Sorry it has been so long since I have posted something. our days have consisted of waking up at 6:30 eating breakfast then catching a boat from our hotel to the dive shop then heading out about an hour to the dive sites. Then doing 2 to three tanks and getting back to the dive shop around 4:30 or 6:00 depending on how many tanks we do. We then clean our stuffand get a ride back to our hotel to take a shower and go eat dinner. The only thing that is in our minds after dinner is going to sleep because we are so exhausted. So, it leaves little time to do anyhting on the Internet especially because the Internet is so slow here. Finally I am not too tired and patient enough to do some blogging. So, I will catch everyone up. A couple days ago we hadan exceptional day of diving. We were also lucky enough to have a videographer from national geographic film our dives. The video turned out really good and we are going to get a copy so everyone at home can see what we saw on our dives. The first dive site we went to was called New Drop Off. It is known for its "tricky" currents. I had been wearing a hood the last couple days and it was bugging me so this dive I decided to go without it not realizing that I had to adjust my weight because the hood acted as a parachute it would fill up with water and air and cause me to be a lot more buoyant then I needed to be. So, the beginning of the dive I was struggling because there was a natural down current plus being overweight I was fighting to stay at the level of everyone else. I knew there was something really wrong when I was kicking faster then I have kicked in a long time and everyone else was not kicking at all. By the way this is captured on the video (really embarrassing actually) It finally dawned on me I needed to take some weight out so i notified the dive instructor and he took four pounds out and it helped so much. I had 12 pounds in when I should of had only 6 pounds it is just crazy how much more buoyant the hood made me. We got to see some turtles, pyramid butterfly fish, some Napoleon rasp, black snapper, barracuda, red trigger fish, nudibranchs, eels, and a lot of beautiful soft coral. There was an area on the dive were there was a very strong down current and our bubbles were going down instead of up it was pretty crazy. We rounded the corner of the wall we were diving which by the way dropped down 6,000 feet into a blue abyss. when we rounded the corner we saw sharks circling and that was our cue to go and hold on to some coral to watch everything go by us while we just hung out on the rocks. This is my favorite part about the dives in Palau you just hold on and watch everything swim by you. There was a very strong current so we had to hold on really tight. While we were hanging out the sharks (grey reef, black tip, and white tip) were circling us and feeding they were getting pretty close about an arm and a half length away at some points. It was pretty crazy too a couple of times the grey shark was swimming level to my face right for me that was just part of her usual cruise and she would turn right before she got to me. It is pretty crazy when you are staring down the nose of a big grey reef shark coming towards you. They are so much fun to watch how they move through the water with such ease. I found out that most of the sharks in Palau are female and the males come during mating season but for the most part they are segregated. We hung out on the rock for about 30 minutes all the fish were swimming by also it was neat seeing all the pretty colors of the fish. We then finished the dive in the shallows and went up to have some lunch. We went to an island to eat some lunch and it started pouring rain then stopped and got sunny and it was off to our next dive at the Blue Corner this is the dive site that Palau is known for it is the one people come from all over the world to go to. And I know why because it is magical. you feel like you are in another world so much going on around you and so many things to see big and small. The dive profile was the same as our first dive we were next to a wall then went and used reef hooks to hook onto the rocks to watch everything go by and finished in a shallow area were there were hundreds of schools of fish. There were huge schools of barracuda, jack fish, big eye trevali, blue striped snapper, harlequin sweet lip fish, and many more. Everywhere you would look there were fish. We also got to see a big turtle at the end of our dive. We then headed back to the dive shop and decided to do a third dive. This dive was called chandelier cave. It consits of four caves that are within a limestone rock island. Most caves do not have oxygen in them but this one does. You dive down with a flash light to about 40 feet and head into a tunnel then you surface in a cavern that is full of ancient stalactites and stalagmites. It is so breathtaking and interesting how nature works. The rock islands are made of limestone and this is very porous so air can get through and water seeps down which is how the formations are formed, it is so pretty because a lot of the inside caverns look like there is glitter all around and each cavern was different so we went to all four and then headed back out the cave. We were presently surprised on the out side of the cave in the shallows we saw mandarin fish they are small and brightly colored orange and purple they are usually really hard to find but, we got to see about six of them. They are so cute!! I managed to get an OK shot of one but they were fast to dive under the rocks so it was hard to get a really close clear one. I have always wanted to see a mandarin fish so I was happy. Charlie and I had heard about a really good Thai restaurant in town so we went their for dinner I had red curry with local fish and he had cashew chicken it was yummy! We were ready for bed after that. I woke up with my sinuses clogged and my ear pounding but I wanted to try and dive anyways but I ended up not being able to equalize and make it down. It made me feel better when Charlie told me that the visibility was bad on both dives and they did not see much. When we got back to the hotel I new exactly what would make my sinuses better a massage. I got a Balinese massage with a half hour head massage and it REALLY helped.My sinuses started to drain and my ear felt better so it was a good decision. We then went to a local Indian restaurant it was really good. The next day I decided I wanted to take the day off and hang out at the hotel. Charlie went diving I woke up and staked out a chase lounge on the beach I read my book and went snorkeling and swam. It started pouring rain for a while and oneof my favorite things to do is swim while it is raining so I did that for a while too. Then I went to the spa and got a two person massage. Two masseuses are massaging you at the same time. And there movements are synchronized it was the coolest feeling ever and again I was not on the table until they woke me up. We ate dinner at the hotel and Charlie's sinuses started really bugging him. He always has sinus problems because he blew out his sinuses from jumping out of planes but they were really getting stuffed up. So, the next day charlie had trouble getting down and he was stuck on the boat. I thankfully was able to make it down today. We went to blue corner again and it was just as nice as it was the first time. This time there were a lot more sharks at the place we put the reef hooks in at one time there were eight circling us. We pretty much saw all the same stuff we saw the first time we dove at blue corner but it was still just as fun and I would do blue corner again because it is always different in some way or another. Something I had not seen before that I saw at blue corner was bump head parrot fish they were really big and there were about 10 of them eating away at the rocks they were really cute and funny to watch. We then went to German channel to look for the manta's again but they were not out. Then we went for a third dive called the helmet wreck it was really fun to see all the artifacts. There was bottles of kirin beer, Big barrels of Sake, machine guns, ammo, face masks, boots, rifles, morphine bottles, depth chargers and much more you could also look inside and see the engine room which was really cool. It was neat seeing history like that under water. Diving is such a fun way to meet people we have met poeple from all over the world. People from Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Hawaaii the Phillippines, Guam, Switzeraland, and France. It is fun because we all share common interests and all you do is talk about what you saw on your dives. There were a couple people from our dive group that it was their last night so we all went to dinner at a place called Kramer's we went with the couple from Hawaii Brian and Nicole and Jim a guy who is here on business and our dive master who lives in Phillippines but comes to Palau to make some extra money when they need him. It was fun. Sorryit is so long but I wanted to get caught up. now I am ready for bed and to get ready for our last day of diving tomorrow!!!