Day 151: La Isla Bonita

Puerto Lopez – Isla de la Plata – Puerto Lopez, Ecuador

Today’s dives were supposed to be fun dives. Somehow though, I came back awfully tired. More so than yesterday.

Bright and early in the morning, we drove out on the boat for an hour to go to Isla de la Plata. This island is coined the “poor man Galapagos.” Before coming to Puerto Lopez, I thought I’d give this island a visit and if it’s good enough, I could probably skip the pricey Galapagos. To my disappointment, Michel told me it’s pretty much named so for tourism purposes. The island is just a piece of land broken off from the main continent. Unlike Galapagos islands, which were formed from volcanic eruptions and home to flora and fauna that are specific to the archipelago.

For the first dive, Luis and I were accompanied by Michel and his two instructors, Juan Manuel and Gustavo. It was a deep dive. The sea life here is quite abundant and quite a lot of different species. We even bumped into a sea turtle!

What did me in today I suppose was helping the instructors with their student divers. At one point, I had to help a panicky student put on her weighs on the water surface. Instead of laying in a horizontal position, she kept moving onto standing position causing the weighs to slide. To make matter worse, she also flailed her hands around knocking my mask sideway while I was managing her belt. I guess in the mid of the confusion, I ended up swallowing some water.

I don’t think I’ll ever be ready for ever want to be a dive instructor. Too much responsibility for my liking.

On the hour-ride back to the dive center, I dozed off on the boat. I didn’t get any chance to take any pictures of Isla de la Plata

But wait, I did manage to get you folks back home this goodie from Puerto Lopez:

P.S.: Shout out to my brother, Tonny. Happy birthday bro :]