Snorkeling with Friends at Diani Beach

On Easter late morning, we all piled into two tour-taxis and drove about 20 km south down the island to Diani Beach. There are numerous glass-bottom boats stationed there for snorkeling because of the shallow-water coral reef, which is protected from wave action by a small white sandy island. The boat captains would throw their anchors down onto the reef (ugh!) and park while bunches of us piled out of the boats with our fins, masks, and snorkels. At one point, during the hour+ we spent snorkeling, I looked up to see about 7 boats parked side-by-side over the reef. I shudder to think of all the damage we humans are doing to just that reef alone, not to mention those all over the planet. Guilty as I am of contributing to that devastation, I did enjoy counting and chasing the numberous neon fluorescent tropical species that cruised beneath me and my gear. Amazing colors and lights and designs! I quit counting at 30+ fluorescent species, but these included starfish and sea urchins along with your typical luminescent fish.

After I felt like I had seen all the variety and sights I could see beneath me, I looked around to see where the others were. I was feeling very sunburn I thought, and wanted to cover up. Jael and I had already found each other and snorkeled together for about the last 30 minutes, so we both came out of the water around the same time. So did everyone else. Then we did our photo shoot from the little sandy island. (The photos are mostly from Tamara's camera, which I had borrowed because Tamara chose to stay back at Tiwi). It turned out that I wasn't really burned at all, but had just felt like it with the salt water and sun glaring down on my back all morning.