Just a few Random and Amazing Photos from all over Cozumel! Cozumel has started to reopen after a complete Pandemic Shutdown! They are going slow and doing it right.
[Read more…] about Random and Amazing Photos from all over the Island of Cozumel!
Do you love the little creatures in the sea? You can find them in amazing Cozumel! Most divers who have traveled to several oceans are familiar with the term, “muck diving”. Muck diving is exactly what it sounds like, diving in muddy, silty substrate which can include coral skeletons and garbage. In such an environment, divers and particularly photographers, can find amazing little creatures and unusual fish. I am not saying that Cozumel has “muck”, but it certainly has shallow dive sites off the shore filled with amazing little critters!
And the rest of these photographs were taken on amazing Cozumel shore dives!
I have done a few shore dives with Mario, of Scuba with Mario. He has incredible eyes, and can find amazingly small critters! Truthfully, my eyes are so bad I can’t find the tiny, tiny stuff even though I wear a prescription mask. I’ve worn glasses since 3rd grade, but in the last couple of years my sight has really declined. I’m grateful when I dive with people who have great sight! I cannot believe some of the animals I saw with Mario…many for the first time!
The moral of the story is: don’t let anyone tell you you cannot find the little critters in Cozumel! As you can see, they are definitely there.
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What’s it about? Photos and fun facts about tropical reef fish, All Fish Faces is an underwater treasure of tropical reef fish faces, some fierce, some fun, but all a joy for fish fans young and old. Impressive, colorful photos and interesting facts — including names of every fish featured — create a colorful dive log worth experiencing again and again. Getting to know, and love, our ocean friends, and feeling the excitement of discovery, is the way to preserve the ocean for future generations! Includes tips on how to help conserve our ocean resources and save our ocean friends. 10% of profits will go to the Marine Megafauna Foundation so they can continue their scientific research to protect our oceans and ocean giants.
My life is a series of unexpected misadventures. I tell my friends they have to be prepared for the unexpected when they travel with me! I recently invited 3 of my closest blogger friends to my home in Cozumel, Villa Coronado. I was excited that they accepted my invitation, and I wanted everything to be perfect! We love our home on Cozumel, and we are also in love with our island, and our island restaurants. I made reservations, arranged for a tasting (#4ChicasinCozumel had an Amazing Tasting at Buccano’s at Night), and looked forward to showing Suzanne (Adventures of Empty Nesters), Sara (Travel with Sara), and Melody (Wherever I May Roam Blog) a wonderful time. However, no matter how hard I try, misadventure is always in my periphery, so it is a good thing my friends are adventurous women!
So, the first mishap was my 20 year old car (hey, it’s an island car, and awesome!). As we returned from our first evening’s dinner at Pepe’s, the car began to smoke. Melody in the back seat asked if we could smell smoke, and I said no. By the time we arrived at my house the car was smoking and hissing like crazy. We all jumped out and ran inside, I mean, what if the car was on fire? It cooled down quickly, but I called our house manager and arranged for him to come out early (people on the island get up at ungodly hours, like 430a or 5a, but not me!) to check the car. Now, this is really awful, especially for me because I am such an animal lover, but Jimmy told me he found a nest in the engine. There was a lot of laughter about it, but I did feel a twinge of guilt and texted my husband about it. He, of course, informed everyone we know, and I began to receive messages like, “I hear you are a bird murderer.”
Of course, the weather did not want to cooperate, and it was overcast. We jumped in the car so I could take them on a tour of the island, and I particularly wanted to take them to the east side (the wild side) of the island which is almost completely uninhabited and wild. Turtles nest on the beaches, there are cool blowholes throwing up geisers, and long stretches of sand to walk on. I knew they would love it! We never got there.
Halfway to the southern tip of island, Punta Sur, the car began to smoke. I knew birds could not have built a nest again so quickly, so we got out of the car. Again, it hissed and steamed, but cooled down. At this point, the sun came out, beating down on us on a black asphalt road in the middle of the jungle. It’s October, so there aren’t a lot of people on the road. For me, the unexpected is the norm, so I can’t say I was surprised at my run of bad luck, and thankfully the gals thought it was hilarious. Cars went by without stopping, though we received a few waves. Finally, a couple slowed down and came back asking if we needed help. Thank you Pete and Becky, we all piled into their tiny dune buggy-ish car and they took us to the Rasta Bar at the end of the island. As we arrived…it started to pour rain. Mucho uvioso!
We had a seat in the open bar area with the wind whipping and the rain coming in sideways. Again, the girls found it funny. Like me, they have a fun loving streak, so they laughed and took photos…for a few minutes. It is true that sometimes you have a really fun adventure when things go off the rails, and fortunately that was the case in this instance. We had to wait on a couple who were at the only dry table in the place. We ordered some goodies and drinks, and settled down to wait out the storm. The Rasta Bar is right on the beach and the waves were really pounding the shore. I’ve been to the bar a million times for a quick drink and a swing in the hammocks, but on this day it was packed! After an hour or so it started to lighten up, and we grabbed a cab to get back to the house. I’d left my keys in my car so was worried that I didn’t have a key to my house, but hey, there my baby was, on the side of the road, all windows open, the interior soaking wet, with my keys in it. Long story short, we went back to the house.
