Secret Harbour: Snorkeling and Scuba Diving
Now it was time to get serious! It was time to do a little packing for
the day because we
ARE GOING
SCUBA
DIVING!
%20copy.jpg)
Ok, so let's take a step back. We were supposed to be on the Oasis of the Seas for Spring Break and St Thomas was on the list of ports we were stop at. I knew that was the place we wanted to scuba dive at. So I contacted several places that were suggested to me on the cruise forum. One of them was to dive with Aqua Action at Secret Harbour. Now Secret Harbour is a place I have considered going for a beach day in the past, but we just never made it there yet.
I contacted Aqua Action about doing a discover dive. They had openings and I inquired about the dive site if diving from the beach and not a boat dive. (Kendra has a tendency to freak out a little and "says" she gets sick on the boat despite they have owned several boats and we used to spend every weekend at the beach) So I decided it would have to be a beach dive to satisfy her. I was told that the beach dive was a shallow reef and around 20' depth and it's a 45 minute dive. She stated there was a sandy bottom with rays and hermit crabs and also some rocks with coral and a bunch of juvenile fish. She informed me they were a sanctuary there at the harbour and said the fish breed well there.
So......... I knew that it wasn't going to be a spectacular dive but it would be good enough that Kendra would enjoy herself and as long as there was something to see, I would be fine too. I was excited either way.
We MapsMe our way there and could not find parking. This place is at a resort and there's no parking unless you are staying there. She had said something about there are 4 parking spots and it was first come first serve but for some reason there was a truck in one of them and they had cones blocking the other 3 spots. So, we were told if those 4 spots were taken we would need to go up the hill for parking and walk back down.
Well, remember our adventure the other day? Well here comes another big hill and I knew there would be no way for me to drive up there and be able to walk down it. There was just no way.
Billy volunteered to be the one to drive up and him and B would walk down. We all got out of the van and grabbed our things and up he went with the soccer dad van. The tires were squealing again as he went up the hill. I laughed...but only because it was not me this time. They said the walk was really long and the level that you can see from down below wasn't even the level you had to park at...it was higher.
We started following a sidewalk and we were pretty lost. We did see a sign pointing left so we went left. We didn't see anything that looked like a dive shop so we found a nice area right beside the water and under a tree. The hubby walked to the other side of the beach and found the dive shop. Both Kendra and I swore the sign said to go left.
Let me tell you what, this place was beautiful! I really really liked it here. The water was so crystal clear I couldn't believe it. The water reminded me of the time we went to Goffs Caye in Belize. I had never seen the water any clearer than that water...until now.
Now let me show you how clear this water is. I was standing in it up over my knees when I took this picture. If water hadn't dropped from me and made a ripple then this picture would appear as if I just had my foot in the sand and had taken the picture.
So let me show you this beach and how pretty it is. Of course I want you to know that the absolute minute that we got on the beach and put our chairs and things down, I immediately headed to the water with my snorkel gear to check it out. So, these pictures were taken mostly after we went diving and before we left.
It was just gorgeous is all I can say and definitely a place I would return to in a heart beat.
So like I said, I immediately headed into the water because it was calling my name. I snorkeled right in front of where we were sitting (which was the opposite side of the dive shop and where the reef was and I just didn't know it yet). Immediately along the side were fish and things to see. Kam was yelling "You swim with me mamaw? You swim with me? You swim with me mamaw?" I told her she'd have to get her mom this time because I was going exploring and of course, she has come to like the ocean too and wanted to see the fish, but I let her know that I needed to have a look around alone first and then I'd let her know if it was safe (and shallow enough) for her to come. Then off I went....
So far, I was pretty impressed with what I was seeing. Plenty of coral life and a few fishes here and there. Sakari was right there with me exploring. Now if you've noticed, she seems to be swimming a lot without her mermaid tail. I don't know what it was about this trip but she really didn't use it a lot. She preferred to swim without anything. Could she possibly be growing out of this mermaid stage? Oh I hope not!
Then she discovered the floating dock and headed there. She loved jumping off of it.
%20copy.jpg)
%20copy.jpg)
I would continue to explore without my swimming buddy at this point. She was having too much fun. Lost her to a floating dock in the middle of the bay. :(
I had never seen so many squirrel fish in one spot at the same time. You might see a few hiding here and there, but there were a lot here at Secret Harbour!
