Week 2 – Ruins, Jobs and more Sharks!

Now that we have all settled into base, Pez Maya is starting to feel like home. And like any home, it comes with its fair share of jobs. This week we were handed out our monitor jobs. This includes everything that needs done around the base from logistics on the kitchen, bar and tuck to writing blogs for the rest of the world to read! But as we got to pick them, I don’t think anyone can complain.

The weather settled down during the first part of the week and we all managed to get in some diving. With virtually all of us ready for the open water, we were diving in the sea. Due to all of us being at different levels, some people are already spotting, others are finishing their advanced open water and for us lowly open water divers, we are getting to dive at deeper depths. With the deeper dives comes more interesting wildlife that lives in the ocean, including sharks! That’s right people, we saw more sharks! Although he was lying still inside his cave, it was still very cool to see him in his natural habitat. Even better was when we went to check behind the cave to see if we could get a better view, we found a crab guarding his back door!

We don’t spend all of our time on dives though. Thanks to lots of hard studying, we are happy to say that everyone has passed their coral and fish tests! Well done guys!

This week we got a special treat in the form of Emergency First Responder (EFR) training. After watching the most patronising video in the world (even better than the PADI open water videos), we practiced our skills on each other doing everything from bandaging to full body checks. We also got to practice CPR on a very lovely manikin named Little Annie.

The weather being as predictable as ever, we couldn’t dive on Thursday due to rough seas. So instead, most of the group decided to go visit the Mayan Ruins in Tulum. We arrived at the ruins in the sweltering heat to find more salesmen than Katie could handle. After buying lunch we decided to save some money and walk to the base of the ruins. We paid our entry (all except for our Mexican volunteers who got in free!) and then followed the path into the breath taking ruins. Many photos were taken and all of us wished we could have learnt more about the ruins of which we were photographing. It was still worth it to see the ruins in all their glory as well as the beach and the lonely iguana. Having finished at the ruins, we all walked into Tulum to enjoy a fantastic dinner at Buenos Aires.

Also, as we spent so much time cleaning the bridge in our first week, we made some signs to try and encourage people to clean up their own litter. It was fun to do and hopefully people will pay attention to them.

Peace and love, Crouz & Maja

Week 2 – Ruins, Jobs and more Sharks!