Bahamas: Connection with nature -Jennie Pahl

Over spring break I went to the bahamas for a week with my boyfriend and our two friends. On our third day we took a booze cruise out to Rose Island, which is an uninhabited island twenty miles south of Paradise Island. After getting there I decided to not follow the group and to start snorkeling before everybody else got in. I swam around the cove to the south tip of the island. It was there that I found the biggest reef I have ever seen. I have never been snorkeling before this and was amazed at the vibrant colors of the fish. I quickly learned that if I floated and kept still I wouldn't scare the fish. After about five minutes I perfected this art and was able to watch them interact with one another. I found that most of the fish only interacted with the others like them. It was so odd to watch them use this reef like it was their very own playground. On this particular reef there was atleast ten different kinds of fish and they also seemed to carelessly play. As I kept moving along I came across a stingray. At this point Mikki, one of my friends, and my boyfriend finally caught up to me. We sat there in amazement just watching this stingray glide through the water like a knife through butter. He stayed around the same area and we watched him for a good ten minutes. After he left I started to swing around to the other side of the mountain where I found tons of vegetation. It was like I had stumbled upon a flooded forest. The marine plants where a number of different colors, shapes, and sizes. After exploring that for about thirty minutes I decided to head back for some alcohol to catch up with the others. Right as I got to the boat the two bahamian guys told me there was a baracuda behind me. I had been seeing them lurking around the boats outside of our resort in the marina the whole week, but mostly only caught glimpses of what you would consider the babies. I turned around thinking they were joking and to my amazement there was the BIGGEST baracuda I have ever seen in my life. I screamed like a school girl and the guys started laughing. Then I put my face back in the water to look at it for a second. When the baracuda turned around my way I jumped on the ladder (I swear thats the FASTEST I have ever moved in my life). I put up my scuba gear and walked over to the desolate side of the island (On the west side they use a small portion of the beach for the lunch set up on the east side down the the southern tip and back up around the west side you snorkel, and the northern tip is completely untouched). While walking up to the northern tip I was stoping to watch to waves crash and consume the very rocky shoreline. The rocks where huge black ones that covered most of the whole northern part of the island. They had unique lines and folds, looking as if they were once lava that had dried (I know it probably isn't but it looks like it. Once I reasched the end of the rocks where it had a drop off into the ocean I sat and watched the water just come in and beat up against the rocks below me. That day was an awesome day..the pictures turned out pretty good too! :) (Which is always a plus)