Sorry, I haven't been very good at keeping anyone updated. I keep meaning to post but my Iphoto has been not loading and I just haven't had the time to mess around with it and fix it until this past weekend. Got it updated and running again though.
First, some exciting news, I finished two more graduate school classes this past week. YAY! That means I have to do one more from now until the beginning of July, then I'll be in Buffalo for a few weeks mid-July and be DONE with my Master's Degree!!! I keep telling Dereek how excited I am about this. The past two years have been too much with teaching and graduate school, trying to stay in shape and start a teachers pay teachers business. I think I've done pretty well in teaching and grad school, the other two I have been slacking on a bit and can't wait to be able to get back into them again. Dereek and I are excited to be living in Colombia with one less thing to worry about.
Now, besides work, life has been pretty fun. Since we're leaving so soon everyone has been trying to plan and do lots of fun things. The last weekend in April Dereek, Morley, Jay, Shannon, some other friends, and I all rented a house in Mochima. I hadn't been out that way yet and it was great! Mochima is a small town on the edge of the Mochima National Park (where all the beachy islands we go to are). Dereek, Shannon, Jay and I got into Mochima early on Saturday morning and we all heading straight out. We had a boat arranged and he took us to a whole bunch of beaches and after our boat tour we chose which one we liked best to stay at. Our boat tour was pretty fun. First, we got to see a whole bunch of dolphins. My pictures definitely won't do it justice, but there were a lot of them, and they'd swim so close and the water was so clear that you could see the dolphins swimming under the water near the boat. Next, we made a stop at this little cave. The way the rock was carved out you could swim under and into a teeny little cave. It was really cool and when there was a wave and the entrance was closed off by water your ears would pop because of the pressure change. After that we got to do some snorkeling. Too bad Venezuelan government doesn't have it's shit together more, because it's a beautiful country for beaches and snorkeling (and I'm gonna assume diving too from what I've seen). We just did a short casual snorkeling trip and the coral and fish we saw are on par or on better than some other resorts I've snorkeled at. Finally, we saw a spot in the water that is very deep and bubbles just come up from the bottom. No one's quite sure where the bubbles come from, but it was neat to see them. After our boat ride we spent the rest of the day drinking, eating and relaxing on the beach.
At night we all hung out at the house we rented and had a bbq on our rooftop. We didn't stay up late at all because we were all pretty tired. Dereek, Shannon, Jay and I had left at 6am that morning to get to Mochima. The next day we had a little bit of a lazy start, but got out to another beach with plenty of time to have some lunch and lounge around before it was time to head back to go home. Sunday we really did nothing besides relax on the beach and then drive home.
It was a nice weekend and great to get to see some new places in Venezuela. There are still so many places that I have not gotten a chance to see here. It's bittersweet it be leaving in June, but I'll only be one country over, so hopefully it won't be too long until I come back for a visit!
Bubbles!! From the deep.
Panoramic view from our roof.
First, some exciting news, I finished two more graduate school classes this past week. YAY! That means I have to do one more from now until the beginning of July, then I'll be in Buffalo for a few weeks mid-July and be DONE with my Master's Degree!!! I keep telling Dereek how excited I am about this. The past two years have been too much with teaching and graduate school, trying to stay in shape and start a teachers pay teachers business. I think I've done pretty well in teaching and grad school, the other two I have been slacking on a bit and can't wait to be able to get back into them again. Dereek and I are excited to be living in Colombia with one less thing to worry about.
