I chow down on a blueberry muffin with yogurt for breakfast (an old snack I introduced Caleb to years ago — back when we still ate sweetened yogurt and mini muffins from the market). This is our last day of diving in Cancun and we forget to bring the dive book. It’s a good thing the room isn’t far from the shop.

yellow spotted stingray

Lore is our guide and we’re free to stay within eyesight as she instructs a newbie. We leave the dock at 9 am, and it’s about an hour before we’re down in the water taking selfies. We hunt for fish and other creatures (spider crab, spiny lobster, brittle stars, scorpionfish, eels, squirrelfish) for 40 minutes and then take a 30 minute surface interval before going back down and having an eel approach me.

Our computers limit our bottom time as they want us to wait a few more minutes, but Lore reassures us that our computers are super conservative and that we’ll be fine. We would be relying on her recommendation if we didn’t have our own, so down we go. I stay down ten minutes past my bottom time and skip five of the eight minutes at the safety stop because everyone else was ready.

scorpionfish camouflage — so beautiful and deadly

My watch beeps angrily at me for a minute and then tells me no dive/fly for 48 hours and turns off the dive planning capability. Lesson learned and I will allow this fancy gadget to do its job without me interfering more than I already do with my ascension rates.

We tip Lore, as she rinses our gear, and Ulises before going for hotcakes and divorciados eggs (one with green sauce, the other red, and sometimes beans between) for lunch and a burger for Caleb. I bring two pancakes back to the room at 3 pm and we try to grow barnacles on the couch till 6 pm after sharing the arugula egg salad we made days ago.

pan to plate to palate

Caleb puts on shoes and it’s back to 100% Natural for dinner. I get wild mushroom tacos and a prehispanic drink (maize, cocoa, cinnamon, etc. with sparkling water). The staff remembers us and gives us some bread and salsa too.

roundabout to dinner

Do you Nintendo?

On the way back to the room, I hail a cab on our right, just done at the convenience store, for a girl to my left looking at oncoming traffic. Finn came in drunk this morning and left the place more sticky and disgusting. He doesn’t crawl out of his room till 5 pm and we can hear him now at 8 pm, but will stay in the safety of our bed.

looking for the muffin man