I
have been charged with doing the report for our
Scuba Trust holiday to the beautiful island of Curacao
in the Dutch Caribbean. We arrived at Heathrow at
the unearthly hour of 0540 hours and met the other
holiday participants - Gill Cullwick, Wellard
(Andy) Wood, Lisa Henty, who was still asleep!,
Carole Illing, Maureen Sheehan, James Davenport,
Susie Rusby, Yvonne Lode, Paul Milsom, Alan Kenny,
Tony Fryer, Daniel James and myself, Geoff Green.
We had to endure all the administrative blunders
that KLM made by ignoring all Gill's correspondence
during the year. Well at least we appreciate all
your efforts Gill. We all had to adhere to max 20kg
weight limit, it's a good job I always travel light!!
Anyway after clearing the airport we were eventually
allowed on board and were scattered all over the
aircraft, much to Gill's disgust and also
quite a bit of frustration endured by all.
The cabin crew were pleasant and very helpful during
the flight and we all consumed adequate amounts
of alcohol (free!) and what proved to be reasonable
food. The flight as you can imagine was quite long
as we had to stop off at the island of Aruba for
an hour before continuing on to our destination
just fifteen minutes away.
However we all arrived safely and were eventually
transported to the Breezes Hotel, where we were
all eventually booked into our various rooms, after
it was discovered that the hotel staff had little
knowledge of our various requirements that Gill
had conveyed to them in her correspondence during
the year. Anyway despite another admin cock-up our
rooms were eventually sorted, and although I am
not one to complain, the Managing Director insisted
that I should be upgraded to a King size bedroom,
he must have seen one of my movies!
The next day we were all able to chill out, if you
can call it that in 40 degrees of heat, but it was
very relaxing all the same with most of us taking
advantage of the all inclusive deal of unlimited
cocktails and any drinks of ones choice, the food
was also very good in the hotel with two additional
restaurants, one Japanese and an Italian, very nice,
which most of us savoured.
The next day we started our diving holiday with
Ocean Encounters, this included two dives per day
for six days and one shore dive per day, as the
hotel had an excellent house reef, also a submerged
car park of quite a few vehicles that a few were
able to see - James, Yvonne and Carole amongst others,
but unfortunately not me! Extra dives for the boat
and shore dives could be purchased at a reasonable
cost.
Ocean Encounters proved to be an excellent organisation
and catered well to our needs both on and off the
boat. The diving crew members - John and Sherman
were very helpful also the various captains and
crew members were always willing to assist.
The diving was very good, the water was warm around
29 degrees, there was an abundance of aquatic life,
which I personally managed to point out to most
of our party, that's the advantage of me being an
advanced diver and underwater naturalist!! I thin
without exception everyone enjoyed the excellent
diving and various creatures that we were privileged
to see as well as a few wrecks and of course the
beautiful coral reefs.
A
bonus to our trip was a pod of dolphins we were
all fortunate to see whilst on the boat, they followed
us and stayed with us for some 15 minutes, that
was such a wonderful experience. We were all able
to take a day off from the diving and travel around
the island on a conducted tour, Gill, especially
was grateful for the scenic views that could be
experienced from on top of the huge suspension bridge
overlooking the harbour and Wihemstadt!! As well
as experiencing the beauty around the whole island
we stopped off at a local restaurant and sampled
their culinary delights which included the Iguana
combo, never again!
My
cherished memories of the diving were special quotes
from Alan Kenny and Susie Rusby. During the surface
interval I asked Alan if he saw the Barracuda. His
reply was "No, but I heard it!". Al, you
are a Gem. The quote from Susie was priceless -
Sherman our dive guide in his brief before we dived
mentioned the "thumb splitting shrimps which
could literally split your thumb if you were stupid
enough to stick it into one of their hidey holes.
He also mentioned that he saw one of the said shrimps
do battle with a Puffer fish and the fish lost!
Susie intervened and asked how she would be able
to tell the difference between the two! Well, Susie,
that comes with an enormous amount of experience!!!
My cherished memories on the land were trying to
keep up with Dan's constant shirt changes and of
course the traumas of his love life! You should
have taken my advice Daniel with some of my priceless
chat up lines - they always work for me.
