A Date with Paradise

I have been writing a couple of books. One, "A Date with Paradise," was inspired by an absolutely horrific dive trip to the Bahamas. I know it sounds great, but it was a nightmare, pretty much from start to finish. I am not sure when the book will be finished, but I'm hoping it will be complete by the end of my fourth year. Whether or not it ever gets published doesn't really matter to me. It is more for my personal entertainment than anything else. I am including an excerpt from one of the chapters which describes a particularly unpleasant night, along with several pictures from that lovely trip from hell. Enjoy. :)

Remember my discussion about the large supply of Scopolamine? Well, Seth left it in the truck, and the five hours of diving had taken our initial patches off. But at least I got my 30-second shower! That was refreshing. As I said before, my standards were eroding and it wasn’t so bad – cold and short, in a space of about 2 feet by 2 feet and shared by about 30 people, but not bad. I was clean, physically exhausted, and ready for a long night of sleep. I was sure that I’d just sleep right through any rough seas and wake up in the beautiful Berry Islands. After all, I’d never gotten sea sick or experienced motion sickness, and I’d not vomitted in about 18 years.

I fell asleep just fine. However, the Twilight Moon was driving against gale force cross winds. Her hull is flat and wide. Do the physics and it is obvious that such a situation is the perfect recipe for a wretch fest. The reason that I woke up was that the boat rolled hard to starboard and slammed me against the bulkhead. The ship was violently moving from side to side and up and down at nauseatingly unpredictable intervals. It scared me. I began to worry that she would capsize and wondered how eight people would escape through an opening that only accommodates one while bumping that one’s head on the way both up and down the steep ladder. You have to understand the the berthing space is VERY small. One can barely sit up in the bunk, and there is only room for a single person (of four assigned to the room) to change. Although not predisposed to clostrophobia, the space was literally pressing in on me. Worse yet, that recirculating feces from the weird marine head must have been sloshing around for some time, because the stench was overpowering and thick. If I hadn’t been nauseated already, I surely would be now due to the pervasive toxicity that would permeate all bedding and clothing for the remainder of the trip and weeks beyond, in the case of my backpack.

I cursed Seth for forgetting the Scopolamine and he said that he had some Dramamine. In a tender voice he asked if I would like some. Like some? “Give it to me!,” I barked. If for no other reason, I knew I had to get out of the cabin for fear of death in this putrid coffin. I made the mistake of turning on the light to find some clothing. Turning on the light was my fatal error. Everything was twisting and turning violently without a visual frame of reference. Getting my clothes on was now a true emergency. I figured it would be gauche, although highly entertaining to the crew, to run topside naked and vomit. I had my shirt on by performing a Houdini miracle in that small space, but my first true gag came as I tried to get my pants on while being flung around in this tomb that seemed to be an impending sacrifice to Poseidon.

Not quite complete in my task, I yelled at Seth, “I’ve got to get out – NOW!” I’m not certain I even saw him, he moved out of the way so fast. During his residency training, Seth made the mistake of standing in front of a person whose skin had the same hew that mine was now sporting, and the result of catching the full brunt of projectile vomit was not one he wished to relive. He had gotten quite skilled at recognizing and evading people who were about to be sick.

I rolled out of the rack as we listed to port (a luck roll for Seth, let me tell you!). I pulled my pants up as best I could and gagged as I raced up the ladder to the deck. I don’t remember if I hit my head on the way up, but since it was seemingly unavoidable under the best of circumstances, I’m quite certain that I did.

I gagged one more time, but found instant relief in the wind and with some reference to the horizon, dark as it was that night. My Hell turned to a different sort as I was hit and completely drenched by a cold wave. Don’t be fooled…the Bahamas ain’t warm, Baby! I knew if I stayed on deck that I’d die of hypothermia. It was only 3:30 am and I wouldn’t make it through the night being barraged by wave after wave. If I went back below deck, the gags would culminate in something far worse, so that was not an option. So I was resigned to being on deck without shelter for a long time while I waited out the fridgid night in agony. I was already exhausted from the days of no sleep, diving, and cold.

