West Virginia, Maryland, Scotland & beyond...

Cam's family

Our house in Aviemore

Along one of our walks through a sculpture garden

One of the Lochs

Out with the girls

The DT girls!

4-wheelin in WV

We climbed up Seneca Rocks in WV

on the farm

Always fun to shoot cans...

Cam, mom and Kristy at the wedding

Mr & Mrs Cochran!

Cameron's first wedding!

Thx Cat for the pic... will update blog soon! x

21 days left

I know I've been so lame at posting and keeping in touch lately but I have just survived an insane few months at work. The shop that I work at was suppose to have 2 Instructors all summer but Ian, the other guy here with me, had some medical problems and left after only working through June. I don't think I have ever worked so hard and am so glad it is coming to an end. We are still steady now but I am getting help from some other instructors. 9pm doesn't seem like such an early bedtime anymore!

We also had some visitors as well! Cameron's cousin and girlfriend came out and stayed for a week. They rented their own flat but we spent every night with them, it was a great time. Lots of eating and drinking... Cameron even took them diving for the first time and they loved it!

As you may have guessed I've got 21 days of work left! I CAN NOT wait!!! Cam and I are flying to Edinburgh for a day to drop off some things and then off to Washington DC! We will be back in MD for 3 weeks and are already making plans to visit my dad in WV, Relax with family, for sure seeing all the new babies and most importantly celebrating Christopher's wedding! I can't wait to be able to sleep and have more than one day off in a row!

Other than getting ready to leave Malta not much is going on... Yesterday I had this "VIP" journalist from Belgium that I was taking for a try-dive and was suppose to take extra special care of her... So about a minute after she got here I could tell it wasn't going to happen, she was extremely nervous, and had never been snorkeling before. We got in the water and I was trying to help her get her fins on and she wanted to know if she really had to wear them... (for anyone that doesn't know your fins are what you use to move in the water and without them you have no control) After about 40 minutes in shallow water we decided it wasn't going to happen for her at that time so I said I would take her snorkeling... Every time I looked back at her she had her head up and was trying to get water out of her snorkel and I'm not sure if she even got to breath properly from it... Anyways, after we get out she says she has something to tell me and proceeds to inform me that this was the first time she had EVER been in the sea in her life!!!!!!!!!!!! Crazy.

So, Cam and I arrive on the 1st of Oct and leave to go back to Scotland on the 21st. We stay there until Oct 30 th when we head to Manchester, England to stay with Kat and Leigh for the weekend and Anna and her boyfriend(an American who we've never met) will be there too! We leave from Manchester on Nov 1st to fly back to Dahab...

Ahhh, to be on the move again. Now I feel like I can breathe.

I'm coming hooooooooooooooommmmmeeeee..... 34 days!

More Birthdays

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHRISTOPHER!!! I can't believe how old we are! I hope you have a great day.

Let's see... what is there to say about Malta in July. It's hot, real hot. The high last week was 100F and there is still a good chance to get sunburned until 7pm. The UV Index is 10 and if it is 10 and higher it is recommended you stay inside... all day. Obviously that is impossible but needless to say I am trying as much as I can to stay out of the sun. The recession has definitely hit here... the hotels and beaches aren't as full and I actually haven't been diving in the past few days. It's nothing too much to worry about but everyone is feeling a bit slow at the moment.

We have started going to quiz night at the pub on our street and last Friday night, we invited a bunch of people. It's an English Pub so most of the questions are British. English football (soccer), Royalty and geography. The first time we went I only knew the answer to one question, which was what feature is missing on the Mona Lisa... All the others were British. Anyways, so we invited a bunch of English people to increase our odds of winning the grand prize (a bottle of wine and a lottery ticket for a €400,000 jackpot) but somehow all the English people sat together and we were left with a team of one Englishman, one Scotsman, one Maltese, one Danish and me! Our team name was The Internationals. Needless to say we didn't win, we got 14 out of 25. But there was one American question!!! What do American's call the boot of their car? Anyone??? It's the trunk. We'll have to try again this week...

Speaking of British people, I still get surprised alot by how different we can be. I had an English student and we went to the cafe in between dives and he asked to buy me a drink and when I asked for Gatorade he looked at me and said what's that? That's crazy to me. Also, Cam and I were at the movies the other day and there was a poster for the G.I. Joe movie that is coming out and my boyfriend has never heard of G.I. Joe... is Britain on another planet or what?!

