Lots of exciting things down here. I actually stayed awake for the entire ride down (about 5 hours), which was awesome for me because I always fall asleep on long drives, even if it's just an hour. After arriving we had a small orientation, and were eaten alive by mosquitoes. Erin was kind enough to share he bug spray with all of us, and for the most part they let up. After dropping off our bags in our rooms, we went down to the dive shop to try on flippers and masks. While we were scheduled for our trip out to Bird Island on Friday, weather conditions moved it to Monday.

We did get to go down to the beach this afternoon before dinner, and the tide was going out so there was lots of neat things to see.I found a whole shell from a bivalve (not sure what kind yet) and a tube worm shell. We also stumbled upon a stargazer fish! There are over 51 species of stargazer, but I believe this one is a Smooth Stargazer. It also has large poisonous spines behind the pectoral fins, but I didn't know that at the time, and thankfully I didn't have to find out first hand.

Photo by: Jessica McAdams

 He was dead, and slimy, but still pretty cool! Though I don't want to meet the fish that took a bite out of him...

Photo by: Jessica McAdams

Also met a little crab today with lots of eggs on her belly, so cool!

Photo by: Jessica McAdams

After the beach we went to dinner, and I took my friend Zach's advice and got a Mexican Shrimp Cocktail. All in all it was a pretty awesome first day.

Photo by: Jessica McAdams