At this point, I’d gotten my wits about me and heard the violent wretching on the port side of the boat. The retired Sergeant Major on board was reliving the over cooked bow-tie pasta, out-of-the-10-gallon-can tomato sauce, over boiled buttered green beans, and chocolate pudding with graham crackers. When this dive charter advertises that the guests will be fed well, they really mean to say well fed. This was an issue of quantity over quality, an no human being should ever be subjected to reliving it.

“Oh, NO!," I thought in sudden fear. “What if more people come up the ladders?” I’d be right in the line of fire. Using every available survival instinct, I realized that I would have to stay warm somehow, so I quickly retrieved and donned my wetsuit which was stored under the seating on the deck, and I just put it over my soaking wet clothes. The way wet suits work is that when you dive, a thin layer of water forms between your skin and the wet suit. Your body heat warms the water and keeps you a little warm. The suit only slows the dissapation of heat, it doesn't stop it. This was not as good a solution, because there was no layer of water to keep me warm, but it was MUCH better than nothing, and it cut the wind. Also, I knew no one would venture out onto the front of the boat, so that is where I wanted to be. Not only did it get the brunt of the waves and wind, but also there was serious danger of being swept overboard if one didn’t hold on. So I attached myself to the front of the boat, intent on staying there for an indefinite number of hours.

The Sergeant Major later said that when he had gathered his wits about him, that he had the same idea of getting to the front of the boat. When he looked to where I was standing, he “cursed the mermaid who had rudely attached herself to the spot of relative safety.”

I made my move just in time, because up the ladder across from ours (where six single bunks housed those poor souls who experienced the most extreme motion) came a middle-aged man who had abandoned all dignity, emerging in his tighty-whities. We all know what white cotton looks like when it gets wet…almost translucent. And believe me, this dude never ever wants to enter a wet brief contest. He flung himself to just where I’d been and began the loudest most disgusting series of wretches that I’ve ever heard. That sent the Sergeant Major off again.

Mr. Translucent Undergarment must have emptied his stomach and taxed his gall bladder, because the next day, the deck was literally green…even after all of the waves had washed over the decks at regular intervals for more than 10 hours. He had to be cold, so he went below deck. How, I’m not quite sure. Needless to say, he did not last long, and he emerged part way up his ladder. But the selfish bastard wouldn’t take the extra steps up and away from the area where the two berthing spaces emerge, and just wretched there, with his face at deck level. Perhaps it was because I was standing there looking at him with disgust, or perhaps he had regained some dignity after seeing what the waves had done to his appearance. Regardless, he was not willing to expose anything below his torso. I cannot say I blame him, but if there was ever a possibility of getting back to my bunk that night, it vanished at that moment when he decided to foul the area in front of the hatch to my berthing space.

I must have given up hope at that point because a sudden and uncontrollable wave nausea gripped me and I vomitted violently. I wasn’t so fond of the dinner anyway. A crewmember approached me about 20 minutes later and asked if I was OK. I felt fine, though soaked to the bone and as cold as I have ever been, but I was very thirsty. I begged for a glass of water, which he was kind enough to retrieve. I knew with certainty that I wouldn’t venture below deck for any purpose now. He delivered the water, and feeling perfectly fine, I sipped it. That was the second fatal error of the night, as I hurled myself to the side of the boat again and…well, hurled. Was this night ever going to end? There wasn’t even a hint of morning on the horizon.

I had grabbed the Dramamine on the way out of the rack, but I hadn’t been able to take it yet, for obvious reasons. It took about an hour more to work up the courage to move myself to the back of the boat where I could ask for more water. By that time, about seven or eight people had come and gone from the deck, wretching all the while. I figured I was safe.

I carefully made my way to the back, still being battered by wind and waves, fighting to stay on my feet, for fear of landing in vomit. My bare feet were bad enough. At this point, I really had no standards. Even the recirculating feces seemed preferable to this. Maslow was wrong: he left out a layer of needs below the first, and I hadn't even realized that level. I had been brought low.