Surprise Surprise I had a toothache 2 weeks ago and went to the dentist, his name is Justin. He filled a cavity and said it would be €40. I didn't have enough cash and he didn't take credit cards so I said I would go to the bank and bring the money back and he said not to worry about it I could just bring it back to him when I came back (I made an appt for 2 weeks later)! All he knows about me is my name and mobile number, Oh yeah and when you go to the doctor here you don't fill out any paperwork or sign any forms. Justin was just about to put the needle in my mouth and then was like, oh yeah, do you have any medical problems?... Its so relaxed, that's how all the doctors I've seen are like.

I seriously can't believe that it's the middle of summer already... Time goes by too fast, slow it down people... and my friends just keep having babies, all the time! I can't wait to come home in October for C's wedding and am excited for Cam to see MD in the Fall. Hopefully the weather will be good. Happy Late 4th of July, I was devastated to find out that there was a picnic with crabs going on without me... I hope everyone is enjoying their summer! xxx

Birthdays

Our birthdays came and went and now I'm 31. We had a great Sat night out with friends and ended up dancing at a Salsa Club at 3am, I guess I'm not that old. We also got to go diving together the weekend before to the wreck of the HMS Hellespont, an old paddle steamer that was built in 1910 and sunk in WWII. I felt so out of my element being back on a boat, since I have been shore diving for the past 3 seasons. It was a great dive but as we were doing our stops on the way up we had to hang onto the line at 6 meters in blue water for a while and since it was rough I actually got sea sick... underwater, it sucked. Once we finally got on the boat we had to wait for everyone else and I couldn't look away from the horizon. I told Cam not to tell any of them I was a Dive Instructor! I think I have stayed in place too long and have lost my ability to deal with motion sickness. I used to get it quite bad, not as bad as my mom who can't even go to see an action movie at the theatre, but once I started traveling I quickly had to get over it with all the ferry and back road bus trips. I'm sad to say it's def gone but if I had my way I would start work on getting it back asap.

Cameron is teaching his first Technical Diving Course this week and is super excited about it. He has been having so much fun fiddling with the equipment for the past few days and grilling me with the exam questions. Work for me is fine, the sea has been so flat for weeks and the water is really warming up! Yeah! Malta just made a new law, anyone with a Maltese boat license has to be certified in first aid/CPR so I have been teaching about 5 of them a week to the locals and has proved to be challenging and as well as fun.

Cam and I were sitting on our balcony last night and saw a car with it's window rolled down and we commented on the fact that the car wasn't locked up and then we saw why. One of the stray cats on our street, which by the way gets fed more than 10 cats worth of food, was laying in the back seat licking itself. We watched it clean itself, then knead the upholstery in the back and then finally move to the drivers seat to sleep for the night. Guess we know why the window was down now.

Hope everyone has a good weekend and HAPPY FATHER'S DAY Dad!!! xxx

Photos

In Portomaso Marina, all the posh resturants and six figure flats surround this bay

View from Upper Barraka Gardens, Valletta

Jean and I in Mdina

View from the Cafe in Mdina

Another Visitor

We had our second visitor 2 weekends ago... Cameron's mum.  Ryanair, one of the European budget airlines just added a new direct route from Malta to Edinburgh so Jean decided to come for a visit.  She was here for three nights and stayed in our flat with us.  Cameron and I both had Sunday off and we went to Valletta and walked around, watched the noon day salute where they fire off a cannon, then we went to Mdina and had chocolate cake at a cafe overlooking the island. We had nice meals out and Jean and Cam even came to my work on Monday and took a sneaky dip in the hotel pool.  It was really nice to have Jean out here and fun for family to see where we are living.  I hope my mom comes soon:)  

Our new Instructors for the season have arrived.  Both are from England and I have helped show them around, both driving and diving.  It is consistently warm now and in the high 80's low 90's.  I am already going brown although I've got a farmers tan complete with flip flop lines on my feet. Tomorrow is my last day off with Cam for the summer. We were trying to get on a boat trip to dive a cool wreck, but it is full so I'm not sure what we will do now.  We will probably celebrate our birthdays tonight as well... We've got a little over a week, Cam's is the 7th and mine is the 9th... Agh, I can't believe I'm turning 31.  That's worse than turning 30.  At least my boyfriend is only turning 27... LOL

All the new Instructors and seasonal workers are arriving and we are meeting lots of new people. We spent the evening with friends at a beach bar called Exiles on Thursday night.  It was one of Cameron's friends 30th birthday and we had a great time.  We met the new pilots of the sea planes they have here, one is Italian and one is Greek and they are so much fun. Maybe we can trade some diving for a ride!  It's great to see things start to liven back up after the winter.  I think both Cam and I are glad to be able to have someone else to talk to!  

