Busy 2nd week in Pez Maya- Hurricane Paula, 350, open water, lionfish huntings & baby turtles
Week two and already everyone settled into their new home, Pez Maya. However this week has been no ordinary week of boat pushes, cooking, grounds work, diving and monitoring…Hurricane Paula was coming to town (but more on that later…)
On Saturday we did a promotional picture, with all staff and volunteers for the ¨350 beach clean¨. This is to bring awareness to the carbon dioxide levels in the ocean, which have been predicted to rise in the future. If they were to reach critical level, life within the ocean as we know it, would be unable to survive.
On a lighter note, congratulations to all volunteers who completed their open water in just over one week! Now all they have left to do is to complete their advanced and then they can move onto fish and coral spots.
In the meantime qualified divers have started their spot dives and already seen some amazing things; eels, stingrays, barracudas, and the current rogues of the Caribbean - lionfish. Lionfish are proving a real problem as they have no predators in these waters, so they have increased in numbers rapidly. Hunters from Pez Maya have been going out with the dive groups in bid to cull the population.
We also helped two baby turtles make their way to sea the other day. The night before, the majority of the nest had hatched leaving these two behind. However we helped them out and sent them on their way.
Now to hurricane Paula. Tuesday morning started as any normal day with morning duties, boat push and breakfast. As we were tucking in, Ed received a phone call from head office telling us we had to evacuate base. This came as quite a shock to everyone as the weather seemed good and people were kitting up to dive. However we had no choice but to pack away the entire base and prepare for bad weather. Time was of the essence… We had to pack quickly if we were to outrun Paula. She was moving swiftly up the coast, closing the gap between us and certain disaster. It took five hours in total, which was a great effort by the whole team and once everything was secure, we all left for the local town, Tulum.
Fortunately for Pez Maya, hurricane Paula did not strike…Unfortunately for staff and volunteers we had to rebuild the base the following day in torrential rain.
That’s all from Pez Maya for now; we have to go prepare for Turtle Festival this weekend!
Cheers! Caz and Katie x
On Saturday we did a promotional picture, with all staff and volunteers for the ¨350 beach clean¨. This is to bring awareness to the carbon dioxide levels in the ocean, which have been predicted to rise in the future. If they were to reach critical level, life within the ocean as we know it, would be unable to survive.
On a lighter note, congratulations to all volunteers who completed their open water in just over one week! Now all they have left to do is to complete their advanced and then they can move onto fish and coral spots.
In the meantime qualified divers have started their spot dives and already seen some amazing things; eels, stingrays, barracudas, and the current rogues of the Caribbean - lionfish. Lionfish are proving a real problem as they have no predators in these waters, so they have increased in numbers rapidly. Hunters from Pez Maya have been going out with the dive groups in bid to cull the population.
We also helped two baby turtles make their way to sea the other day. The night before, the majority of the nest had hatched leaving these two behind. However we helped them out and sent them on their way.
Now to hurricane Paula. Tuesday morning started as any normal day with morning duties, boat push and breakfast. As we were tucking in, Ed received a phone call from head office telling us we had to evacuate base. This came as quite a shock to everyone as the weather seemed good and people were kitting up to dive. However we had no choice but to pack away the entire base and prepare for bad weather. Time was of the essence… We had to pack quickly if we were to outrun Paula. She was moving swiftly up the coast, closing the gap between us and certain disaster. It took five hours in total, which was a great effort by the whole team and once everything was secure, we all left for the local town, Tulum.Fortunately for Pez Maya, hurricane Paula did not strike…Unfortunately for staff and volunteers we had to rebuild the base the following day in torrential rain.
That’s all from Pez Maya for now; we have to go prepare for Turtle Festival this weekend!
Cheers! Caz and Katie x
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