In the Captain’s pre-sailing briefing (why the word sailing is ever used is another question I’d return home with, as the sails were never raised), he explained how to properly vomit on his vessel. As explained before, using the bathroom like a civilized person was not an option due to the temperament and fragility of the marine heads. But the bathrooms were not civilized anyway, so I guess that didn’t matter. So that left the areas in the lower part of the boat and the deck. He explained that if one were to vomit on one’s bunk, that there would be no replacement sheets forthcoming, so it would behoove the guest to get topside in the event of sea or other sickness. Passengers were cautioned against vomiting overboard, for fear of falling overboard, which would be a true emergency. Instead, guests were to sit on the benches and vomit onto the deck. That was the only place to sit, as the berthing spaces, sleeping four people each, were large enough for only one person to change at a time. Therefore, it was not an ideal place, in my humble opionion, for everyone to be vomitting. No one asked my opinion, however, so I didn't say anything.

I made it back to the helm, which was just as exposed as everything else topside, and got out my Dramamine. I waited about 20 minutes more, to be certain my stomach was calm. I chatted with the crew and all seemed well. I swallowed that seemingly insignificant and tiny little pill with some soda water, and wouldn’t you know it? I felt my stomach contract violently and had to fling myself to the side of the boat again. There were no more chunks left, so I was acutely aware of and could actually feel that demon pill from hell as it escaped my gullet, like Jonah from the whale, mocking me all the while. Here is a lesson, boys and girls: if you are already sea sick, Dramamine will make you seasicker! I don’t recall that among all of the warnings and instructions on the bottle. I don’t think I will ever forget the taste of Dramamine.

Now I don’t have much disposable income, but I was seriously considering bartering all of my worldly goods and taking a third mortgage out on the house in exchange for an airplane ride from the next port back to Miami so I could escape the hell of my Bahamas dream vacation.

It was finally getting light, and one more trip to the side of the boat would be it for me. Someone brought me some bread and water and told me that it would help, which, miraculously, it did. Isn’t bread and water what they feed prisoners? I have never been so tired in my entire life. Nothing had changed in terms of wind, waves, and motion of the boat, but it was light. The Captain told me we had only about three more hours until we reached some protection from the waves, but it turned out to be more like four hours – four long hours. My face, lips, and eyes were absolutely raw from the salt water, and I was so cold that I stopped shivering all together. I ended up being on deck, vomitting, freezing, and battered by waves and wind for 10 hours. This was after a couple of days of bad travel experiences which left me sleep deprived. I donned my swim goggles that look like big mirrored bug orbs to protect my eyes. I must have been a sight…wet suit, bug eyes, and battered…to those emerging from a night without seasickness. Seth, in the unkindest of moments a man could have, took several pictures – not one, but several.

You know how people say they wish their vacation would last forever? I felt that mine already had, and my biggest fear is that it never would end. I was too tired to recall why this would be fun, and I certainly couldn’t comprehend why I’d spent so much money to do it. We were now 130 miles from Miami, rather than 45. If the winds didn’t shift, that meant that we’d get triple our money’s worth on the drive back. That thought was too much to appreciate at the moment, and we were rolling up to the next dive site.

Seth convinced me to dive somehow, and I thought I’d feel better if I did. Besides, I had to get off the boat. I watched Seth as he readied himself for the dive, because I was moving slowly. I have to mention that, like it or not, swimsuit styles for men have changed over the years. But Seth, never a slave to fashion, still clings to his Speedo. To his horror, and my great entertainment, he realized that not only did no other male have a suit above knee length, but that his suit had aged, and aged badly over the years. He stretched it in front of his face and realized that he could see, particularly down the center posterior section, right through what remained of the paper-thin spandex.

He squealed, “Did you see this?”

“I’ve been trying to get you to lose that damn thing all week, but who am I to tell you what to wear?” I replied.

Seth was religiously careful about where he bent over and for how long for the remainder of the trip. My sense of humor had not drowned and was back with a vengeance, much to his dismay. I remembered back to his evil moment hours earlier, and I thought I’d return the photo session favor later, as he was bent over in his special Speedo, if I could muster the energy.