Cameron is busy taking some online business classes and I just finished a 10 week writing course online.  The sea temperature is steadily increasing, thank God, and I've had some really experienced divers recently which makes work much more fun... I'm looking forward to the summer and to see what comes next!

After I had settled into being back in Malta, I stupidly volunteered to work on a Sunday (we are closed Sundays in the winter) I contracted some type of Rotovirus... no really I think it was  some gastro thing or other... either way, I didn't return to work until the next Monday.  I am blaming getting sick on the diver I had on Sunday, something was going around his hotel, and I will never volunteer to work on my day off again!  I guess it was good as I lost the 5lbs I had put on while I was home.  After 4 days of visiting the bathroom every 2 hours I finally went to the doctor almost in tears asking when I was going to get better... he said it could last up to a week. It started on a Monday and by Saturday morning I was finally starting to feel better.  That was brutal but thankfully Cameron didn't get it which was good since I needed him to take care of me.  After a few days back at work I started diving again and managed to regain my strength and am now 100%. 

 

At the end of the week I returned to work our friends from the UK arrived.  Kathryn and I met in Honduras while Cameron was her dive instructor.  We also met up with her and her boyfriend Leigh for New Years this past year.  They arrived late on Thursday night.  We went for one dive on Friday and then out for some drinks.  On Saturday we went to Gozo for the day doing 2 dives where Leigh managed to get a serious sunburn on the back of his neck.  We spent the night out again eating dinner at a Maltese restaurant drinking the Maltese Special Reserve wine(costs about 3euros a bottle) and we had a great night.  We stayed in bed late on Sunday and then headed to Mdina (the old capital, it's Valletta now) and walked around a bit and then napped in the afternoon.  Sunday night we headed to Paceville (pronounced parch-a-ville) which is the trendy area in Malta, needless to say we don't frequent the bars there but we checked some fun ones out and had a great night.  The night ended with us smoking sheesha at a salsa bar called Fuegos.   

We were both sad when they left, we had such a great time while they were here but we are already trying to make plans to meet up with them and Anna for New Years again this year.  

With Kathryn and Leigh gone we have been trying to catch up on our sleep and taking a break from the wine...  Work is really starting to pick up and the weather has really been nice lately. This week we are looking at a high of 70F this week!  I have divers everyday starting tomorrow through next week so I'm hoping for a bit of a tan soon!!!  I love the sun!

Happy Spring everyone! 

 

First pictures then words...

Cam and I outside the gates of Mdina, Malta's original capital
View of Blue Hole (we go diving in there) in Gozo.
We are standing on top of the Azure window.

All of us in Egypt... just kidding:) Yummy sheesha

Me swimming out of a cave in Gozo

Cam and I

Cam Kat and I looking out over Malta from Mdina

Walking through Mdina

Checking out someone's birds...

Cam and I on a night out in Paceville

Kat Leigh and I after a dive in Gozo, with the Azure window

in the background and really bad hair!

I have so much to catch up on but wanted to post these pictures first then will work on writing... Cam and I had friends out from the UK and had a blast... Here are some photos...

Surprise!

I am back in Malta now… oh yeah, you didn’t know I had left. I had been keeping a small secret, mostly to those close with my mom. My mom spent Feb 14th – March 14th in Gulf Shores Florida (or Alabama, I’m not sure) When she arrived back home late on the 14th of March, she had no idea I was sleeping in the house next door. The next morning I had Christopher go over to see if she was up yet, he took he to the front of the house and as I came in the back door quietly she stood up to see who was there. I walked through the kitchen and we met face to face in the dining room. It was a great surprise. My mom stood there looking so confused and just screamed. She wouldn’t even touch me she was so freaked out. It was great. She said her first thought was that maybe I was moving home. Sorry mom, but I did come home for a visit.