So the manager got it to a shop, and I rented a car. We went out and had a lovely dinner, which will be another blog because the food, as always, was amazing and deserves its own post. We had a lovely meal and a much calmer evening. We had so much fun together, it is always fun to be with people who “get” you, and bloggers and writers have their own set of idiosyncrasies. The next morning we were able to get out and go to the other side of the island, and it was fabulous. We stopped for a drink at Coconuts, a well known crazy bar on a cliff with a view. After exploring, we headed to the grocery and Melody, who is quite the cook, wanted to whip something up for us. She asked me, do you know how to turn on the oven? Of course, I mean it is my house, right? As if I really know how to turn on the oven. I fiddled with it, but it wasn’t heating, so I finally figured out that you have to hit the pilot light, or the starter, or whatever you call it. By the time I did that the oven was full of gas, and you guessed it, it went BOOM and I flew back several feet, landing on my back. At that point I remembered that I had done it previously. Oops. Suzanne came running, and couldn’t believe I was lying on my back in the kitchen after being blown back five or six feet. She heard the boom, and the other gals came running, so we told them what happened. Fortunately I wasn’t on fire, so no major damage, just a lot of laughter.
We got the car back, returned the rental, and continued to have a wonderful time. You know, there was something else that happened, but I can’t remember what it was. Hm. Truthfully, so many bizarre and weird things happen to me, basically due to my own unique ADHD craziness, I don’t always remember everything that goes wrong. I know I’m forgetting something, maybe the girls will remember. I’m sure it is something ridiculous, as usual. It is my theory that I was jinxed at birth with peculiarities unknown to normal people. I am a magnet for unexpected weird occurrences. One thing is undeniable, being around me is rarely dull!
PS; Oh. I went into the grocery today, lost my keys, searched the store, then went out to look in the parking lot….I had left my keys in the car, with the car running. Sigh. Sometimes it ain’t easy being me.
Adventurous women also love good food! The #4TravelChicasinCozumel had the honor of a tasting at Cozumel’s Buccano’s at Night restaurant, and it is a tasting none of us will ever forget! The food at Buccanos was not only good, but outstanding! Ines Falkenberg and her two children, Carina and Bosco Barbachano are a trio of incredible talent. Ines and Bosco have incredible creativity when it comes to food, and Carina is an excellent artist and her art is very evident at Buccanos. She also does graphic design for the restaurant. (Check out her art at https://www.facebook.com/art.caribarbachano/.)
[Read more…] about #4TravelChicas had an Amazing Tasting at Buccanos at Night, Cozumel!
#4TravelChicasinCozumel! Yes, indeed, that is our hashtag! Four travel bloggers who met online 3 years ago and who have formed a blog consortium of sorts, 4 Times the Fun, and 4 times the audience! with Adventures of Empty Nesters (Suzanne Stavert from Pasadena, CA), Travel with Sara (Sara Broers from Mason City, IO), Wherever I May Roam blog (Melody Pittman from Vero Beach, FL), and of course, me, Travels with Tam from Dallas, Tx! We are a support system, we share each other’s posts, guest blog, and promote one another whenever possible. We have met only a couple of times at travel conferences, but we have a connection and enjoy being together, so here we are, hanging out in Cozumel, at Villa Coronado, and having fun, often odd, adventures all over the island. There hasn’t been a dull moment! Check out the hashtag, #4TravelChicasinCozumel all over social media, and join in the fun we have had this week! It has been wonderful to see the island through the eyes of my friends! And it is a good thing they have a sense of humor (which is necessary when traveling with Tam). Stay tuned!
Columbia Deeps and Columbia Shallows! Cozumel is a well known diving destination. Jacques Cousteau put Cozumel on the map in 1960, and he did a documentary about the mesoamerican reef, of which Cozumel’s reefs are a part. There are many beautiful dive sites on Cozumel, but I have to say that I love diving Columbia Reef. Columbia is quite far south off the island, and therefore it is never loaded with divers the way Palancar often is. The coral mountains of Columbia are breathtaking, and the shallow area is full of life. I think these photos will show you why I love it so much!
Isn’t it amazing to contemplate that we know more about the planets in our galaxy than we do about our own oceans? Our oceans are in terrible danger, and we must start doing more. There is a new documentary out that everyone should watch. I was interviewed for it but didn’t make the final cut. Check out Chasing Coral on Netflix. I have been in many of the places depicted, and I have seen the damage that climate change is doing. Yes, climate change is real. We must start paying attention.
