I slept really well at the Manta Lodge. Other than the constant breaking of the waves, the hotel was quiet as a tomb. Little town. Off season. Turns out there are two other guests, John and Linda from San Antonio. Since none of us are serious partiers, the bar was quiet except for the tv playing the introduction to Law and Order.
First thing in the morning you go down and enjoy the ocean view from the restaurant - bar area. You sit and enjoy your coffee until the waitress asks what you'd like for breakfast. Today's offering is bacon and eggs with toast and jam. I think the jam was actually orange marmalade. Given my experience, I thought breakfast might be an exercise in futility and it was.
About 7:30 Sean, the divemaster, asks me if I'm ready to go. I am the only diver today so no problem. Sean, Sledge, his assistant, and I pile into their extra fancy dive truck. After a bit of coaxing and one inspection under the hood, the truck starts and we drive down to the town pier to head out for our day of diving.
Sean and I get our gear ready while Sledge prepares the boat. This is one of the smaller boats I've been on during one of our dive trips. Sledge will stay with the boat while Sean and I dive. Sean, oddly enough, is Swiss but he allows that he could never live in Switzerland. I suspect it left its mark though. He doesn't care for Caribbean islands that don't have mountains.
Once everything is ready Sean takes the helm and we're away heading for the wreck of the MV Roundtable. The ship was intentionally sunk for divers so we're able to go inside through a hatch into what had been the engine room, through the interior and finally up to the bridge.
After getting back onto the boat, the futility of eating breakfast became apparent and we headed off toward dive spot#2, the Japanese Gardens. This is a particularly rich assortment of coral and fish and I saw several tarpons, lobsters and some strange little eels who were busy pretending to be seaweed. The underwater currents were very strong and now I fully understand the idea of drift diving.
After another surface rest period, demonstrating the futility of eating breakfast again, and admiring the view of Speyside from the boat, we do our third dive of the morning at a location called The Cathedral, or if you happen to be from around here, De Cadedral. All the white spots on the shore are buildings.
By noon, the day's diving is done and I'm starving. So after cleaning the salt out of everything, I'm off down the road to find lunch.
Today I pick Birdwatcher's Restaurant and Bar. Their place is much nicer than Redman's; they have glass windows and matching furniture. The menu is similar though; chicken, fish, lobster and shrimp. With any of those you get the same sides; rice, salad, macaroni pie, callaloo and provision.
The two mystery items, the callaroo and the provisions are on the upper left of my plate. The callaloo is a pureed spinach with some assorted spices. The provisions are an assortment of starchy foods. In this case I got a couple of slices of plantains and some purplish yam that was like the taro I've tried in Hawaii. In any case, the food was fine and abundant and a bit less expensive than at Redman's.
And, yes, I had a bottle of Carib Beer. And a bottle of Sorrel Shandy. I have no idea what a sorrel is... the bottle had pictures of some bright red plant or flower or something. It was definitely tasty.
