VTVLC 2018 Marine Biology Trip to Honduras : Third Day in Utilá

Students woke up, ate breakfast (Honduran pancakes or fried dough) then reef ecology students soon headed out on the first scientific dive of the day. Students in their groups were sent out to identify invertebrates like crabs, shrimp and snails. One really cool invertebrates we saw, a favorite amongst groups is called the Christmas tree worm, a small creatures that lives inside hard coral and when disturbed shoots it’s beautiful shape into its small hole of a home.

This morning the open water crew watched the last of our PADI informational videos. We were then surprised with our final written exam which we all passed easily. After the test we went on or second open water dive. The dive location we went to was Black Coral Wall. Everyone geared up and hopped into the bright blue water. After descending to the bottom about 6 meters down, we briefly went over a few skills. We then spent the rest of the dive swimming around the reef. We went down to about 12 meters at the deepest part of our dive, which meant going along the side of the reef where it dropped off into deeper water. We returned to shore for lunch and then did some class work with using a dive table. This got a little confusing but everyone figured it out eventually.

The second dive for the reef ecology group included the group video taping an area on the reef location where students were asked to tuck measuring tape around coral, rock, sand, algae and sponge where we would later identify these structures when looking at the videos.

The open water crew’s second dive of the day was in confined water. One of the groups went in the pool and practiced skills and the other group went out into the reef just off the dock. One of the skills was to take off our masks and swim around a little bit, guided by our dive master. This was challenging and new for some people.

Instead of our normal dinner and lectures tonight, we took a group trip into town for a carnival going on. It was about a 20 minute walk to town, where we had a delicious dinner of tacos and assorted meats. We then walked around for a little bit and got dessert from small markets, then made our way back to Coral View Beach Resort. It was a fun quick trip and everyone had a great time experiencing the local culture of Utila.