Snorkels Aweigh!

Last week, nearly 4 months after dropping it off at the post office, we finally got the last of the boxes that we shipped from Denver. We had been eagerly awaiting its arrival, so we were nonplussed when we saw the beating it had taken during its transpacific voyage. When we commented on the condition of the box, our friendly post office employee pointed to a hole and announced that a rat had likely taken up residence inside. This seemed possible since we had packed these boxes without regard to varmints. (As you may recall, USPS had told us that they would travel by plane and arrive in less than two weeks.)

We stood back a bit as we opened the box, unsure what we would find inside, but all was well. Although a bag of almonds had exploded inside, the remainder of the contents were in good shape, with nary a rat to be found.

One happy consequence of the delivery is that it contained our snorkeling gear. We’ve been out on the water on various kayaks and canoes a number of times since our arrival, but we hadn’t yet explored beneath the surface, where world-class scuba diving and snorkeling awaited.

This morning we hopped on a boat with a group of a scuba divers heading out from one of the local dive shops. Yap is famous in the diving community for its resident population of manta rays, and our

destination was Gufnuw channel, one of the two hotspots for seeing these giant creatures.

We followed the scuba divers into the water,

and within a couple of minutes we were lucky enough to spot several manta rays about 60 feet under the surface. This photo, with a manta passing just a few feet from one of the divers, provides a sense of scale. This was one of the smaller mantas, which can exceed 15 feet in wingspan.

In addition to manta rays, Gufnuw channel is flanked by a spectacular coral reef that is just a few feet beneath the surface at high tide. At low tide the water isn’t high enough to allow for easy swimming, but our timing was perfect and the snorkeling was spectacular. Due to a fogging problem on our camera’s underwater casing our pictures, unfortunately, were not. (The fogging is visible in the manta picture above -- the water clarity was much better than the photo represents). We can’t wait to get this fixed and head back out to the reef for more underwater photography.

We’re looking forward to more underwater adventures in the coming weeks and months, and we’re both planning on getting scuba-certified in short order.