Hey everyone!

Today the day began fairly early for all of us, with breakfast at 7. The breakfast was so great, I specifically loved the banana pancakes! Then we suited up and got ready for our first dive. It was great to finally get into the water, specially because it was so refreshing and because we got to see so many amazing species. I got specially excited when I saw a Highhat (a piscivorous fish, my taxa) eat another smaller fish! Sadly I didn’t have the camera with me on the first swim so I didn’t get to take a photo (yet, even if I had the camera I am not sure I would have been fast enough!)

After swimming for a while we came back onto land and got lunch. As always the food was great, I got some french fries, cole slaw, and two raisin cookies. After lunch we went for another swim, yet this time it was a completely different experience: we went through the mangroves of death. There, we all got aggressively bitten by the blood thirsty mosquitoes. We all ran into the water hoping it would stop, yet they followed us in. Thankfully, as we moved further in they left us alone and we were at peace to take photos (and attempt to complete the scavenger hunt!) I personally did not finish the scavenger hunt yet I got to see so many cool fish, sponges, and many hard and soft corals. After a while we got asked if we wanted to run back through the mangroves of death or swim a much longer route. Without a second thought we all chose to swim back. After we got back many of us took the chance to shower. Then we watched two presentations about hard corals and soft corals. Afterwards we got a much needed break before dinner. Later at dinner we got really tasty rice and cheesecake! To conclude our day, after dinner we all listened to a few more presentations, this time about coral reef framework and growth, sponges, ctenophores, and jellyfish. Today was very fun and also a little tiring, yet I’m more than sure that we will all be ready tomorrow morning after a well deserved 10 hour nap.