Day 8

We woke up at 7:45, had breakfast and then went upstairs to get ready for the submarine trip! Oh my gosh was I ever excited! We got ready, got into the buses and off we went. We got there around 9:30 and our trip was at 10am. We didn’t have a lecture this morning because of it so we had one at night instead. We wandered the gift shop and I bought a nice postcard with a map of Barbados and some of the local spots that we’ve checked out written on it. Then at 10 we got onto a boat that took us to the submarine. Once we loaded onto the submarine and climbed down the hatch, we took our seats and waited to start moving. We went down to about 140 feet, we got to see the ocean floor, lots of fish, lots of coral, rocks, sea fans, then we also saw a sunken ship which was really cool. There were lots of fish around there so we stayed there for a bit then went to a coral reef where there were even more fish! It was absolutely incredible; I loved every second of it. Thankfully my camera battery didn’t die until the last minute of the trip. After we got out of the submarine and back onto the boat, we went back to the main building and each got a certificate with our name on it which was pretty cool and a great souvenir. Then we got back in our buses and headed home. Once we were home we had lunch then got ready to head to the beach. Some of the girls and I went to the beach, swam to the dock and tanned, and just hung out for awhile, then some of the guys joined us. They had chicken fights and played colors, I watched because my foot was hurting (I stepped on something in the sand right on where I have a piece of coral so it hurt quite a bit) and I was tired. Man oh man, were they funny; the chicken fights included hair pulling, lots of yelling, it was just too funny. Then we went to the boat so we could go do our water sampling lab. The lab took awhile but it wasn’t hard. After sampling the shallow water we went diving and snorkelling at a sunken barge. There were tons of fish and a reef right by the barge so we swam with them and took lots of pictures. We literally would swim through a school of fish, it was crazy. I got a few pictures of parrotfish, those ones with yellow stripes, and a blow fish. After awhile we got back on the boat and went to do the deeper water sampling. Once that was done we came back and headed to our rooms. I showered then had supper and checked some stuff online. After supper we went to the teacher's place to hear a lecture from one of the researchers here who teaches at the universite de quebec a trois rivieres. He told us about his experiments here and some biology stuff, it was interesting. After the lecture some people went out to the bar at the hotel next door, some went to watch the juniors championship hockey game, other studied, and I just stayed in my room and relaxed, read, and studied a bit. I uploaded the pictures from my camera and posted some of them on facebook. I really like some of them. I spent most of the night reading my book, chatting a bit, replying to a few messages, studying a bit, and just taking it easy. We’re all so bruised and cut up XD The dead pieces of coral that keep washing up with the waves keep hitting and cutting our feet and shins. Plus I have blisters, scrapes, cuts, coral pieces embedded (I got most out) and bruises, especially since I accidentally banged me arm on the boat. And we’re all so tired since we don’t get that much sleep and we’re busy being active and in the sun all day.