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I was snorkeling with a few friends in a shallow lagoon off the coast of Lighthouse Reef, an atoll near Belize, Central America. The water was clear enough to let the sun dance on the sandy ocean floor. I was busy discovering the many colorful and crazy fish who live there. Something caught my eye and made me look up to the surface. It was a huge dolphin. Big and gray, but moving very fast. This dolphin zoomed in front of me for a second then disappeared. I was thrilled. It felt like magic.
In my mind, she was enormous. I was both frightened and eager to see her again. She returned right away and seemed to use her snout to 'read' me, like she was using a metal detector to 'see' what was really inside me. Then she started swimming very fast and jumping up and out of the water. It seemed to me that she was very excited. I just stared in awe and hovered on the surface. She was only 6 feet in length but she seemed bigger than that to me.
She did her disappearing act a few more times. It was like playing hide 'n seek. I kept looking in all directions but still couldn’t see her. Then, out of the blue, she appeared and came very close to me. Once she got so close that I couldn't help but reach out to touch her. It was almost like she was asking me to play with her. I was careful not to touch her blowhole or her mouth.
She started diving to the bottom which was about 15 feet. We were in an area with a little sea grass and a few coral heads. I would dive down to the bottom next to her, then swim back to the surface. We had begun a game of 'Monkey see, monkey do'. She was much better at it than me. She could hold her breath a lot longer than I could.
I went back to our boat to get my camera. I tried to get into a position where the sun would be in the background and the dolphin would swim in front of my lens. She did this a few times, but after a while she came up from behind me and pushed me gently as if to say, enough of that business, let's play some more. I handed my camera to my husband and went back to our game of hide and seek.
When I show pictures of the dolphin, I ask kids what they think she is feeling at that moment? What do you think? What do you think she is trying to say to me? E-mail me at bourque@commspeed.net
My daughter, Alyssa, met that dolphin, too. She grew up to be a great scuba diver. Read about Alyssa Bourque’s exciting Blue Hole dive. Write to her about her diving adventures.
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