Thursday, Friday

Thursday evening the girls and I went snorkeling in a bioluminescent bay.  In this bay there is a sort of microorganism that, when you brush against it, lights up much like a glow-in-the-dark watch dial.  Swimming in the waters under a moonless sky was amazing: when you are still, the water is dark.  But make one move and you are covered in glowing glitter.

I would hold my hand still under the water, then move my fingers and watch them glow.  Or dive beneath the waves and watch the glitter stream past my mask.  Once the Unidentified Humanoid swam by me and I could see a large glowing object looking like a comet passing within a foot of my face.

I’ve read that there’s only around a dozen of these bays in the world and Puerto Rico has three of them.  All I can say is that I loved my time there – it was like swimming in a pool of stars.

Unfortunately it was all too dark to take pictures.  I tried with the underwater camera, but the glitter was too dim to be captured.  But here’s one of us on the boat on our way to the bay.

That was the last adventure of our trip.  Friday it rained much of the day, and we had a lazy day.  (Though I did get out for a last snorkel.  What, should I have been worried about getting wet?  I saw what looked to be a school of newborn fish, tiny little things the size of a fingernail with yellow and black stripes swimming beside a much larger fish of the same sort.)  And then Saturday was the usual scramble to get to the airport and home – the first sight of ice on the rivers seen from the plane was quite disheartening.

But we’re home now.  It’s nice to be home, but I do wish it was warmer!