Once the boat was anchored into the sand we could fully appreciate the beautiful color of the water. It was the most amazing color of turquoise and it was clear all the way down to the bottom. Probably about 30 feet just off from the boat was a amazing coral reef. Rodica put on her flippers and jumped into the water and swam over to the reef with a waterproof camera. They had cases you could rent for $20 to put your iPhone in and use in the water to take pictures. It was really cool. I, on the other hand, looked like a doofus when I tried to jump off the side of the boat. I was laughing so hard with Robyn that I couldn't even get my feet up onto the top step with the flippers on. I don't think that the younger worker appreciated my humor. His name was Chris and he asked if I needed something in kind of a snotty attitude or what I was trying to do. I told him I was fine and I wasn't trying to do anything except stop laughing. To my surprise I finally made it up to the top step and jumped off the side of the boat into the gorgeous blue water. I am okay to call it blue because it really was clear as you look straight down. The next thing I did was catch my breath and started to swim toward Rodica. My mask must've been foggy because I couldn't make out anything below. I took the camera from Rodica and just started snapping pictures. I finally decided to try to rinse my goggles in saltwater.
Amazingly that worked and a whole new world was opened up to me. The corals, plants and the creatures were beautiful. Beautiful colors and all amazing types. I couldn't take it all in. I wanted to get closer so I could take better pictures, but I didn't want to snorkel down 20 feet without my brother Ryan there to protect me like he did in Hawaii. So I told Rodica, "Let's go in a little bit to a more shallow area, like about 10 feet deep and I would take off my float belt and snorkel down." So we swam in a little further toward the reef and I thought a little stingray of some type and a gorgeous purple sea anenome, before Rodica called me over to look at a big fish. I swam over but didn't see the fish so I continued to lightly kick my feet with my face in the water looking at things.
Before I knew what happened, I was swept away by a wave further out and onto the coral reef. My mind was going 1,000,000 miles an hour. I didn't want to put my feet down on the reef. I knew I couldn't touch the reef because it was sharp and they told us it takes 1000 years to grow. I didn't want to wreck it and the water wasn't deep enough for me to swim. Every time I tried to make it out back toward the ocean, another wave would push me back onto the reef. I was so happy when I looked up to my left and saw Rodica in the same predicament. I thought, "Oh good! We can die together!" Funny enough, when she saw me she thought, "Oh good Richelle will save us. Now I'll be okay." After a few minutes of panic and wanting to cry, I realized no one from the boat was coming for us. All I could think to do was to go inward toward the very narrow, rocky beach and walk around past the coral reef and then swim out to the ocean and back to the boat. I had no idea what this would actually mean, but I knew we could not get off that coral reef swimming towards the waves. The waves thrashed us and threw us, but eventually we made it to a more shallow place. When I tried to put my feet down on a rock and I had a couple of large thorns poking through my fin into my heel. I knew I could not walk in that condition so I sat down and took my fin off. Rodica was yelling for me to leave my fin on, but I had to get the sharp pain out of my foot. I pulled out the two spines and was able to walk on the rocks. The rocks were little tiny pebbles that got inside of our fins with each step we took. That process was painful, but necessary. We finally made it around the mountain cliff and back around past most of the shallow part of the reef. I sat down to empty the rocks out of my fins and get back in the water. It was too shallow to jump but too deep to walk so I just sat there. Before I made it back into the water I just wanted to just start crying. I was so mentally exhausted and defeated. Not Rodica! She was her typical happy, perky spirits! She said, "Come on Richelle. Let's go!" So I went for it. Just before I jumped, Rodica and I both made sure we both knew we were headed straight for the boat. We were done with snorkeling!
After years of Apollo swim team, I knew I was a strong swimmer and could get back to the boat easily, but I was worried about Rodica. My most important thing was to get over that reef. I just started swimming and didn't look back until I was passed the reef below. When I turned around to check on Rodica, she's far behind me saying, "Come back and bring me the camera. There's a cool fish!" I told her, "No! I thought we were swimming back to the boat?" I guess it would be more accurate to say I screamed it at her repeatedly because I thought we were going back to the boat! We had made an agreement that we were done. I had just survived a very scary nightmare and I was not about to go through that ordeal again.
When I got back on the boat I asked Robyn why she didn't send anyone to help us? She said, "I watched you two the whole time. I was looking out wondering who are those idiots on the reef, when it suddenly hit her those two idiots are Richelle and Rodica!" She said she didn't want to draw any attention to us and have people yelling at us or being angry so she kept a close eye on us. Once we figured out how to get up to the beach, she knew we would've been okay. I had some foot issues, but Rodica had some hand issues. We thought she had some thorns of some type in her hand, but I guess they were puncture marks and the dark lines were blood.
We ate a little bit of lunch and then I was really excited to head to Flamenco Beach. That was supposed to be our next stop. However we ended up going to the little tiny island called Culebrita.
Culebrita is the largest cay near Culebra. Culebrita's beach is the finest of white sand and the water visibility is almost unlimited. It is accessible only by boat, and boasts the oldest operating lighthouse in the Caribbean. In 1981, the old lighthouse was registered on the National Register of Historical Monuments of the United States. We could see St. Thomas from there. I had read about it and knew that this was the place that the sea turtles nest if I hadn't been so paranoid about snorkeling I might've tried to find one but I wasn't about to embark on that adventure again. 
The captain got us about 6 feet or 10 feet from the beach. We were able to just walk over through the water and lay out on the beach. Unfortunately, Rodica did not allow me to bring my book. Not only did she not allow me to bring my book, she called attention to the entire boat, that I wanted to bring my book. I was not happy when Rodica slept while I sat and did nothing on the beach.
Robyn sat in the water for a little while and then got cold and went back onto the boat. I did not want any extra time on the boat and the water at the second beach was a gorgeous color of Tiffany blue. Totally different than the first beach. It is so amazing, so clear, and so beautiful. There are no words to describe it and pictures do it no justice.
After an hour or so on the beach we got back on the boat and headed the hour or hour and a half back to Fajardo. The fish eating snacks over the side of the boat.
The couple sitting in front of us on the boat was extremely drunk, seasick and probably sun sick. They were burnt to a crisp, drank tons of alcohol, drank no water and used no sunscreen. The two of them puked most of the way back. No matter what ideas Robyn or the ship mates gave them, they would not follow them. Robyn even ended up getting a little bit of vomit up you got her arm. I told her she deserved it since she didn't let us take the little airplane to see Flamenco Beach in the first place. Once back in the city we took the van back to San Juan.
We were happy to be back in one piece, safe and sound. Rodica and I were both pretty scratched up on our butts and back of our legs. Rodica had some puncture marks in her hand that luckily healed quickly but were swollen and painful for a while. We went down to dinner our last night there. For the second night in a row we all ordered tomato soup and bread. It was delicious. After dinner we drug are tired bodies up to pack our suitcases and get a little shut eye before we headed home. I was so tired I didn't even try to read. I think I was the first one to sleep. That never happens.
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