John and Rachel's Family

In November of 2000 we had a family holiday to the Bahamas, meeting up with Colin, Roos and Michelle, Annie and Harry (Roos's parents) and Elizabeth. While we were there Colin and Roos sprung a surprise on us - Roos was expecting, due in July 2001! This was bad timing for Roos as it meant that she couldn't drink marguritas and had to pass on the scuba diving.

We stayed at a very nice villa on Paradise Island and had a great time despite rather indifferent weather - next Thanksgiving location will be further south in the Caribbean!

In preparation for this holiday John took scuba diving lessons and completed his PADI certification on the vacation. In addition to the training dives Colin and John took a dive with about 20 Black Tip Reef sharks, some of which were at least 8 feet in length. A most incredible experience!

In the picture to the left you can see some of the sharks circling in the back ground. Black Tip Reefs are not dangerous so this isn't as foolish as it might at first seem, plus with the dive masters feeding the sharks with chunks of meat the sharks weren't really interested in the rest of the divers. The main precaution we had to take was to keep our hands folded across our chests as dangling fingers would look like small fish to the sharks and therefore be fair game to them.

The other dives were rather more ordinary but a lot of fun none the less. Since then John has been scuba diving with Colin and Roos in the Dominican Republic.

Colin, Roos and Michelle, in the Bahamas, in November 2000. No sign of Becca yet!