Day Thirteen: Diving in Sorrento

We both woke up this morning in a great mood, ready to go diving. Tragically, neither of us had been diving since July of last year, when we did the treasure hunt in Newport with Dave's dive shop. I was concerned that we weren't going to get to go diving at all, because I realized earlier in the trip that I forgot our dive logs and C-cards. Fortunately, the owner of the dive shop in Sorrento told us that it would be no problem because they could look up our certifications for us. Excellent!

We set out to the main part of Sorrento for the first time, trying without much success to follow the terrible map that the B&B provided for us. The map was blurry and the street names were too small to actually read, but we made it to the city center and eventually (after asking several locals) we managed to find the street with the dive shop. We made it to the dive shop, only to find the doors locked. I found us an internet point nearby, only to re-read the email that said we needed to meet them at the marina, and not at the dive shop. We set off in a hurry since we only had ten minutes to get there, and it was a ten minute walk.

Down the stairs, down the twisting street, down, down, down to the Marina. I asked yet another local where the boat was, and finally we found the group! We waited for a couple more people and then we were off.

The scenery and the breeze were just beautiful, and we were so excited to be out on a boat. We met some of the people in our dive group, including two guys from Norway who usually dive with dry suits. We rode for about twenty minutes before arriving at our first dive site. During the ride, they assigned us tanks, BCDs, and regulators. They gave us wet suits, but the first one I tried on was much too big. The boat stopped for a short time before the first dive for us all to jump in and have a quick swim, and I could feel the water sloshing around in the sleeves and trunk of the suit. I knew that switching suits would be a pain, but I also have gone diving with a too-big suit before and ended up absolutely freezing before the end of the dive.

I was mildly surprised at the amount of wetsuit that they gave us. We both were given 5mm suits with hoods. A lot of the guys were even wearing rash guards under the suits, whether for comfort or for extra warmth, I'm not sure. I had meant to pack my rash guard and our masks, but I can add that to the list of things I forgot in my epic wedding-honeymoon-cleaning list of things to do at the beginning of the month.

We got to the first dive site and began our descent. I was thrilled with how crystal clear the water was. I don't think I've seen water that clear since Australia. It made me sorely wish that I had found room in my luggage for my dive camera, but it would have been one more thing to just lug around with us this whole time. We were down to a max depth of 90 feet, and we were under for 40 minutes. It was really freaking cold down there at depth! My whole face went numb. I'm not exactly sure just how cold it was, but I'm pretty sure that at that temp at home, I would be wearing AT LEAST 7mm of wet suit, if not my hooded vest. I was pretty unprepared for the cold, considering how warm the area is.

Speaking of cold, the other worse kind, Joel did not have a terribly good dive at all. I could tell from the beginning of the dive that he wasn't doing too well, and I was constantly concerned and checking to make sure that he was near me. He had trouble descending, largely because he still had lingering congestion from his cold. I had a scare in the middle of the dive because I turned to the person that I thought was Joel, and he had a red mustache and it took me a few seconds to find him. We did have a cool experience being able to see the thermocline. The difference in temperature was so dramatic that you could actually see the cold and warm water reacting the same way you can see heat radiating off a grill in the air. I was glad when we ascended to warmer water, because even though the fish were neat, I didn't like being so cold.

After the first dive was over, Joel was quite done for the day. I was still cold for a lot of the surface interval, but I decided I definitely wanted to do the second dive. We drove to a different place, and the rest of us went in for a second time. I was much more relaxed on the second dive, because I wasn't constantly worried about Joel being okay. We didn't go quite as deep, 62 feet this time, and I still had over half a tank left when we surfaced. I saw all kinds of cool fish on this dive, like a scorpionfish and a fleet of silver and yellow fish that would feast on a part of the reef and then scurry off.

I felt really bad that Joel didn't have such a great time, so when we got back on land, we went back to the hotel and I let him nap for several hours. After his nap, we went into Sorrento to explore, window shop, and take some pictures. We saw two different Italian weddings… what a beautiful place to get married. I'm not really jealous though, because I had a pretty beautiful spot myself, hehe.

This car very nearly got stuck.

Wedding carriage! 

We walked around the town and then scouted for a place to eat. The guy behind the desk at Mami Camilla suggested a place in Sorrento, but I really wanted to eat some place on the water and watch the sun set. After a long walk back towards the hotel, with no luck, we decided to go eat at the place we found last night.

We got a bottle of prosecco with dinner, and watched the sun set over the Mediterranean together. The colors of Vesuvius as the sun went down were just beautiful, and the sunset itself was magnificent. It was a really enjoyable and relaxing dinner. We actually saw a third wedding group while we were eating, taking their portraits on the pier of the restaurant. Can't blame them, it was such a pretty spot. A beautiful end to the day.