Putting my own advice to the test
The Geezer’s Guide to Adventure is now out and doing well. In it I suggest how readers can add more fun and adventure to their lives, even into 60’s, 70’s and beyond…and do so safely, comfortably and economically.
A week or so before the book came out, my wife and I decided to take on a new adventure..a week long trip to a place we had never heard of, the Cook Islands. We expected it to be an ocean adventure with plenty of sharks and other critters to keep us interested. So…at age 75 for Linda and 77 for myself…off we went to Rarotonga and Aitutaki atolls in the Cook Islands.
Our trip to the Cook Islands was one of the best trips of our lives. We loved it all…and you will too. We found the water to be warm and clear, the people to be welcoming and helpful and the scenery to be everything you would expect from atolls in the South Pacific. One missing…never saw a shark. However, we made up for that by a swimming experience that neither of us will ever forget. As you read the following, remember that we do foolish things, but we do not do them foolishly. I will explain.
We decided to swim out a pass in the atoll reef, a deep channel where boats can come and go from the atoll to the open sea. This particular pass on Rarotonga was too narrow for boats, but plenty wide for critters to come and go on the tide. And the tide…it created a current that was much faster than walking speed, more like running speed…except we were swimming.
We jumped in the water at 5:45am…and it was still dark and quite cloudy. More importantly, the outgoing time was just plain RIPPING out toward the reef, some half mile or more away. This was meant to be an underwater photo mission, but it was too dark for photography on the way out. And, we really did not need to use both arms to swim…Linda and I had one arm loaded up with a quite large camera and water housing. In fact, we did not need any arms to swim…just let the outgoing tide take us…outgoing.
We reached the reef in no time. When we reached the white water from the waves that were breaking ten to fifteen feet high onto the reef, we turned around and headed back to the beach. The sun was now up enough for photographs and we started our one arm swim in pursuit of coral and creatures to photograph.
When you turn into an outgoing tide and find that it not yet let up as expected, you kick hard to stay even…progress is hard to come by. When you finally wear yourself out, you look for a spot on the wall of the reef where you can duck into it and get some rest from the current. Right then is when all my tips from the book paid off.
Linda and I do not ignore danger and go it alone. If we sense danger, we either choose another activity or we gear up for whatever danger might come our way. On this one, we geared up by hiring two big strong watermen to accompany us…one with a paddle board we could get onto at any time and another with a life guard sling we could grab and be pulled out of trouble. These two guys came equipped with experience and good eyes. The good eyes paid off immediately.
As I prepared to duck into the quiet water around the reef, one of the guys yelled at me and pointed directly in front of me. In front of me, exactly where I was preparing to grab onto a stony part of the reef was…a stone fish…a huge, really hard to see, spines up and ready for me, extremely deadly stone fish. Deadliest fish in the sea…a foot from my hand. Check out that very stone fish at the top of this blog. Ok…my investment in hiring these two guys had already paid off magnificently.
We photographed the stone fish, the eagle rays, puffer fish, a variety of huge reef fish, turtles and colorful coral and reef fish all the way back to the beach. Given the outgoing tide…back to the beach was over two hours of constant swimming. Did I mention we are 75 and 77? It was exhausting.
Payoff number two on my investment in safety…with about 100 yards left to the beach, after being in the water and swimming constantly for now nearly two and a half hours, in an area where we could finally get our feet to touch the sand, Linda asked me if I minded if she took the guys up on their offer to drag us back in. Heck no, I’ll join you. They dragged us in like dead tuna. Never been happier in my life. When we could finally touch dry sand, my legs were completely gone…I could barely stand.
Why is this not a story about two foolish old people trying to get themselves killed? It is not…no way. It is a story about two extremely experienced ocean swimmers, who studied the risks and prepared for those risks…who hired people to look for and guard us against unexpected risks…and those two water safety experts had the equipment and ability to “save” us at anytime…and they did. Was it more dangerous than we expected? Yes and no. We expected sharks, lots of sharks in an early morning ocean where they would be hard to see…and we were prepared for them…looked forward to those encounters, because we are used to be around sharks (and then none showed up…they were probably watching us in the dark water that kept them hidden until the sun came up). The yes part was the fact that we were not expecting stone fish and did not expect to be swimming full time for two and a half hours…but that is where the safety backup comes into play. We came ready to play…and recognized that there is always some danger in the ocean…and on land.
I would bet money that more people die in the Cook Islands from accidents involving vending machines than die from encounters with stone fish. I know more die from falling coconuts than sharks or stone fish. I am absolutely sure that I was safer in that dodgy early morning situation than I would have been on a motor scooter driving around the island on the wrong side of the road. Risk needs to be taken seriously, but trying to always avoid risk leads to less fun and fewer stories.
Would we do it again…absolutely…a little later in the day and after a much more careful examination of the tide charts. Oh…and I would wear a kevlar reef glove on my non-camera holding hand….and I would still hire those two water studs to keep an eye on the old folks…us.
When we got to Aitutaki, it was all just complete pleasure. It is a big atoll, most of it looks to be 15 to 20 feet deep, at most. Crystal clear and warm water. Calm surface, as the fringing reef protects the atoll waters from wave action and some of the wind. Lots of snorkel areas to explore…safely. Never saw a shark or stone fish. Did see dozens of big ulua and a bump head wrasse that was twice my weight or more…plus giant clams, turtles everywhere, colorful reef fish and purple coral. It is heaven.
One word of reality…snorkeling sounds so easy and fun…and it is. But there is a learning curve to it and some physical conditioning is required. Take it seriously…please. Linda and I always think about the time we went on a boat, way out deep, looking for sharks so we could hop in and photograph them. There was a young lady from London on the boat…she had never snorkeled in her life. As soon as we got out from out encounter with the sharks , she, for some reason, jumped in…and was immediately attacked by one of the most dangerous sharks in the world. We all coordinated to get her back on the boat with all of her limbs still attached…I really do not know how she escaped from getting a very nasty bite. When she finally stopped trembling, I asked her how she like her first snorkel experience. Her answer “You mean my last snorkel experience.” Don’t be that person.
And if you need to calm down or warm up after reading this blog…here is a link to some of our Cook Island photos
https://donhurzeler.smugmug.com/Cook-Islands
.