I would come up every so often to see if Sakari wanted to continue our snorkeling together and I would only see her saying watch me! Take a picture!
And then I spotted it....
%20copy.jpg)
It was game on after that...here she came. Duuude, you saved me and she's back to swimming with mommy again! Sakari would follow him around for awhile and swim and was having such a great time. Just think, we've paid to go swimming with the turtles in Barbados several times and this trip has been amazing with finding them right at the beach. It was just great.
This is how close we were to the waters edge.
%20copy.jpg)
I knew it was getting close to the time we should be heading over for scuba diving so we started heading back to the opposite side of the beach where everyone was at. Of course snorkeling along the way back. Our dive was to be at 1pm.
I absolutely love feather dusters (worms) and the colorful ones are so pretty. You see the red and white striped one above? How cool is that? I've only seen them a handful of other times.
We gathered our things needed for scuba diving and gosh darnit I forgot our scuba dive log books that we always carry with us and have them sign Sakari's book! It was sitting on the table back at the condo. I have never forgotten that before. Mom failure today. :(
Me, the hubby, Sakari, and Brayden headed over to the dive shop. Only we are missing someone...Kendra! Well, she decided she was not going to do the dive. Her lips were still hurting and at this point they were starting to swell. She told us to go on without her and she wasn't even getting her face in the water because of them. She said they kept her up last night and she wasn't feeling the greatest because they were burning. I felt bad for her but at least B was going to get to go.
We checked in at the front desk and paid and the longer we stood there the more items we seemed to by from the store. From pop to drink to other little things...but I found my SCUBA GUY magnet. I have only been able to find them at a few other places. They are hard to find. I swore that the next time I found them I was going to buy a bunch of them and just paint the names of the places we've been diving at on them. But, they only had one of them darnit!
We waited for quite some time before they were ready for us and they took us back to a room for our "class". Our instructor ended up being Courtnie, who was the person I had been emailing for months (for both our visit by cruise ship and this land vacation). She started having us fill out our forms and put a video on for us to "watch". Now I don't know about everyone else, but I'm not concentrating or watching something on a tv if I'm reading and trying to fill out forms. I couldn't even tell you what it was about honestly. A glance up here and there to see a family having instruction or diving with huge smiles on their faces that looked like it's the best thing they've ever done was on the screen I'm sure. Then Courtnie came in to briefly go over our "skills" information and we ran through them so quickly I don't really remember that either. But, we've done so many of these classes that we really don't need to go into depth on everything. We took our test, received our fins and supplies needed and then headed out to the water.
%20copy.jpg)
We quickly did our skills test in the ocean with no issues and then Courtnie motioned us up. She said everyone did good and "are you ready?" At the time I was standing up, I glance over and see Kendra and Kam at the beach and she was taking pictures of us. She mouthed something and then started putting her fingers up. Two fingers up, then 1 finger, then 5 fingers. What was this sign language. Ohhhh I get it, it's 2:15pm. Ok, thanks for that. I don't know if she was trying to say that it had already been 1 hr and 15 minutes since the start of this or what. But I gave her the "ok" dive sign and off we went for our 45 minute shallow reef dive.
Now the first thing I always try to do is take a picture of us heading out. I gave Sakari my newer camera because she really enjoys taking the macro's on this camera. Normally the hubby would be armed with the gopro but for some reason I couldn't get it to work just a day before we left for vacation. I was charging it one day and it worked fine and then the next it wouldn't even come on. So, I decided not to deal with the hassle and didn't bring it this time. I was heartbroken though because I had just purchased a new case for it and filters especially for diving and color correction!
Now prepare yourselves to be bombarded with so many beautiful colors in the next thousand or two pictures I'm about to share (well not really, but it sure felt like it when I was trying to pick out which one's to share) because the corals are just so vibrant and colorful.
LET THE COLOR EXPLOSION BEGIN
I want to start out by showing you this picture. It was close where we first went in. It's called pulsing xenia. They are so neat to watch and I had some in my small "nemo" tank. They open and close like they are dancing and I think it's probably the first time I have ever really seen them in the ocean.
There seemed to be a lot of clams in this area too. Sometimes they are really hard to spot because they blend in with the rocks or sea floor. But the little zig zag top always gives them away and if you get close enough, they will close up.
