Santa Marta

I woke up early to go scuba diving while Amanda relaxed at the hotel. We came to Santa Marta to visit Tayrona National Park which is known for hiking to beaches and scuba. So my hotel hailed me a taxi at 6:45 am and we were off to Taganga - a fishing village and a backpacker haven with many dive shops.

The ride was about 15 minutes to Poseidon Dive Center, a 5 star Padi shop run by Germans - I knew they would be legit and I could trust them. I’m technically Open Water Scuba certified, but really don’t go enough. I got certified just to feel more comfortable and safer in the water. As my last dive was several years ago, I had a “tune up” session. Our teacher was Jorge who was very nice and the other students were not certified and were just learning basic skills. It was an American uncle and his Colombia nephew on a family vacation, promised to the uncle”s wife who passed away from canacer last year. It was sad, but nice to see the uncle fulfill his promise.

Here’s Taganga beach where we climbed into our boat and a selfie during our ride to the dive site:





There were three groups on the boat - Jorge went with the uncle and nephew, three guys were getting certified, and I had Edwin as my guide. Edwin was very patient and kept elongating my name, “Cyyynthiiiia!”

We went on two dives, one at Cali Chan and Punta Aguja. We saw blowfish, trumpet fish, spotted eel, moray eel, lobster, and etc. I even got to hold a spider crab.





On my second dive, I lost one fin, got it back, then lost it again, and then lost the other fin. I really sucked a lot of air during this ordeal, but managed to get through it. They had me wear diving shoes because of my toe. Other than that, the dives were uneventful and it was like riding a bike. A few of the guys on the boat got nauseous, but I was okay as I took Dramamine. For lunch, we had chicken kebabs and packaged cake and guava jelly for dessert. Here are a few photos from our return trip:





Back at the hotel, I met Amanda at the rooftop pool. She had explored the town a bit and I was starving, so I ordered beef flautas and mango lemonade:



Amanda was enjoying our do-nothing afternoon and decided to take some fun rooftop photos. Here’s one:



We continued to relax and eventually headed out to dinner at a Greek restaurant where we shared several appetizers. I was super hungry and paired the meal with a rosé. On our walk, I got to see some more of the town that Amanda had explored during the day. We headed to bed early as we have an early day of trekking Tayrona!