Now, besides work, life has been pretty fun. Since we're leaving so soon everyone has been trying to plan and do lots of fun things. The last weekend in April Dereek, Morley, Jay, Shannon, some other friends, and I all rented a house in Mochima. I hadn't been out that way yet and it was great! Mochima is a small town on the edge of the Mochima National Park (where all the beachy islands we go to are). Dereek, Shannon, Jay and I got into Mochima early on Saturday morning and we all heading straight out. We had a boat arranged and he took us to a whole bunch of beaches and after our boat tour we chose which one we liked best to stay at. Our boat tour was pretty fun. First, we got to see a whole bunch of dolphins. My pictures definitely won't do it justice, but there were a lot of them, and they'd swim so close and the water was so clear that you could see the dolphins swimming under the water near the boat. Next, we made a stop at this little cave. The way the rock was carved out you could swim under and into a teeny little cave. It was really cool and when there was a wave and the entrance was closed off by water your ears would pop because of the pressure change. After that we got to do some snorkeling. Too bad Venezuelan government doesn't have it's shit together more, because it's a beautiful country for beaches and snorkeling (and I'm gonna assume diving too from what I've seen). We just did a short casual snorkeling trip and the coral and fish we saw are on par or on better than some other resorts I've snorkeled at. Finally, we saw a spot in the water that is very deep and bubbles just come up from the bottom. No one's quite sure where the bubbles come from, but it was neat to see them. After our boat ride we spent the rest of the day drinking, eating and relaxing on the beach.
At night we all hung out at the house we rented and had a bbq on our rooftop. We didn't stay up late at all because we were all pretty tired. Dereek, Shannon, Jay and I had left at 6am that morning to get to Mochima. The next day we had a little bit of a lazy start, but got out to another beach with plenty of time to have some lunch and lounge around before it was time to head back to go home. Sunday we really did nothing besides relax on the beach and then drive home.
It was a nice weekend and great to get to see some new places in Venezuela. There are still so many places that I have not gotten a chance to see here. It's bittersweet it be leaving in June, but I'll only be one country over, so hopefully it won't be too long until I come back for a visit!
On the boat on our way out
Dolphin! Seriously, pictures don't even begin to show how cool this was to see them in the water swimming next to the boat.
Almost got it jumping! There's a dolphin tail.
Under this rock was where the cave was.
Right there. Swim under there and into a cave.
Cave party!
Dereek and I in the cave
Blurry, but still pretty awesome.
My cave injury. Those rocks in there are pretty sharp.
Inside a larger cave that the boat could go in there were tons of religious statues. Interesting contrast to being on a boat, in a bikini and drinking.
The spot where we went snorkeling.
Morley helping to secure our boat at the beach. lol
I live in such an ugly country. =P Just kidding.
We have a hard life, I know, but someone's gotta do it, right?
The outcome of falling asleep on the beach while all your friends have been drinking all day. lol
Getting back to Mochima. Those houses are the town in almost it's entirety. Really tiny place, but awesome.
The view from our roof.
At the beach on Sunday.
It was clearly a miserable, awful weekend. (but not at all)
Such a pretty place. These are the aspects of Venezuela that I will definitely miss.
And I'll miss these cool kids too (except Dereek since he's coming to Colombia with me)
Quick note on the past weekend and upcoming plans. This past weekend Dereek and I went up to Puerto to go yacht hunting. Never thought I'd say that in my life. We kinda have enough money to afford a decent boat to rent for the day, so as a goodbye, we're all gonna do it. In order to plan, Dereek and I spoke to people at the marinas about boats and costs. It was fun and we got the information we needed. We also got introduced to this old Italian man who has a MASSIVE yacht. We sat on his fancy boat drinking soda and chatting with him for quite some time. He was quite enamored with the fact that I was from the United States and told us about he immigrated from Italy to Brooklyn and played the saxophone. He was quite the character, but nice. He invited all of us out on his boat this weekend as a personal invitation. We're kinda considering it since we wanted to go to the beach this weekend anyway. Not quite sure yet if we want to hang out on a fancy boat with an old Italian guy, or just make it all of us and chill on the beach.
Checking out boats at the marina in puerto
This is the boat we're thinking of renting. We can BBQ on it.
And this is the old Italian guys yacht that Dereek and I hung out on. Yeah, nice weekend of fancy boats.
