A Beautiful Day

Yesterday started out at the dock at Leverick Bay with a shower, and a beautiful rainbow:

We snorkeled Eustatia Reef and saw a SHARK:

Then we stopped by Biras Creek and saw an iguana eating a flower:

We travelled around the North Sound in our dinghy in the company of about 22 other dinghys. We were all participating in the 2nd Annual Leverick Bay Dinghy Poker Run, which is a sort-of race around the sound, where everyone dresses up in pirate garb and piles into their dinghy and then cruises to the different resorts in the area:

At each of the 5 stops, each player got a card, and the one with the best poker hand at the end, won. Well, one of our guests this week, Swashbuckling Sam, took 1st place and all the glory with his winning hand: a full house with three 3s and a pair of Queens! The prize was a real silver pirate doubloon from the Saba Rock gift shop!!

The event raised over $2,000 which was donated to the local animal rescue, and is used to fly vets from the states down to care for the local pets and strays.

Algal Bloom!

So here in the BVI the water temp has gone up about 5 degrees and the algae is everywhere! I've never been diving in water this murky (one reason I don't dive in NYC), but we took the plunge and much to my delight there was a thermocline at about 60' depth and the temp dropped at least 5 or 6 degrees, and the water cleared up! The colors were still very green because the light had to filter through all that algae, but at least we could see the wrecks as an overcast cloud of greenish brown algae hung above us. Oh, and there was this 7' reef shark checking us out: