MITSUGIRLYS EPIC CRUISE--2nd time around-1st from Port Canaveral

[mitsugirly]

Oops, now Kolin sunk to the bottom. Someone rescue him.

 

 

 

I think coming back up into more shallow water is throwing us off a little.

 

We could now see other snorkelers around us and knew we had to be close to the beach. I can't believe I DID IT! I actually got to scuba dive. Man what an experience.

 

Off in the distance were some ballyhoo I believe...and of course our "hello we're down here" floating red bag/device.

 

 

Luke got our attention and signaled us to grab on to this pole that was sticking out of the sand floor. He signaled for me to give him my camera and he took multiple pictures of all of us together. (Nice finger Luke).

 

 

 

Rock on dude!

 

 

 

 

 

Then we turned around and headed back up to the shore. I obviously didn't want to come out of the water because I was still down there and it wasn't deep at all. LOL

 

 

 

 

[mitsugirly]

I'm totally thrilled that you got her into the PADI Seals class and that she did a dive on your vacation. I know that for a mermaid like her, being under water is the most important thing, and I'm excited to hear how it went for her (and you too!).

 

I'm thrilled too. She absolutely loves it. I just wish she didn't have so much trouble with equalizing/popping her ears.

 

loving your review and laughing about the day at the Baths...I'm sure you weren't laughing then! My cruise in 2015 was much like that with the 2 "friends" we brought along and it made for stressful days even though I tried to keep calm and enjoy the things around me

 

 

Haha. I'm sure we are not the only ones that have experienced this at the Baths. LOL

 

Awwwwwwww' date=' MAN! lol What a place to break.

Work is overrated.....lol

However, it's what allows you to cruise 3X a year. SO jealous!!!!

 

Was thinking of you yesterday with the active shooter/stabber at OSU. Was hoping that's not where you went to school......

 

Ok, patiently waiting for more...[/quote']

 

I agree. Work is over rated...and that's 4x a year for me this year. :D

 

Thanks for thinking of me and the situation at OSU. This guy actually graduated from the same school I attended several years ago when I became a nurse. He then transferred to Ohio State this year. The "think" it's a terrorism attack, but he is now dead thanks to the security police at the school. I currently attend Ohio University and my classes are all online thank goodness. It's a cruel world to adventure out to these days.

 

Still loving it cant wait for the next installment

Thanks and glad you are still here.

 

I Emailed them to make sure they are aware there is a definite problem with the service at O'Sheehan's. Yours is one of several reviews that states O'Sheehan's is lacking in the service department.

 

Being the optimist that I am I am hoping they will look into it and maybe tighten it up a little bit.

 

I will definitely have a good time on my cruise. We always have a good time no matter what. We make our own good time. There have been times the hotel and weather was horrible. We just walked down to a place with a pool table and bar food. A couple of pitchers later and all was well with the world.

 

We will be in the middle of the ocean with free food and drinks. Couple that with a casino and we will have a blast.

 

Gotcha. I was just wondering. We are the same way...always find a way to have a good time despite the downfalls. Absolutely...food, drinks and casino. What more could you ask for on a ship? I'm perfectly happy with that. :D

 

 

These are postcard quality!!!

 

Thank you. It's funny someone else said that on social media and my daughter Kendra replied "They look fake" LOL

 

Kim, I understand what you were going through. I learned scuba diving at the exact same place at Coki Beach and I remember vividly wondering if I would freak out. I have anxiety attacks from time to time and starting thinking I might get claustrophobic but then I reminded myself how much I wanted to learn scuba and decided to just go with it. I had done tons of snorkeling wearing a mask and using a snorkel and that didn't bother me at all so I figured maybe this would not be the problem I was afraid it would be. As it turned out, I had a marvelous time and didn't freak out at all. LOL! I think it's really just anticipatory anxiety.

 

I have heard others mention getting claustrophobic, but you are in a big open space in the ocean. How do you get claustrophobic? Is it just being in the mask or ?? Just wondering.

 

Anticipatory anxiety...yep, that's definitely what happened to me.

 

 

so awesome, I did a discover scuba thing many years ago in st thomas and loved it!

 

Did you do it at Coki?

 

Oh my gosh! Cliffhanger!

 

No not really...my mermaid needed a shower. lol

 

These pictures are absolutely beautiful. I've never been underneath the water to ever see this stuff.

 

Thank you very much and it's definitely one of those "do not miss" type of things in this world. There's so much to see and explore. It's definitely another world down there and so peaceful.

 

The pictures are awesome. Thanks for taking us along. Love the coral.

 

Thank you and you're welcome.

 

Some of the best underwater pictures I've seen, amazing!

 

Why thank you Azzie. :D

 

amazing pictures! thank you for sharing these they are absolutely stunning.

 

Thanks so much. I appreciate the nice comments.

 

Thank you for the amazing photos and great review! Your first dive and you managed to take all these fabulous photos! WOW! Very Impressive. Your coral photos are as good, if not better, than prints I purchased in the Caymans on a cruise many years ago.

 

Aww, thanks so much. I really appreciate the comments and compliments. It means a lot. I work hard on taking as many pictures as I can on vacation so that I have plenty to share. Believe it or not, I share much less than I actually share (due to blur or something going wrong with the picture...sometimes I get a little too snap happy and screw them up big time...just a little "behind the scenes info.)

 

Great photos Kim!

Thanks so much. Did your signature line just get bigger or is it me? LOL

[mitsugirly]

OK, I'm going to stop here. There are some things I would like to discuss...and show, and it might end up being a little longer than I would like it to take tonight. It's after midnight and I have an early (gasp) doctor appointment tomorrow. So, I will return some time tomorrow after work.

 

I hope everyone is still enjoying the review. I know this section has been a little picture heavy and time consuming, but honestly, I only shared a small amount of the pictures I had. I just take so many and I try to eliminate a lot of them but my enthusiasm gets the best of me and I'll be like, "Ok, that's all...oh wait, ooohhhh ahhhh, I like that one too. Oh wait, this is a good one. Oh my, this one's pretty too." So before you know it...I've shared more than I had anticipated. Oops.

 

Thanks for being patient with me.

 

Have a wonderful evening (or morning if you are reading this tomorrow). :) <3

[SuiteTraveler]

Claustrophobia because of the thought of putting the dive mask on and then having the regulator in my mouth at the same time. I don't know why I thought it would be a big deal to have both pieces on my face - I'd had a mask and snorkel for like forever. LOL! And as it turned out, I was fine anyway. I just totally freaked myself out for no reason whatsoever. Dumb, I know!

 

Love the photos of your dive. I remember feeding the Sgt. Majors- I was having a hard time NOT grinning as they pecked at the large Milkbone. It reminded me of the behavior of my parrot back home and how all creatures are related. This fish might be my parrot's distant cousins! So precious! I could have fed them forever! There were so many in the area and they were all over me darting in and out and pecking at the Milkbone. I got a few bites (just fish mouth shaped bruises) which I showed off at dinner to our table mates.

[rayness]

How fun and amazing pictures. I wish I could scuba dive. I'm not that strong of a swimmer and the bad thing is I have a pool where I live that's open year round. I'll live vicariously through you! I'm sailing on Epic Saturday can't wait!

 

 

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[dporter]

It was more than 15 years ago so I don't remember what beach it was. I remember lots of coral and the tink tink tink sound of the fish eating the coral.

[dng6325]

Your underwater pictures are awesome! Did you use any type of enhancement software or did your pictures just came out looking this bright and colorful?

Thank you for sharing!

[SquishTheWhale]

I'm really enjoying that the timezone difference means I have an update from you to read on my lunch every day!

 

The scuba experience looks so fun- and I think you did really well considering how uncomfortable you felt first of all. I've done scuba in a pool before but I really want to do a discover scuba session in Costa Maya when we stop there on the Escape. Having a hard time persuading my partner though as he is also scared of the deep blue/sharks/everything. It's also scary to me, but I want to overcome that and have the experience!

 

How did the baby shampoo tip work on the snorkel mask? Did you rub it in and then wash it out before you go under? Could be useful- although for Christmas I've asked for a full face snorkel mask and they don't fog up due to separate seeing/breathing areas! :D So excited to take it on the cruise and try it out.

[vedettes1]

Do you have an idea of how much one can see if snorkeling rather than scuba? I.e. is Coki worth it for snorkeling only?

[Boscodog]

Just wanted to thank you for taking the time to share your incredible pictures. I am thoroughly enjoying your review and looking forward to the next installment. One question, how long was the diving experience underwater.

[keeponcruising]

I can't believe you all went scuba diving with no experience except Sakari. ;) The photos are just amazing.

[k9trix]

Thank you for the pictures of the Epic, it helped me make a decision on which 2017 cruise to take, really looking forward to exploring the ship. At this point I'm going for the studio room, but if a good price comes up or I just get weak I might go for the balcony. On a side note, your family's tattoos are great, really impressive work. I thought in a previous review you mentioned Kendra has a shop, are one of them the artists?

 

Trix :)

[katiecat]

Do you have an idea of how much one can see if snorkeling rather than scuba? I.e. is Coki worth it for snorkeling only?

 

I don't snorkel but have been to this beach a couple times and saw plenty of fish close to shore.

[_beachgirl_]

I hope everyone is still enjoying the review. I know this section has been a little picture heavy and time consuming, but honestly, I only shared a small amount of the pictures I had. I just take so many and I try to eliminate a lot of them but my enthusiasm gets the best of me and I'll be like, "Ok, that's all...oh wait, ooohhhh ahhhh, I like that one too. Oh wait, this is a good one. Oh my, this one's pretty too." So before you know it...I've shared more than I had anticipated. Oops.

 

Definitely still enjoying your review. I've been considering taking a discover Scuba excursion but like you, I'm a bit nervous. Seeing how amazing your pictures are (you also may have sold me on the camera), I really want to try it out! Looking forward to reading your final thoughts on your diving day and the rest of your cruise and review.

[rguy123]

Nice intro to scuba. After you get comfortable with it try a night dive.

 

 

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[SuiteTraveler]

Do you have an idea of how much one can see if snorkeling rather than scuba? I.e. is Coki worth it for snorkeling only?

 

You can see much of the same stuff snorkeling at Coki - so yes, it is worth it for snorkeling, but don't be scared to try scuba for the first time there - it is much easier than you would think.

[Luvnlyfagain]

Amazing photos! The coral....WOW! I've added another "must visit" place to my list. :D Thanks for taking the time to do such detailed reviews.

[ABQrobin]

Hey hey.... glad you got to scuba dive. I told you that you would love it. Now time to get certified. Honestly, it gets easier. The first 50 dives are the hardest, then you don't even think about it. It is just magical.

 

robin:)

[mitsugirly]

Claustrophobia because of the thought of putting the dive mask on and then having the regulator in my mouth at the same time. I don't know why I thought it would be a big deal to have both pieces on my face - I'd had a mask and snorkel for like forever. LOL! And as it turned out, I was fine anyway. I just totally freaked myself out for no reason whatsoever. Dumb, I know!

 

Love the photos of your dive. I remember feeding the Sgt. Majors- I was having a hard time NOT grinning as they pecked at the large Milkbone. It reminded me of the behavior of my parrot back home and how all creatures are related. This fish might be my parrot's distant cousins! So precious! I could have fed them forever! There were so many in the area and they were all over me darting in and out and pecking at the Milkbone. I got a few bites (just fish mouth shaped bruises) which I showed off at dinner to our table mates.

 

Not dumb at all. Makes perfect sense and that's kinda what I figured it was all about, but wasn't sure since you had mentioned that you had snorkeled for years. Glad you were able to do it. :)

 

Fish battle wounds...I like it! :D

 

How fun and amazing pictures. I wish I could scuba dive. I'm not that strong of a swimmer and the bad thing is I have a pool where I live that's open year round. I'll live vicariously through you! I'm sailing on Epic Saturday can't wait!

 

 

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Aww, I have always been a strong swimmer, but with my weight gain, it does wear me out and I had really wondered if I could even do it. Courtney is not a strong swimmer AT ALL and she did awesome. You'd be surprised how easy it is to scuba....as long as you are not going against the current.

 

 

It was more than 15 years ago so I don't remember what beach it was. I remember lots of coral and the tink tink tink sound of the fish eating the coral.

 

Ahhh yes, the parrotfish with their huge teeth chewing up the coral "tink tink tink"...so cool when you get to hear that.

 

Your underwater pictures are awesome! Did you use any type of enhancement software or did your pictures just came out looking this bright and colorful?

Thank you for sharing!

 

Aww, thanks so much. No enhancement software, but more on this coming right up...due to my lens.

 

I'm really enjoying that the timezone difference means I have an update from you to read on my lunch every day!

 

The scuba experience looks so fun- and I think you did really well considering how uncomfortable you felt first of all. I've done scuba in a pool before but I really want to do a discover scuba session in Costa Maya when we stop there on the Escape. Having a hard time persuading my partner though as he is also scared of the deep blue/sharks/everything. It's also scary to me, but I want to overcome that and have the experience!

 

How did the baby shampoo tip work on the snorkel mask? Did you rub it in and then wash it out before you go under? Could be useful- although for Christmas I've asked for a full face snorkel mask and they don't fog up due to separate seeing/breathing areas! So excited to take it on the cruise and try it out.

 

Yes, time zone's can be beneficial for that reason. :D

 

I really hope you get to try out the scuba in Costa Maya. <----You get to go there??? My Escape says the same old route we just did (Tortola, St Thomas, and Nassau). I would much rather go to Costa Maya instead of Nassau. Eh. Hopefully you can talk your partner into going with you. Amazing experience!

 

The baby shampoo=amazing. I didn't have one bit of fog the entire time! I'm definitely going to mix me up some to take with me from now on. They just poured a bunch in our mask and let it sit. Then just pour out, quick dip in the water and you are done. No wiping it out or scrubbing. It was just amazing!

 

I tried out that full face mask when Sakari was taking her scuba class because I was thinking about buying it. It was weird to say the least. You have to keep your head a certain way or the snorkel (since it's hard) will go under water and you get no air. I kept freaking out because I couldn't breathe and couldn't understand why. Then once I discovered why it was doing that...I had to laugh. I do like that it didn't fog up or get water in the mask at all. But, I opted to just buy a really nice and (more expensive) scuba mask this time around instead.

 

Do you have an idea of how much one can see if snorkeling rather than scuba? I.e. is Coki worth it for snorkeling only?

 

Absolutely I know. That's what we did last time we were here and it has been probably one of the better places we have ever been to. If you want to see what all you can see just snorkeling along both sides, check out my report from the last time. It's listed in my signature line, under St Thomas, and then Coki. There's TONS of pictures.

 

 

Just wanted to thank you for taking the time to share your incredible pictures. I am thoroughly enjoying your review and looking forward to the next installment. One question, how long was the diving experience underwater.

 

You are very welcome and glad you are enjoying them. Thanks so much for the comment.

 

Well...the scuba class is about 1/2 hour. Then they take you out into the shallow water to do the skills, which was 19 minutes (probably because there was so many of us...7 total and then my daughter having issues), then feed the fish for 4 minutes and they have on our books they logged 10 minutes. So that portion was a total of 23 minutes for that portion.

 

Then heading out, up until we came back was 37 minutes. I SWEAR to you, I thought we were out there about 1 1/2 hours. We were totally shocked when he told us we were out there 37 minutes and that's what they wrote in our log book. I double checked my time on all the pictures I took and they are absolutely correct.

 

Their website says 20-30 minutes in class and the dive is around 40 minutes and down to 40 feet.

 

I would do it again in a heartbeat.

 

I can't believe you all went scuba diving with no experience except Sakari. ;) The photos are just amazing.

 

I know right? I felt like I knew everything though because I had just went through it with Sakari. I sat in on all of her class, helped her do her assignments in the book, watched the video's they give you to learn, and of course I was in the water with her on 1 of her swims and got to watch everything and the skills that they had to do. So, I was kinda one step ahead of everyone. :D

 

 

Thank you for the pictures of the Epic, it helped me make a decision on which 2017 cruise to take, really looking forward to exploring the ship. At this point I'm going for the studio room, but if a good price comes up or I just get weak I might go for the balcony. On a side note, your family's tattoos are great, really impressive work. I thought in a previous review you mentioned Kendra has a shop, are one of them the artists?

 

You are very welcome for the pictures. I hope you have a wonderful time on the Epic no matter which room you finally decide on. I REALLY like the studios. They are so neat.

 

Thanks for the tat comment. I'm not sure if you are referring to us girls, or Kendra's fiance...because he's loaded with them. He has some "ok" work and then some good work. He's been collecting for years. I think he likes to allow people to experiment on him. LOL Yes, Kendra owns a tattoo shop. She just bought a place, remodeled to make it into a tattoo shop and runs the place. They don't do any of the work and have 2 tattoo artist and some that does piercings and tats. I'm very picky about my tats and who does them, which is probably why I only get one every 3 years. LOL

 

Definitely still enjoying your review. I've been considering taking a discover Scuba excursion but like you, I'm a bit nervous. Seeing how amazing your pictures are (you also may have sold me on the camera), I really want to try it out! Looking forward to reading your final thoughts on your diving day and the rest of your cruise and review.

 

I can begin to describe the feeling I had when scuba diving. It was simply amazing. All my worries and fears went out the door when I was under there. We didn't even realize how far down we were and I had completely forgot about my dry mouth/throat of the taste of it. I will definitely be searching out other places to do this at on future cruises.

 

 

Nice intro to scuba. After you get comfortable with it try a night dive.

 

Thanks. A night dive might be pushing it a little for me. Eek. I definitely would have a heart attack not being able to see except with a light. I'm not sure that's for me honestly. They won't let you do a night dive unless you are certified right?

 

Amazing photos! The coral....WOW! I've added another "must visit" place to my list. :D Thanks for taking the time to do such detailed reviews.

 

Thanks and the coral was amazing. It's definitely a "to-do" place...even just for snorkeling (check out my snorkeling review if you haven't already). There's some amazing things there.

Edited November 30, 2016 by mitsugirly

[pghsteelerfan]

Now it's time for the ship pictures. I have to say that this ship, by far, has been the hardest ship to get pictures of out of ALL the ships I have ever sailed. When we sailed her back in 2010, I really didn't have a lot of pictures (and everyone knows what a picture freak I am) and I just couldn't understand why. Now I wonder if it's the same reason I had this time....or I was just too busy having fun with my hubby's first cruise.

 

Several things hindered my picture taken abilities this cruise.

 

*The amount of people were just INSANE! This made it hard to get good pictures because people were just everywhere blocking the view and although I thought it in my head to scream "MOVE OUT OF MY WAY, DON'T YOU KNOW I'M TRYING TO GET THE MOST AWESOME PICTURES FOR PEOPLE ON CC?", I decided it would probably not be a wise choice.

 

*They have A LOT of the venues closed when they are not open. :eek: I mean CLOSED! As in if they aren't open, the doors are LOCKED! The dining rooms were locked, the theater was locked, some of the bars/venues were locked. So, when they unlocked them is when the hoards of people were flocking in and that's not the type of picture I wanted obviously.

 

.... :o

 

So happy to find your review...saw you post somewhere else that you had it in progress and have been reading up to this point. I am ROFLMBO right now because I am the exact same way. When taking pictures on cruises, I don't mind people in certain ones, but when I do the "tour" inside of the ship or even scenic places at ports, I don't want people I don't know in them and also feel like saying "move out of my way" but never do. As you said, not a good idea. :p On our most recent cruise (Liberty, the southern itinerary out of San Juan), I got up super early on St. Lucia day to get pictures sailing in. I also did my tour since I had a couple of hours to kill before we needed to be off the ship. The places were nice and empty with no one in them but it was because they were all locked. It was from about 6 to 6:40AM (according to the time stamp on the pictures).

 

In St. Lucia while on our tour, there was a beach that we were dropped off at from the boat and from there we walked through a parking lot to catch our land transportation. There was about 15 minutes for restroom breaks. I went down to the parking lot and there was a gorgeous view of one of the Pitons and another section of beach. Made for a beautiful picture except for one little problem. There was a man down there fishing or something and his bathing suit wasn't pulled all the way up, so there was a little more than "plumber's crack" showing, more like a "half moon". LOL!!! I was able to edit him out on the program that came with the computer. But where he was standing and the solid colors around him made it easy.

 

I'm really enjoying what you have so far and looking forward to the rest. I do have some catching up to do. Thanks for taking the time to do another one!

Edited November 30, 2016 by pghsteelerfan

[mitsugirly]

HEY NOW, You both snuck these comments in on me as I was commenting on everyone's comments. :p

 

 

Hey hey.... glad you got to scuba dive. I told you that you would love it. Now time to get certified. Honestly, it gets easier. The first 50 dives are the hardest, then you don't even think about it. It is just magical.

 

robin

 

50? :eek: I don't cruise often enough obviously. :p

 

So happy to find your review...saw you post somewhere else that you had it in progress and have been reading up to this point. I am ROFLMBO right now because I am the exact same way. When taking pictures on cruises, I don't mind people in certain ones, but when I do the "tour" inside of the ship or even scenic places at ports, I don't want people I don't know in them and also feel like saying "move out of my way" but never do. As you said, not a good idea. On our most recent cruise (Liberty, the southern itinerary out of San Juan), I got up super early on St. Lucia day to get pictures sailing in. I also did my tour since I had a couple of hours to kill before we needed to be off the ship. The places were nice and empty with no one in them but it was because they were all locked. It was from about 6 to 6:40AM (according to the time stamp on the pictures).

 

In St. Lucia while on our tour, there was a beach that we were dropped off at from the boat and from there we walked through a parking lot to catch our land transportation. There was about 15 minutes for restroom breaks. I went down to the parking lot and there was a gorgeous view of one of the Pitons and another section of beach. Made for a beautiful picture except for one little problem. There was a man down there fishing or something and his bathing suit wasn't pulled all the way up, so there was a little more than "plumber's crack" showing, more like a "half moon". LOL!!! I was able to edit him out on the program that came with the computer. But where he was standing and the solid colors around him made it easy.

 

I'm really enjoying what you have so far and looking forward to the rest. I do have some catching up to do. Thanks for taking the time to do another one!

 

 

LOL, I remember you posting about the guy with "parts" hanging out and editing him in another thread. Oh my. :eek: It would take me way too long to do that kind of editing in all the pictures I take. I just have to suck it up and deal with people being in some of them. :o

[mitsugirly]

So about the pictures...I'm going to go over a few things and explain some things about my scuba pictures.

 

What I do to my pictures for all reviews, I don't really "edit" them, but I do go in and put my name stamp on them and then I run an action on them that I have saved on my computer. It does a resize of the pictures (because when I take the picture, I'm using the absolute best quality on my camera) and then it sharpens for web because every time you open a picture and do something to it, it loses pixels and quality. Then viewing on the web will also cause it to lose quality in the original picture. This new camera I have also has the ability to shoot in camera RAW, which is the same as using a DSLR.

 

NOW...everyone has read that I got this new fish-eye lens that I bought extra for my camera. Well, when I added on the lens, I didn't think to compensate for adding the lens nor did I think about it being darker underwater when we started to go down deeper. Deeper=darker, which was my concern and getting scared but yet I didn't think about that when it came to my camera and should have adjusted the settings and over exposed it a little. Also, it was raining while we were under there, so no sunlight. So, most of my deeper underwater pictures were a little darker than my normal pictures are and I did have to lighten them up a little to a lot. They just wasn't pleasing to the eyeball enough for me. :D

 

 

So here's a few examples to show you what I mean. The one without the name stamp is the original picture out of the camera. The one with the name stamp has the lightening done to it. The first is us holding the crab. Still great detail in everything, but just upping the exposure for some light completely makes it easier to see.

 

 

 

Here's another picture that lightening the picture up really brought out the colors and clarity because now you could see everything better.

