WaterWorld III - Deep Blue

“Deep Blue”
Did you see the movie??? It was wonderful!!! I feel like the main character in that movie, I identify with him, I feel better in Water that on land.

Back to my Island (Easter Island or Rapa Nui or Isla de Pascua or Tepito Teje Nua) at the end of 1970… There was a French Scientific expedition, that wanted to study underwater flora and fauna, of course one the best places in the island are the Motus.

There are three (3) little islands right in one corner of the big island, to the side of Rano Kao (One of the biggest crater in the world), they are called Motu Iti (Little island) Motu Nui (Big island) and Motu Kao Kao (Pointy island). The deeps between the outside wall of the crater and the Motus is from 20 to 150 feet. Deep at the Motus is estimated to be over 10,000 feet, and that my friends is called “Deep Blue”.

The name probably comes from the colour of the water… You see is crystal clear, so when you dive, all you see down there is a deep blue colour.

It’s a wonderful experience, for the first time, and then you look for it the rest of your life…. You feel small, very small and you give thanks to the one that created this wonder.

Maybe is “Deep Water Vertigo” what you look for after the first time… Deep diving is something that few people do.

Most of the underwater flora and fauna are found between 10 and 65 feet (3 to 20 meters). The best deep diving can be found in Puerto Rico, on the Ceiba side of the island, there is a place called “The Wall”. You go from 60 feet, to the edge and then is all the way down to more than 1,000 feet. You are only allow to go down to 180 feet for a few minutes, because of decompression, but is THE MOST FANTASTIC EXPERIENCE!!!.

WaterWorld II - Rapa Nui, Anakena

Let’s go back a few years, January 1969; my father was transferred to Eastern Island (Isla de Pascua, Rapa Nui, Te pito teje nua). He was the Commander of the Chilean Air Force base and was also named the governor of the Island. There was also a U.S.A. Air Force/NASA base for tracking satellites and Apollo missions.

Funny story: My father’s last name is a nightmare for English speaking people, you see, is a compound last name “Perez de Tudela”, so the American people just called him by his initials “PDT”. If you go to Eastern Island you will find a discotheque that is named after my father, it’s called “PiDiTi” (just pronounce PDT in English and you will know what I mean!!), and is the best of the island.

Here we are, a 11 year old boy in a beautiful South Pacific Island, average temperature 80°, temperature of the crystal clear water 75°, dimension of the island 22 km. by 18 km. by 14 km. YES!!! Is almost a perfect triangle in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.

I already told you that I loved water, and this was/is the perfect place for me.

First weekend in the island and the family goes to one of the two sand beaches Anakena (the other is called Ovaje).

It’s a beautiful cove with the whitest sand you have ever seen, and once you get into the water a fantastic new world opens up. It’s transparent, full of colours, full of life!!!. You can spend hours in it, because the temperature is great, and the water is so clear that you can see everything.

I know that Love gives everything, and this place doesn’t hide anything from you, so I fell in Love…

WaterWorld I - Water

WATER

Yes, I want to talk about water... You see, your first nine month of life are spend “under” water. Really!!, you are like a deep diver hook up to your mother “ship” by a cord. Your movements are free, there is not “up” or “down”, gravity doesn’t affect you and sounds are muffled, like they came from far away.

Maybe some of us keep that memory alive!!!. That maybe is the reason because I wanted to be in the water all the time when I was a child, or it was that my Father also loved water, but the story so I was told, is that I could barely walk but I was like a “fish” in the water.

My Father will put me under water when I was three months old, and I will stay under water for 30 seconds or more. By the age of eight I was skin (free) dive with my father, and when I turned 13 I was scuba diving.

It was at the Naval Academy of Chile were I finally was “free”, when I had my first scuba dive, when the beautiful underwater world was showed to me. It’s was love at first “dive”.

You see, the underwater world is a “natural” place for us humans, there is no weight and you move in three dimensions. Sometime the best “position” is head-down if you want to look inside a cave, instead of placing yourself in the bottom of the ocean and looking to the front (your neck is not that flexible!!!).

This is how the story begins, I will let you come into my underwater world, but it will be in episodes.

WaterWorld I