I was home for 2 weeks and of course it flew by so fast. I got to see so many people and hang out with friends it was great. I also met a few new members to my inner circle, Saylor Jane and Zora. Friends organized a night out in Leonardtown and although it gets blurry there toward the end, it was a great night! I did some shopping and tons of eating. Once my bags were packed, I mean cram packed, it felt like I had just arrived, as it always does and I was on my way back to the airport. I left at 10pm and landed in London at 9am. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention I had a tooth pulled the day before I left, don’t ask, which made for an interesting trip. I decided to load up on the pain pills once we took off and I had 3 seats in a row so I could lie down. After staying in the same place for so long now I’m beginning to lose my travelers touch and somehow succumbed to some kind of illness. Once we landed in Heathrow, I didn’t know if I could make it off the plane without being sick and grabbed a air sickness bag on the way out just in case. I walk down the stairs of the plane to see a bus we have to take to get back to the airport. It is completely full. The ride was only about 10 minutes but felt like forever, all I could think about while I sweated through my t-shirt was how I was going to throw up on everyone around me. Thankfully I made it and almost collapsed once I got into the fresh air. I started feeling better once I wasn’t moving and tried to find a place to hang out during my layover. I had to wait there all day until my flight to Malta left at 8pm. I rented a room at the yotel, a hotel thingy inside the terminal where you can rent rooms by the hour. Not really rooms, they are more like an Asian inspired train car. I slept for 4 hours and then caught my ride back to Malta.

I arrived at 1am and Cameron was there waiting for me. It felt really good to be back as well as in warmer weather. Since I’ve been back it has been sunny and warm everyday and now I’m just waiting for the water temperature to start to rise back up. We have really been enjoying our new flat and Cam and I are going to have a roommate for a few weeks. Someone that has come for diving courses needs a place to stay while he looks for a more permanent place and it is great extra money for us. He will stay until our friends from the UK come out at the end of the month.

Here are a few pictures taken while I was home.

26 YEARS OF FRIENDSHIP

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BETSY

xoxoxo

Visitors

We have our first visitors in Malta! Our friends Kat and Leigh are coming in April! They will be coming for 5 nights and we will do a few days diving. Cameron is going to teach Leigh his Advanced Course as well. This will be the 5th country that Kat and I have got together in... We met in Honduras, then met for New Years in Amsterdam, she came out to Egypt 2 summers ago, we spent New Years together this year in Scotland and now we will be together in Malta. I think that anytime Kat and/or Anna and I meet up it should be in a new country and all of us are hoping to meet up next winter in France for a ski holiday:)

As for Malta, we had a spell of amazing weather where Cam managed to actually get a sunburn and now we are back to gail force winds. I am hoping that within the next few weeks the weather will steadily get warmer and warmer, I need the sun so badly (and a tan!).

Cameron has just done a RYA boating course and the Instructor does these speed boat races here with those boats that I call cigarette boats. That is the boat Cam learned in and now he will be able to drive our boat at the dive center. I can't remember if I said but Cam got a job at H2O this year, he will manage the shop I worked at last summer and I am going to be working at another one at the Radisson Hotel (still H2O). It will be fun to work closer together but that means we won't have any days off together all summer :(

Oh yeah, one of the best things happened the other day... Cameron is diving for a week with a group of fellow Scottish and Irish lads. After introducing himself and chatting of a bit, one of them said "Where are you from? America?"

Ahhh Haaa

That's awesome.

Happy Spring everyone!!!

Pictures

Cam and I taking a walking in the hills with a nice view of some small town

In the very distance you can see 3 buildings, that is the Radisson and the dive center I work at is on that beach

There are even farms up here

Ta Dah! Our new flat... just after a clean.

The tv is just for looks, we don't have cable.

