I started to write the following blog nearly a year ago. And though we had an underwater camera malfunction, i.e. none of the pictures we took came out, I’d like to share the stories. The land pictures are stories within themselves, but alas as my memory fades, I do my best. So here, I chose a bunch of odd pictures that were not included in the last Tobago posting entitled The Seven Year Itch. Tobago is the most enchanting island we’ve been to and ranks high along with Dominica. As is true with Dominica, it’s thanks to its people as much as its wild, natural beauty.
As we were rolling gently in Man-O-War Bay in Tobago, a gentleman kayaked over to solicit his services as a certified freediving instructor. He and Paul exchanged pleasantries while I was busy down below. The guy introduced himself, Alexis is his name. He briefly shared that he has backpacked the world and hitched rides on sail boats to get from continent to continent for the past 11 years. Eventually he found his own boat. He and his marine-biologist partner Charlie salvaged a sailboat and now work on environmental projects and give freediving lessons from their boat. The boat they salvaged looks just like the ancient Polynesian style Kon-Tiki, with a tree trunk boom and mast. As a marine biologist, Charlie gets involved in all sorts of projects regarding the conservation of waters and its wildlife. She is also an accomplished free diver. That’s all. In this lifestyle you meet some of the most dynamic people and Alexis and Charlie get gold stars. I loved the story of them sailing up the Nile River and anchoring surrounded by hippopotami. They slept out on the deck, so as to be close as possible. You can travel to Alexis and Charlie, they’re nomadic freediving instructors who will train and host you on their boat.
Alexis “does his rounds” in the anchorage to let boats know about this opportunity and it is quite a perfect little bay to get it done. Paul was very excited when he was giving me all the details. Honestly, I was very mildly interested. At first. I’ve had some harrowing experiences that have turned me off to going deeper than 5 feet and holding my breath. I’ll do so when snorkeling to get a better look at certain things, but that’s about as deep as I normally go. Plus, there was a scuba diving incident that left me fearful of ever trying deep diving again, even with a tank. I had resigned to being a snorkeler and to never return to scuba nor body surfing anywhere other than the Jersey Shore or Long Island. Those are the waves I grew up with and can negotiate. Now, as I mature, I’m happy to observe and float. I certainly never considered myself capable of freediving. Paul planted the seed with his confident excitement and continued to nudge me on with a level of spontaneity to try something new that I hadn’t seen in a while.
Eventually, Paul’s enthusiasm was contagious. Plus, after going to Alexis & Charlie’s website, I didn’t need much more convincing to at least try. They clearly had the expertise and we had seen them busy teaching with multiple other students in the bay. I eventually warmed up to the idea and even started looking forward to it. Feral Freediving had me intrigued and Paul’s ebullience was easy to go along with. Nudging complete. I’d at least go along for the lesson and if needed, observe and float. As I mentioned, I’m quite good at that.
Alexis came aboard the RK for the theory portion of our introductory course. I was soon taking notes on how oxygen and hemoglobin bind and carbon dioxide dissolves in your plasma. Charts were drawn on a white board with color coding, and I copied away: the black-out stage, blood saturation, minutes under water, chemo receptors in your alveoli in the lungs. Depth, pressure, volume… proper form and recovery breathing. Understanding all this is important to avoid, well, dying. But way before dying, it’s the passing out, the “shut down” mode that we’re really avoiding, which leads to the dying part. But that’s why you follow these procedures, techniques, and never ever freedive alone. It’s on the ascent that the blackout usually happens. No level of diver freedives alone, according to Alexis. Paul was at home during our lecture since he’s the scientist. I was keeping up. And, silently having daymares about the black out stage. But my curiosity and Alexis’s mere belief that I could at least try, was enough.
Then we got to the “dry” practicum part, before getting into the wet practicum. Relaxing mentally and physically are tremendous components of this sport. This is the part where Alexis gave us a bit of guided meditation training. Now I was more at home. The 2-minute cockpit meditation that Paul thought felt so long, made me even more enthusiastic to try it in the water. Perhaps I can meditate on land, but meditating in and then under the water while holding my breath, submerging and resurfacing, now that was a different story. I was growing increasingly curious to face the opportunity. Alexis says he and other freedivers called it “forced meditation” and I didn’t understand this concept at first. Once in the water, then, I got it. Boy, did I get it. And it was incredible! It’s actually a sport I could imagine continuing to pursue. It’s quite indescribably beautiful.
