Monday, December 31, 2012

Dolphin dives

*sparklingly (http://sparklingly.blogspot.com)
{ Monkey love | Honduras | December 2012 }

When we decided to go somewhere warm for the holidays we knew we wanted a mix of jungly and beachy, so we looked toward the coastlines of Central America. Our first choice was this gorgeous property in Nicaragua built on a lake in the middle of the country that seemed perfect: green in every sense of the word, intimate, lots of places to explore, yoga out on a dock everyday, my style of food and comforts, but sadly worked out to be too expensive for us, especially since we wanted to do a solid two weeks.

The place we ended up choosing in Honduras isn't exactly what I expected, but one thing it delivers in spades is the junglyness. We're on a nature preserve of sorts and there's a family of monkeys here that are adorable (until they try to swipe your things), these squirrel/gerbil-type critters that scamper around, stately peacocks, squawky geese, iguanas that look like mini-dinosaurs and therefore freak me out when they sidle up to our palapa on the beach, roosters that crow at random times of the day, pheasants that look completely out of place and humble cows. Quite the motley crew.
*sparklingly (http://sparklingly.blogspot.com)
{ Shiver-inducing iguana | Honduras | December 2012 }

But of all these wild beasts, the most amazing are the dolphins (which aren't running wild on the property of course).

I was somewhere in the neighborhood of about ten years old when The Little Mermaid came out and I was obsessed (until The Lion King, which is now and forever will be my all-time-favorite Disney movie, despite feeling like I should like Aladdin more since it features a Disney princess I can identify with). Anyway, point is, I watched that movie verging on daily for quite a few months after we bought the VHS, so I knew all the lines, the characters' expressions and the words to all the songs. I felt like Ariel and I were the same and I even tried to perfect a little mermaid/dolphin dive in the pool during swim practice (which may be why I was never a good competitve swimmer, too much time wasted flipping my imaginary fins around).

*sparklingly (http://sparklingly.blogspot.com)
{ Sweet little guy saying hello | Honduras | December 2012 }

When R and I had the chance to actually swim with dolphins a few days ago it was completely surreal. They were these gorgeous, playful, cuddly (seriously!), laughing (again, seriously!) creatures that loved to impress and were crazy for our applause and cheers and whistles. It really was an incredible experience. They had this magnificent power, but turned to mush when they sensed we were happy. And their speed and grace! They'd zoom off, do back-to-back flips and then race back to us, stopping with a swift ninety-degree turn right in front of us. Then they'd loll over on their sides so we could scratch their silky smooth bellies. We were able to take some beautiful pics of us hugging our dolphins and us each getting a sweet little smooch from them.

One of the most amazing things for me was seeing my 6'4" husband become like a little boy again when the dolphins swam around him. I've seen him with babies and puppies, but he was absolutely enthralled by the dolphins and his giddiness was just as precious to me as the chance to flit around with dolphins and channel my inner Ariel.

If you've never done it before and ever have the chance, please promise me you'll take a swim with some dolphins. You won't regret it.

*sparklingly (http://sparklingly.blogspot.com)
{ Showing off for us | Honduras | December 2012 }

And with that—Happy New Year's! Here's to a fabulous (hopefullly dolphin-filled...or at least dolphin-adjacent) 2013 for all

2 comments :

  1. AMAZING!!!!!!! can't wait till we jet of to our fun in the sun in a few days.... ! :)

    ReplyDelete

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