Valentine's Day

This was my 3rd Valentine's day with Cam. First was spent on a tiny island in the South China Sea drinking wine out of aluminum cans. Last year we were eating fajitas with Jessi in Playa del Carmen and this year we had a proper night out with a nice dinner at a restaurant called il-Veccja overlooking one of Malta's many small bays. I had a surprise planned for Cameron on the morning after but decided to tell him what it was at dinner. It's a good thing that I did as he needed that time to get used to the idea. I'm actually not sure if I'm suppose to be writing about this as I was sworn to secrecy at first.
Cam gets pain in his back quite a bit but has never gotten a massage. All the time he spent in Asia where a massage costs less than a beer, he never got one and sort of acted like he would like to... well was I wrong. I booked us for a package at the spa called Romance for Two. I really thought he would be like it but as he started guessing paint balling and go-carting when I told him I had a surprise, I started to get nervous.
As for the package, it was both of us side by side at the spa together for 30 minutes exfoliating, 60 minute massage and then 30 minutes in a private bath/jacuzzi. Apparently that was not something Cam thought he could handle but after a little bit of time he got used to the idea and I was really excited so he agreed to go. He didn't want me to tell anyone (I don't really know why, he's not the first man in the world to get a massage but he obviously didn't know that) and as we are taking a walk the next day before we went to the spa we saw a friend out and the first thing he said was that we were going to get exfoliated and to get massages... I kind of looked at him like, I thought you didn't want to tell anyone? It was almost as if he felt like he was doing something wrong and was confessing it before he got caught.
Anyways, it was amazing! I never wanted it to end and Cam enjoyed it as well, although he acts as if he didn't as he says he doesn't know any guys that have ever gotten massages... I'm not sure if we will be going back anytime soon, at least not as a couple but if I had to guess I would say that will not be Cameron's last massage.

8 days

8 days until we move into our new flat! I'm still counting the days and am feeling like we might finally be settling somewhere. This will be our first big move, as in we each have more than one bag each. Saying that we were talking last night about how many different places we have lived in together. I decided to sit down and count it out, mostly thanks to the fact that no one wants to go diving today, but that's besides the point. Let's see... I guess I wouldn't count Roatan as we didn't really live together so I guess it starts in Malaysia. I'm only really talking about a place we spent significant time otherwise this post might take the whole day to complete.

We stayed in a town called Semporna in Borneo for more than a few weeks, mostly just because we liked the punishment... We lived in the Dragon Inn, which was a hotel on stilts over the water. Through the floor boards of our room you could not only hear but actually see the water below us which seemed very charming at first. The bathroom was much of the same and you just showered over the wooden floor that served as a drain as well. I can't help but think about our little rat mystery there. At night it was hard to ignore the rustling in the walls although the sure sign of them was the soap... which we kept replacing. Every night the rats either got extremely hungry or decided to turn attention to their hygiene. Either way our soap had little rat teeth marks, it seemed every time we turned our backs they had been there. That's also the same town that served me a 'banana split' Malay style with sweet corn and yam flavored ice cream. No wonder the rats were eating soap!

Next place we settled was on Tioman Island in Malaysia. We lived in 2 different places in the few months we were there. They were both actually almost identical little huts. One was on the beach and the other was in the jungle. Both were small wooden huts with a bed and bathroom. I can't believe I'm going to say this but we moved from one to the other because the one in the jungle had a place to hang up clothes and a small dresser. That sounds so desperate. Oh how I love hot water... and washing machines. We washed our clothes in a small bucket in the 'bathroom' which was a toilet, small sink and shower head that sprayed the whole room... with only cold water. The second place we lived had a really nice garden out front with picnic tables and grass. It also was the invasion point for the monkeys living in the jungle behind our hut. I thought they were really cute until they knocked down all the trash cans, rummaged through ours and tried to sneak into our room any chance they got. The locals obviously weren't impressed by their behavior which quickly explained the gunshot sounds in the afternoons and why one of the monkey's was walking around with a nub for an arm... poor guy.

I don't think we could of found somewhere more different for our next home. We moved into a Bedouin Village in the Sinai Desert. When we arrived I think our standards were so low that we thought we hit the jackpot considering this house had a kitchen, a proper bathroom and a locking front door. What we failed to realize was that there was absolutely NO furniture (we had a small mattress but nothing else), there was a huge hole in the back wall of the house, don't ask (which let in half of the deserts sand) and a very unreliable fresh water system. I will admit that it had an incredible view of the mountains and the Red Sea. Apparently twice a week the city water was to come on between the hours of 9am and 4pm or something like that. If you were lucky enough to be home to catch it on then you could fill your tank and have water for the week. BUT what most likely would happen was the water wouldn't come on when it was suppose to and you would miss it, leaving you with no cooking, brushing your teeth with bottled water and showering at work. Don't get me wrong, you could use the well, which was semi-filtered sea water that smelled like animals, so at least you weren't completely left with nothing! After a few months of this we came to our senses and moved. We found a really nice flat closer to town with real furniture, tv and aircon!!! Now, that was nice. It was the first proper place we lived in together which gave us a chance to cook and have friends over. What were we doing before? Let's be honest, I'm not a desert nomad.

