{"id":2236,"date":"2016-12-23T19:19:24","date_gmt":"2016-12-24T01:19:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/?p=2236"},"modified":"2025-02-27T16:33:40","modified_gmt":"2025-02-27T22:33:40","slug":"my-so-far-only-scuba-dive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/2016\/12\/23\/my-so-far-only-scuba-dive\/","title":{"rendered":"My (so far) only scuba dive"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a>Sondra, who had monitored my progress or lack thereof suggested that when we get to Cartagena, I look up a dive shop and talk to the boss about taking me solo.\u00a0 “You’re not ready for prime time,”\u00a0 she lectured to the already convinced.<\/p>\n

I made contact with Dive Planet in Cartagena, and announced that I wanted to go scuba diving.\u00a0 I had my card, but “was not ready for prime time.”\u00a0 The boss asked if I could afford a private dive, and when I assured him that I could, we were in business.\u00a0 We joined one of his tours out to a dive site,\u00a0 \u00a0I explained I had never scubad before, and I was really worried.\u00a0 My goal was to basically snorkel but about 5 feet down and not have to keep coming up for air.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>The ride was through the harbor and past some of the surviving forts that guarded the entrance to the largest Spanish fort in the New World.<\/p>\n

When we got to an underwater park, he let his group go, and worked patiently with me, reminding me of the basics, particularly how to follow and signal to him.\u00a0 Somewhat emboldened, I backed over the side and all of a sudden was in the warm Caribbean.\u00a0 He pointed out the deadly but beautiful Japanese Man-of-War.\u00a0 When I looked at my depth gauge, I realized I was at 50 feet, which was about the limits I was equipped to handle.\u00a0 The colors at that depth changed, and had I not been rational, I might have wanted to stay all day.\u00a0 Fortunately, the boss was smarter than I was, so we went back to have lunch with Carolyn.\u00a0 One more dive topped the day, and we returned to the city with another check on my bucket list.<\/p>\n

I’d said I would not go anywhere specifically to scuba, but the card did enable me to add the activity to possible events.\u00a0 I could not wait to gush to Patti Koranda and Dick Smith about how well their pupil had done.\u00a0 Sondra already knew.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sondra, who had monitored my progress or lack thereof suggested that when we get to Cartagena, I look up a dive shop and talk to the boss about taking me solo.\u00a0 “You’re not ready for prime time,”\u00a0 she lectured to the already convinced. I made contact with Dive Planet in Cartagena, and announced that I … Continue reading “My (so far) only scuba dive”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2236","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arrival-cartagena-2016"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2236","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2236"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2236\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8401,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2236\/revisions\/8401"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2236"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2236"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2236"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}