This little guy was digging his way to China as well. Maybe that's where Sakari gets it from
We continued on. I was taking my time and taking pictures along the way. I'm always the last in the line. I just hate to rush. I feel like you miss all the beauty. Most beginners dive to just be diving and the experience. I dive for the pictures of course!
There were just so many different colored sponges and coral. It was so beautiful and to know it was so close to the beach and pretty shallow water.
I was going right along and I noticed I was headed in the wrong direction. I quickly turned around ??? and started following the hubby. Sakari was going along and taking pictures as well and I could tell she was doing some macro shots.
I'll share some of Sakari's photography she did this time. She captured some really good up close pictures and some that were so-so. But she gave it her all.
I REALLY REALLY REALLY like this one she did. The composure and everything I thought was spot on! The way she positioned the camera above it and looking down instead of from the side. She is really starting to pay attention to detail and explore different angles.
%20copy.jpg)
And just a few more from her before I continue on.
Remember how she said we would head out to the reef and turn and then go out to maybe some grassy area to see the turtles and rays? I was starting to see more sand than reef so figure at any given time we were about to turn right and head over that way (although I would have just rather spent more time on the reef than any grassy area with the turtles because we've seen those snorkeling and have had more than our fair share of turtle spotting this vacation but whatever).
Then I notice that the kids were holding something and I kicked, as much as I could with a bum leg, to get over for pictures. They had captured an arrow crab. Now remember B didn't particularly like the one we held when we were doing the SeaTrek walk. But for some reason, he was ok with this one.
We continued on...
Then I see her give the up signal and we went up. I thought she was about to tell us what was next. Instead I got a "so how'd you like it?" My first reply was "Wait, are you saying we're done? We haven't even been out here very long". She said "yes, the dive is over". I frantically looked all over for Kendra because I remembered her giving me the 2, 1, 5 signal before we left and I NEEDED to know what time it was right this very moment! She was nowhere to be found. I would have to rely on my pictures at that point. I knew there was ABSOLUTELY POSITIVELY NO WAY we were out there 45 minutes. It felt like maybe 15 minutes to 20 minutes TOPS!
I'm sorry, but I kept questioning her like I knew it was off. We've done a lot of dives (IMO), well at least enough to know what 45 minutes feels like. I'm no fool! She kept insisting that we were out there 45 minutes. We walked inside to get our books stamped and filled out. Kendra finally showed up and said "What is going on? Why are you back already?" I told her I honestly had no idea and I know we weren't out there no 45 minutes. She said "no because I told you when you were just finishing up your skills it was 2:15pm and you guys are already back and it's only been around 15-20 minutes!" She said once we left she had noticed that the instructor left the flag thing behind that they always hold to let boaters know you are down below and she tried to go out and catch up with us to let us know and ended up with some spikes in her fingers from a sea urchin because she couldn't put her head under water to see what was under there. She ended up with 5 spikes in her finger and here's the remaining 3 still in her finger the next day.
This would be the only video I took during our dive that day due to the short period of time we were out there.
She said after she couldn't catch up with us, she walked back to the other side of the beach to get Kam, they went out in the water and she looked up and noticed us coming out of the water and walked back down the beach to us. Kendra also questioned Courtnie and Courtnie kept insisting that the dive was 45 minutes. Then she said let me show you my dive log on the watch. She kept scrolling and scrolling and if this dive watch is anything like other things, you scroll to the first one and that should be your last dive? You shouldn't have to keep scrolling to look for it right??? She couldn't find it and then came up with an entirely different story at that point.
