked me at. Because he’s awesome (he did spend some time working in the hotel industry before he became a do-gooder, but I sometimes forget that he has this skill).

I’ve already ordered a big-ass strobe light (that better arrive at the shop before I leave) so that I can better capture the color underwater (my photos from Curacao were quite…blue). and I’ve started the list (a necessary obsessive-compulsive tendency that occurs in the weeks leading up to any big trip. I’ve been known to have to turn around halfway to the airport because the tickets were still sitting on my desk. The lists are a must!).

Now I just have to find time to buy some completely unnecessary additional beach clothes and a good, large carry-on bag, and I’ll be set. I think…

I’ve already blocked out the part about having to fly coach for 25 hours in each direction. Really. I’m not thinking about that part at all.