What was most fascinating to me in the intro part of the lesson was learning about the mammalian diving reflex. It’s a response to being underwater that certain mammals have, humans included, and pronounced in infants. This complicated physiological response overrides other reflexes which allows for longer survival under water. I briefly learned about this years ago when Daniel was an infant. At 3 months old, after his inoculations, he went to baby swim classes. Holding him out at arm’s length, maintaining eye contact with him, I’d slowly submerge under the water. He’d instinctually hold his breath. As his receptors told him to do, he’d naturally maintain a breath hold, eyes wide open and locked on mine. I’d stay down with him as long as I could stand… five to ten seconds or so. Then we’d come up together, emerging from the water and he’d just flutter his long eyelashes to get the drips off, happy as a clam… or more like a chubby otter, giving a big smile.
Alexis had told us about the movie the Le Grand Bleu and we tried to watch it but could not find an online source and Amazon doesn’t deliver DVD’s here. I had the chance to read about the movie and the real-life protagonists it was based on. One of them was Jacques Mayol known for many free diving world records, his book Homo Delphinus: the Dolphin Within the Man. It explores his philosophy about humans, our origins from the deep, and our spiritual connection to the sea. In short, his belief is that humans have a hidden aquatic potential that can be revealed with physical and psychological training. His philosophy was based on achieving a state of relaxation based on yogic breathing. Which, again, for me is all well and good above the water but I never thought I could achieve it below the water. And when I tell you I’m a believer. I am a believer. I never thought I’d be able to free-dive so deep. Mayol’s theories seem to have been proven many times over. The world record is 831 feet. Deep free divers defy what doctors and scientists had claimed impossible. Further evidence are some ethnic groups, like the Sama-Bajau of Southeast Asia, that have exceptional freediving abilities that seem to be a genetic adaptation. Approximately three genes. Fascinating stuff. As for our spiritual connection to the sea, anyone who stands in front of a body of water might be able to conceive this truth. I’ve visited the book Blue Mind in a previous post. In the book, Dr. Nichols offers a paradigm shifting template for joy and wellness, essentially.
During our freediving lesson I expected Paul would get there and quickly. In fact he started head-down diving right away. Alexis gave us the choice of descending head up or down. I was apprehensive still and did not go head first, I went feet first. It took me three attempts before I even felt comfortable enough to go head first. It was a matter of coordinating my equalizing, aka clearing my ears by pinching my nose, just so, while kicking to get under the surface with momentum. The line we trained on in the water was attached to a float up top and held down by a weight floating below. There was a tennis ball marking 20 feet – our goal for the day. Yes, twenty feet. Of course, that number went into my brain and out. I wasn’t getting anywhere near it and just going to focus on not panicking, not a depth record.
I discovered equalizing was the absolute most important thing… after getting over the fear factor. Not sure I conquered that, but there was momentary liberation, which was outstanding. It is the equalizing that is the continually hardest aspect for all free divers, no matter their levels, not just for beginners, Alexis explained. It’s the most frequently discussed topic amongst free divers. Techniques are always shared in the sport. After figuring out how to really equalize, it made a world of difference for me. So when we started the practicum part of the lesson I didn’t expect much of myself. Certainly not attaining 20 feet on my first day, when I’ve never done much more than 10 feet ever before, while I was feral and free many years ago, and that goes for Paul too. He had never been deeper than about 10 or 12 feet.
Thanks to Paul’s mustache, he got water up his nose on his second dive, not quite 10 feet. He didn’t think he’d be able to carry on. Alexis brought some mustache balm, aka vaseline, to help the seal of his mask in the spot over his mustache. He used that generously and things improved. We carried on.