The story now changed to it was a TOTAL of 45 minutes. Wait, what do you mean a "total" of 45 minutes??? She now said it was including the skills. Oh hold up a minute!! I have NEVER had another dive company include our skills check off as part of the actual dive. There's usually time allotted for the class and the check off and it doesn't include the dive itself! Heck, I think back to the times we've went before and Kendra had issues getting adjusted to the breathing or mask issues and spent near 30 minutes just doing that BEFORE going on a 45 minute dive. Also the times we've done a skills check out in a pool prior to heading to the beach. They NEVER included that time in the dive. Just a minute ago you stated the dive was 45 minutes and now you're changing it to that included our skills as well? What a rip off! I just paid $270 for a 15 minute dive along the side of the rocks where I could have snorkeled and seen all that. I mean I knew it was a shallow dive and all but NEVER would I have paid for that amount of time! She tried to say every dive company includes the skills in the dive itself. BS! For a Discover Scuba Dive, they have a certain amount of time allotted for the entire thing from start to finish meaning from the start of the video's, class, skills and the dive and it's usually a few hours long. She then said "yes, the entire thing was for 2 1/2 hours. Ok, so if that's the case, our class was supposed to start at 1pm (and we got started later than that) and if I calculate this correctly then the entire thing should be over by 3:30pm right? Kendra looks at the clock and says it's only 3pm at this point and we had been standing in there while she filled out the books. So had we had a 45 minute dive (like we were told AND their website says) we would be finishing up at 3:30pm as she said.
So on to the next story she had for us which was "Well, you guys are too advanced for this type of dive and should have done a boat dive". So of course MY next reply was "Why, so we could dive for maybe 10 minutes because since it includes skills and all in the 45 minute dive, then I'm sure you have to factor in the time from the beach in the boat out to the dive site so there goes your entire time!" She said "no you would do a 45 minute dive after we get to the dive site" SO WHY IS THIS ANY DIFFERENT???? You would give us 45 minutes of diving time if we went by boat but right off the beach you don't??? Does this really make any sense? To ANYONE?
Of course I have a camera and take A LOT of pictures and a picture when we first started and it was 2:19 when we actually went under and took off. Sakari has pictures of us ALREADY OUT OF THE WATER and walking on the beach at 2:40pm. So that meant the dive had been over long enough for us to come up, me asking about the time and her making small talk about how great we are at diving and it was the most relaxing and easiest dive for her when she's not constantly having to watch people, taking our fins off and me taking my BCD and tank off (because I couldn't carry the tank because of my leg) AND getting out of the water and walking to the shop. So you are talking 21 minutes total from my first picture when we went under to us already having our stuff off and out of the water...which would equal about 15-16 minutes in diving!
I'm just so disappointed in this entire experience and I would NEVER use them again or recommend them to anyone. When she changed her story several times I knew she knew we were right and that's just bad business trying to cover your tracks like that. Just not right!
After scuba I decided to go over and snorkel the area we had just went diving at. (Yea, there's no such thing as too much water time for me). It's quite the swim from the other side of the beach and I would snap a few pictures here and there. I spotted a cute little spotted trunkfish. I just LOVE these little guys from their coloring and spots, to their cute little lips, to the way they flutter around in the water.
I made it over to the rocks and took a few pictures in the area. I spotted a sea cucumber, a large crab walking around, and a pencil sea urchin (which was exciting because I don't see them very often at all) so that made my day...and a fireworm...which didn't make my day and I stayed far away from it.
I then remembered that I hadn't done any over/under pictures and thought I would give it a shot. The water was fairly calm but I didn't have my fish eye lens so I really doubted that I would get anything. Here's a few shots that was "almost" there and looked like any other over/under shots that I've attempted in the past. Close but no prize for me and not National Geographic worthy.
I just can never seem to get it right...until this happened...
Now THAT'S what I have been trying to accomplish on any over/under pictures I've taken in the past. I was super happy when I got home and seen the way these pictures turned out! #pattingselfonback
Mr Krabbie Cakes walking along the sea floor on my way back
My day is made and I had the long swim back to the other side of the beach where it looked like my family had disappeared. All of our bags and the chairs were GONE!
I finally found Kendra and the crew had moved up and under the trees and they were relaxing but yet ready to go.
I told them to go ahead and carry stuff up and Billy was going to get the van.
Sakari showed me that she had been stung by something and she had a bump on her finger/hand. When she was over on the floating dock she made some friends that were staying at the hotel and they kept asking me, while I was snorkeling, if there was anything under the dock because every time they jumped in and climbed up the ladder they felt like they were getting stung. I investigated and didn't see anything there. I never got stung while I was there around them either.
This place was a great place to come to to snorkel. It was crystal clear water and plenty to see. We had an amazing time at the beach. HOWEVER, I would NEVER recommend Aqua Action for diving if you are a Discover Scuba Diver. NEVER EVER! They completely ripped us off and it wasn't cheap! You could tell they knew what they did and I would never use them again! BEWARE!