Today - almost exactly one year after I started my trip - I finally figured out how I want to continue my life after. It sure took a while for me to reach this conclusion, but I'm certain that it's a good decision - I'll write more about this in a separate post, coming up in a few days :-)
In the afternoon, I went diving. I had heard that the diving around El Nido wasn't so good because much of the coral was dead. In hindsight, I'm glad I didn't heed this particular piece of advice. There was plenty of coral and it was very much alive.
The two dives - at Helicopter Island and Nat Nat - were two of the most relaxing dives I've ever done. I was the only diver with my guide, and for once the guide went at a speed that allowed me plenty of time to look at everything (usually guides go much too fast for me.) The relaxed speed also made me consume much less air than usual, making these two my longest dives so far with 60 and 69 minutes.
El Nido has at least ten dive centers, and I'd chosen more or less randomly: a dive center that happened to be on the way from dinner to the hostel. As it turned out, I couldn't have chosen better: they easily had the best equipment I've seen in a dive center on my trip. Unlike other dive centers in El Nido, they had a nice speed boat - not one of the wooden bangkas that are used for everything in the Philippines, but a purpose-built dive boat - and a ladder that was coated with grip tape, making it super comfortable to get out of the water after the dive (on the island hopping tour, I had struggled with the wooden ladder that was hanging too high, removing a fair bit of skin from my shins in the process.) The masks had padding on the strap, making them much more comfortable than un-padded masks, and all the rest of the equipment, too, was new and in perfect shape.
Besides the vibrant marine life, the highlights in these two dives were certainly the bluespotted stingrays and the green sea turtle we saw. Besides those, there were also lionfish (named for their mane of sorts, I guess), pipefish that looked like a piece of rusty pipe, and moray eels.
It's amazing how all experiences are colored by my current state of mind. Today I was very relaxed, finally having found out how I want to continue my life. As a result, the dive was very relaxed and enjoyable. When I compare this to other dives, I'm wondering if I've misjudged dive sites where I happened to be distracted or anxious. But, of course, this applies to more than diving - all of life, in fact. Definitely something to think about, keep in mind and work on!
