After my last relationship ended, my family wanted to do a Christmas Cruise. I looked at this as my chance to get certified. So I went down to my local dive shop and signed up for the pool sessions over a couple of weekend in December. We had three couples and myself. The instructors were great. They gave me a referral and then came the cruise. Well, the first obstacle was getting to the cruise itself. A blizzard shut down the Denver airport for the 48 hours prior to my flight leaving. Thousands of people stranded at the airport blocking security, even getting to the airport 3 hours early didn`t look to be enough. Fortunately I fly enough that I could use the priorty line and made it to Florida. Then to the boat. Met the dive instructor on the boat, Phil. He was an ex navy dive instructor and it showed. The first thing he had us all do was a refresher show so he could judge our skills. Checkout went fine, although one lady dropped out as she just wasn`t ready to get back in the water. Mechanical troubles delayed out getting into Jamaica so our excursions were cancelled there. Then we went to the Grand Caymans. Same dive shop as before (Don Fosters). We showed up, set up all of our gear and were getting ready to get into the water when the cruise ship recalled us due to high seas. Getting back to the ship was rough, but now we had lost two days. The third chance was in Cozumel to at least get some of the dives in. Once again, due to weather they cancelled the dives. And now we still haven`t been able to get in the water even though there is only one day left in the cruise. The final stop is Princess Cays. No diving there, but at least I could snorkel. The attached pic was from that. So I did get in the water one day. The reef there is dead as a doornail, but they feed the fish so there is some marine life around until the thousands getting off the boat hit the water and the sea life all takes off. But the water was warm. So no chance to get certified yet.