One of the other characters of the holiday was definitely
Maureen. Mo, you are an inspiration to us all. I
initially thought you would be limited in what you
could achieve on the holiday, I was so wrong, you
definitely achieved and did more than all of us,
that included rock climbing, the flying trapeze!
(Wellard take note) catamaran sailing, not to mention
a touch of scuba diving and being wooed nightly
by the local crooner. It was a pleasure being on
holiday with you Maureen.
They were some great people on the holiday, my fond
thoughts go to of course Gill for her
endless patience, friendship and quiet subtle humour,
you always make my holiday, thanks. Also to Wellard
and Lisa and also Tony, thanks for your funny lines
and laughter during the days and nights, also congratulations
to Wellard on achieving his 1000th Pleasure Dive.
My personal thanks go to all those kind people who
made efforts to help not only to me but many of
us during the holiday, and at the airport, Carole
thanks for lugging my bags, also thanks to my scuba
buddies who shared with me such a wonderful experience
in the Ocean's depths. I hope to see you all soon
on future trips.
I
have been charged with doing the report for our
Scuba Trust holiday to the beautiful island of Curacao
in the Dutch Caribbean. We arrived at Heathrow at
the unearthly hour of 0540 hours and met the other
holiday participants - Gill Cullwick, Wellard
(Andy) Wood, Lisa Henty, who was still asleep!,
Carole Illing, Maureen Sheehan, James Davenport,
Susie Rusby, Yvonne Lode, Paul Milsom, Alan Kenny,
Tony Fryer, Daniel James and myself, Geoff Green.
However we all arrived safely and were eventually
transported to the Breezes Hotel, where we were
all eventually booked into our various rooms, after
it was discovered that the hotel staff had little
knowledge of our various requirements that Gill
had conveyed to them in her correspondence during
the year. Anyway despite another admin cock-up our
rooms were eventually sorted, and although I am
not one to complain, the Managing Director insisted
that I should be upgraded to a King size bedroom,
he must have seen one of my movies!
The next day we started our diving holiday with
Ocean Encounters, this included two dives per day
for six days and one shore dive per day, as the
hotel had an excellent house reef, also a submerged
car park of quite a few vehicles that a few were
able to see - James, Yvonne and Carole amongst others,
but unfortunately not me! Extra dives for the boat
and shore dives could be purchased at a reasonable
cost.
Ocean Encounters proved to be an excellent organisation
and catered well to our needs both on and off the
boat. The diving crew members - John and Sherman
were very helpful also the various captains and
crew members were always willing to assist.
A
bonus to our trip was a pod of dolphins we were
all fortunate to see whilst on the boat, they followed
us and stayed with us for some 15 minutes, that
was such a wonderful experience. We were all able
to take a day off from the diving and travel around
the island on a conducted tour, Gill, especially
was grateful for the scenic views that could be
experienced from on top of the huge suspension bridge
overlooking the harbour and Wihemstadt!! As well
as experiencing the beauty around the whole island
we stopped off at a local restaurant and sampled
their culinary delights which included the Iguana
combo, never again!
My
cherished memories of the diving were special quotes
from Alan Kenny and Susie Rusby. During the surface
interval I asked Alan if he saw the Barracuda. His
reply was "No, but I heard it!". Al, you
are a Gem. The quote from Susie was priceless -
Sherman our dive guide in his brief before we dived
mentioned the "thumb splitting shrimps which
could literally split your thumb if you were stupid
enough to stick it into one of their hidey holes.
He also mentioned that he saw one of the said shrimps
do battle with a Puffer fish and the fish lost!
Susie intervened and asked how she would be able
to tell the difference between the two! Well, Susie,
that comes with an enormous amount of experience!!!
My cherished memories on the land were trying to
keep up with Dan's constant shirt changes and of
course the traumas of his love life! You should
have taken my advice Daniel with some of my priceless
chat up lines - they always work for me.
They were some great people on the holiday, my fond
thoughts go to of course Gill for her
endless patience, friendship and quiet subtle humour,
you always make my holiday, thanks. Also to Wellard
and Lisa and also Tony, thanks for your funny lines
and laughter during the days and nights, also congratulations
to Wellard on achieving his 1000th Pleasure Dive.
