One Day till Lift Off

We barely squeezed it all in, and the problem is that 1 suitcase, somehow without our knowledge, germinated into 3 overnight. As a veteran traveller and suitcase packer, who learned from the best (globetrotting parents), I know in my heart of hearts that we could have packed better and were we to unpack everything, delete the "un"necessities (there are none of course), we could fit it all into just 1 suitcase and the Bauer bag, but there are more pressing issues to fill our time during the next day, than to prove to ourselves we can do better. Prior to any trip we commiserate that we work twice as hard gearing up for our journey and upon our return, playing catch up with paperwork and bills. This often negates all the euphoric effects of our time away, which is why we had agreed years ago to make the one week vacation obsolete, realizing that it takes us 2 weeks to really get into holiday mode. Except this time around, that's all the time we have, so our next words of wisdom, should be coming from Roatan... till then....

One Week Till Roatan

As you can see from the picture, it will be an impossible task to fit all we want into the suitcase"s" we intend to take to Roatan. Sure we started off with just pull on shorts, T-shirts, flip flops, bathing suits (do I really need 4), cover ups and all our scuba gear with bags, but then we realized what else we needed to incorporate in the mix. Multiple bottles of OFF and high octane deet (to ward off those pesky sand flies everybody always complains about), 3 bottles of suntan lotion (in varying degrees of strength), 7 books (trust me I will devour one a day), Beach towels and bag. We need our I-Pod, bottle of Pampero Rum, Camera, body moisturizer, aloe, facial cream, aspirin, benadryl, cortizone, deodorant etc. The only concession I am making in the cosmetics department is the necessary lipbalm. The immediate task at hand is to defy physics and prove that we can fit 10 cubic feet of travel stuff in 5 cubic feet of suitcases and Jose Luis' newly acquired Jack Bauer "24" bag.

10 Days and counting till Roatan

Okay, so the wetsuits, flippers, masks and BCD still fit, but will they all fit in our luggage. With all the new homeland security and travel regulations www.tsa.gov including not allowing
more than 3 OZ of any specific liquid in your carry-on, we have to rethink what we check in and what we can carry with us on board the aircraft. Having worked in the airline industry for a dozen years we lived by the premise that if you could not carry it on with you, it just was not worth taking (this due to the oft stand-by position we were put in). So even a 2 week trip to Europe, including semi formal dining out wear fit in our overhead bin. We became masters at layering, rolling and wrapping our clothes in intricate patterns around one another in order to limit creases and wasted space.
We used to carry our regulators (fragile as they are), bottles of water (to hydrate), creams (to ward off the dry air in planes), medicines and for me a couple of 187ml bottles of champagne to imbibe and enjoy once we arrived at our destination. None of these are now allowable and so the entire issue of packing no longer becomes an afterthought but an intricate engineering problem, that will take us the next 10 days to resolve, not unlike the time it took us to solve the Rubik's Cube.
The open suitcases will be perched on the bed while we calculate, position and re-position everything we are taking with us in such a way that not a nook nor cranny, neither a millimeter is left empty. We are thankful that we are staying at Fantasy Island Resort on Roatan, where scuba diving is the norm and focus of the day and dressing up means putting on pull on shorts, a T-shirt and flip flops, while Polo shirts, belted shorts and shoes would be considered formal wear.
So off we go to try our hand at our first day of packing.

Getting Ready for Roatan

Postponing the inevitable, we finally spent the day getting some of our clothes ready and our Scuba Gear out of the closet : checking the regulators, octopus, BCD, wetsuits, snorkel, mask, fins and more. Although we have flown with most of our own items during the past years, we often did not bring our wetsuits, for lack of space, so after holding in my tummy and breath, Jose Luis zipped me up....and yes it still fit, while Jose Luis, the athlete that he is, as always, had no problem with his wetsuit.
Excitement is mounting , and the countdown has begun, as I will be trying out my newly acquired open backed fins with booties, and as we plan our first night dive on this trip, lights to guide us through the dark underwater maze, were a must as well.
The only thing that we have yet to purchase is a good underwater camera, to relay to our non diver friends and customers the exquisite world we observe once we slide into the blue waters of the Caribbean. Maybe, instead of the prerequisite jewelry or clothing, we can make it a mutual gift for our 26th anniversary in August.
Although it has only been 3 1/2 years since we officially became Open Water Divers, we spent the 3 years before that on dozens of Snuba and Discover Scuba trips, working our way, slowly but surely, towards that certification, and wishing, like so many times in life, that we had "done it sooner".
As we continue to amass info from Fantasy Island Resort, regarding the different dives we plan to make, we realize that 7 days, as usual, will not be enough, but having started a new restaurant only 6 months ago, we can not take the time away from our new growing endeavour.
Although the Resort includes all the diving and eating you can fit in, we plan to scour the island for other eateries and bring back ideas for our restaurant Elements Global Cuisine "Without Boundaries" in Gulfport, Fl.
We will keep you aprised as to our progress as we count down the days to our July 1 flight.
Catherine and Jose Luis Pawelek
Chefs/Owners
Elements Global Cuisine
twotravellingchefs@hotmail.com