After Egypt we moved to the nicest place we've been so far, for 5 weeks. 17 Russell Place. Cameron's parents house. We had a nice big bedroom equipped with lovely bedding, a full length mirror and even a complimentary blow dryer! Now this was luxury. A never-ending supply of clean towels, hot showers and a refrigerator and freezer full of food awaited us in what we both would have described as heaven. Since I had met Cam he had been telling me what his mum's fridge was like and I ready for it to become my reality. We were both ecstatic at the fact that you could turn on the faucet, fill a glass and drink cold, clean water. It was amazing. After this we went to America and were lucky enough to stay in my mom's B & B which was equally as amazing. After all this we were somehow ready to leave our little lap of luxury to see what else was out there.

On to Mexico! We were lucky enough to find a place pretty quickly once we arrived in Playa del Carmen. We responded to an ad and moved into a big house with a Mexican, an Italian and another American! Ok, it was Jessi. This place was pretty good except the neighbors were outrageous. I don't know I can really blame that one on the house though. I was in a good location, had a roof top deck and our bathroom was covered in Mexican tiles which was cool. Oh yeah, we were only 2 blocks from Walmart! We were moving up in the world! Unfortunately the people in the surrounding area either didn't sleep or they had their days and nights mixed up! Of course it made it worse that it was hot so you had to keep the windows open all night if you wanted to live. You name it and it was happening at 3am, washing dishes, burning leaves and even children's birthday parties... full on with Dj's and everything. No joke.

Now. Malta is the most built up place we have been so I had high hopes for our living arrangements. When we arrived summer was just around the corner and there was less choice of flats available. We found one we could afford, was in a great location and have lived there for 10 months now. It has been a great place to live for our first year and fine over the summer. But over the winter it has proved to be a bit old, cold and wet. Most people in Malta have dehumidifiers (it's VERY damp here) and electric heaters. But not us! No, we thought we could make it through the winter without spending the money. But, apparently it's been the coldest and wettest winter in Malta in 50 years! Just our luck:) We are now just trying to get through the last few days (it's really not that cold, highs in the 50's and lows in the 40's) and then will be living the high (and hopefully warm) life in our brand new flat.

Stay Tuned...

Click on Sarah tells all

http://www.padi.com/scuba/special-offers/special-offers-americas/go-pro-challenge/

Thanks Mom!

I got a package from home and am sitting here reading one of my diver magazine's mom sends me and I just had to share this paragraph...

Most sports have pinnacle achievements: Mount Everest, Ironman, Jaws. But no sport encompasses the world like scuba diving. No sport has the diversity, the true level of authenticity, the ability for everyman to discover something that has never been seen before. In no sport do kings and paupers pursue the same quest side by side without bias or prejudice or competition. No sport is entirely focused on the purity of the experience, an experience that comes from the pulse of the Earth, from watching life, unrehearsed, unfold before our eyes. We explore the Earth's last frontier. We will never be able to see and do everything available to us. And that's the beauty of our world: limitless possibilities. From pole to pole, country to country and sea to sea; the big, bad, ugly breathtaking and unknown- all of it lures us, pulls us, fulfills us.

If that doesn't inspire you to be a diver, nothing will.
THANKS MOM!!! I LOVE YOU! xo

I just got the most sad yet awesome email from someone that read my story on the University of Md website and followed the link to my video on YouTube. It's from a boy named Justin who's friend Dylan was diagnosed with Leukemia a few years ago and has been in remission since and just relapsed in December. He has suffered from cardiac arrest and now has a pacemaker. His Bone Marrow transplant has been moved up so hopefully that is a good thing. Justin says he has had such a hard time and he didn't know how to deal with his feelings until he read my story...He said that now he has high hopes and is going to share it with Dylan and his friends.
I think that is amazing.