So before you dive, it’s critical that you relax. Meditate, floating face down in the water is how you begin. I came to conjure up the vivid feelings attached to a memory of a summer snorkeling and shell diving in the Med. Paul conjured up an image on his little yellow Force-5 sailboat on Candlewood Lake in CT, moving slowly with the lapping of the lake. Or it was more like floating face down in the water conjured up the memories in me. Whichever way they manifested, memories and their corresponding relaxing states of body and mind, worked well for both of us. We were calm and focused and ready to go under.
Then, my struggle became another. My instinct kept telling me to go back up every time I felt and heard the vibration of passing boats. It’s quite normal since I often swim in areas where I need to be careful. Alexis, told me above water that I was safe, again and again, once he realized my Pavlov-like fear response. Nevertheless, I reacted and always wanted to come up. Eventually Alexis, with a knowing, peaceful glance under water, assured me I was safe, so I trusted and kept on. He locked his gaze on mine and nodded ‘yes’ confidently. The nudge I needed. Now I was the baby being held out at arm’s length under the water. It was by far the bravest I’ve been in a long time. And perhaps oddly trusting… but if you ever met Alexis, you’d understand.
So down I went. When I finally felt the tennis ball, I nudged it even further down, a little act of bravado before turning around. I know I was able to achieve 20 feet and about a 2-minute breath hold primarily because I had come to trust Alexis and his expertise pretty quickly. Then, once I felt safe, my own instincts kicked in and it was so liberating.
Paul reached the twenty foot mark no problem. He already has a lot of experience cleaning the bottom of the boat with bursts of free dives. In solidarity, I watch him and hold my breath (above water) as he dives under, when he cleans the boat. It’s the idea of having something above me that really creeps me out, but Paul does it without a problem and can hold his breath while exerting himself. His fears are different. He’s more scared of sharks. Which I believe all children of our generation can thank Steven Spielberg for. Not that I’m fearless of sharks, mind you. But I have swam in waters where I had earlier seen sharks. A dolphin swam up to me in the water the other day and I panicked, however. Paul was under the boat and when he came up I told him “something” was in the water with us. I really couldn’t think straight though. In my memory, I did hear and see the dolphin come up for air and arch back down under the water. I was so panicked in the moment and just needed to get out of the water. Together, holding hands, Paul and I swam around to the swim ladder back onto the boat to watch what was clearly the visiting dolphin slowly swimming away through the bay looking for mischief and a playmate. I know sailors that have had amazing encounters in the wild, but yes, dolphins are still wild animals and honestly until I was out of the water my fear ran wild.
If we ever run into Alexis and Charlie again somewhere, I would train again. Until then, I feel more comfortable freediving once again. I do so sometimes while I snorkel and when checking on the anchor and am grateful for the renewed inspiration and confidence. Maybe one day I’ll be feral and free enough to feel comfortable the next time a dolphin swims up for a look. I hope I have the courage to stay. That said I’d like to end by sharing a courageous dolphin story that I found about a miracle encounter the freediving champ, Enzo Maiorca had. He is one of the real-life protagonists of The Big Blue movie I mentioned above.
“While diving in the Mediterranean with his daughters, Enzo was in the water preparing to dive. He felt a nudge on his back and turned to see a male dolphin beckoning to him. The dolphin dove, and Enzo followed. About 12 meters down, Enzo was led to the dolphin’s mate, who had become entangled in a fishing net and would soon drown. Enzo quickly surfaced and returned with his daughters and a couple of diving knives. They freed the dolphin and helped her to the surface. Although Enzo held several free-diving records … it was the lives of sea creatures that concerned him most. Enzo dedicated his life to educating the world about the link between healthy seas and healthy humans. He often quoted Vangelis: “Until a man learns to respect and speak to the animal world, he can never know his true role on Earth.” Enzo recalls of his dolphin rescue: “As soon as she (the dolphin) was on the surface, after breathing out foam and blood, she gave birth to a dolphin calf under the watchful eyes of her mate.” Enzo and his daughters marveled at the miracle they had just witnessed. While they were still in the water, the male dolphin circled around and touched its beak to Enzo’s cheek, like a kiss of gratitude. The world is full of opportunities that lead to miracles if we only follow those nudges…” (PassItOn-Media).
May you find the opportunity to be feral and free, with minimal nudging, and may it lead to miracles.
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