 

 

 

Lighting is what it's all about in photography. Having the perfect light can make a perfect picture.

 

One thing I also had going against me was that when we headed out into the water, it was very cloudy (as I mentioned above and you can see in the pictures as we were walking down the beach and into the water to start our scuba) and it was sprinkling. I didn't know it at the time that we were scuba diving, but it was raining. We wouldn't discover this until we were finished and came up out of the water. Our instructor also made the comment, see everything is still the same under the water and you didn't even know it was raining up here did you? Rain doesn't stop a scuba diver. :D

 

So, had it been a bright and sunny day out...maybe the pictures wouldn't have turned out so dark...or too dark for my taste.

 

I can say that after scuba diving, I went snorkeling and the sun came out. Those pictures are perfect, just like always. So, it's all in the lighting you have around you. That's probably why I take such an abundance amount of pictures for my reviews. Sun comes up, sun goes behind a cloud, facing the sun, sun behind you....it all makes a big difference in the picture quality. The sun light can be your best friend, or you worst enemy. It's always your friend when you are in the water. :D

 

I have always said...when I take pictures, I will sometimes stand there and take 4 or 5 of the same picture while adjusting my settings, to waiting for the sun to come out or go behind a cloud. I'm patient sometimes...other times, I'm a walk and snap kinda girl and if I get the picture, I get it. If I don't, it wasn't meant to be in the review. :p

[blarko]

Oh my gosh.....I actually laughed out loud at the part where you and then Courtney "fell" to the bottom. Your description of how it happened made me feel like it was actually happening to me. As usual, very entertaining!

 

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[mitsugirly]

Now, I'm also taking this opportunity to discuss more camera talk.

 

Remember how I said that Coki Dive Center also uses the same camera that I do for all their pictures they take of people doing the scuba dive? Well, I didn't identify exactly WHICH model they use, but they said it was the Olympus Tough and he knew how to do the settings and showed me a few tricks as well. So, I guess I just assumed they had the exact same TG4 camera as me. But, for the most part, most of them are about the same with the buttons on the outside.

 

Now...I spent a big portion of my time prior to the cruise and trying to decide if I wanted to book the Discover Scuba with Coki or if I wanted to go with somewhere else that was mentioned. When I was researching, I found that they had all of their pictures online that they take of people diving. (If anyone read some of my other postings, I believe during our discussion on my Fascination cruise at the end, my concern was that the pictures I was seeing on there didn't really look like there was much coral or that they were actually going all the way out to the reef. Well, this is because the photographer only goes out so far and then turns around and leaves. They are not taking pictures of you out there in the deep with all the coral and such...from what I can tell). Anyhow, the point is, I looked at TONS of these pictures they took of everyone and their scuba dive. I was excited about buying ours.

 

So, I got home and purchased all of our pictures (once again $35 for as many as you want). But, when I looked at them I was like "Hey, wait a minute, these don't even begin to resemble what I had seen on there before."

 

So here's a few of their pictures, from our day, of us.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Does anyone notice anything? Like the COLOR? Why are they like this? Did they totally forget to put the setting on underwater? I'm so confused!! (And disappointed).

 

I'm going to see if I can possibly do anything with them to correct them, but man...I just wasn't expecting this at all after seeing everyone's pictures from before.

 

I did go on and look at the rest of that days pictures, and they were all good, with the exception of 1 other dive, which turned out green as well.

[mitsugirly]

I purchased 44 green pictures...just saying.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now one might ask...why did you buy them then? Or didn't you get to see them before purchasing them? Well, the simple answer is...yes, I did see them before purchasing them and the reason I did buy them is because they would be the only pictures that would be captured with me in them (since I have the camera and take all the pictures) and I wanted that memory. It's as simple as that. I have emailed the Dive Shop to let them know my concern and ask exactly what happened, but no response yet. I'm not wanting my money back, I'm just wanting an explanation as to what might have went wrong and to make them aware of the situation (or possibly not putting the camera on the right setting or something) so that they might be a little more careful in the future. These are "memory" pictures and very special pictures to some (it could have been a honeymoon for the other couple...you never know).