NATURAL BEAUTY! RAS MOHAMED NATIONAL PARK

Nothing better than a trip to Ras Mohamed National Park.
The reserve at the southern end of the Sinai Peninsula, reflects one of the most extraordinary scenarios that you will ever come cross.
The beautiful arid red desert framing  crystal clear waters are completed by a small mangrove at one of its extremities.
Between salt lakes and a small crack made ​​due to an earthquake, the beauty of Ras Mohamed, so most say, hides bellow the water.
The most stunning scenery of Ras Mohammed is found in the coral reefs that surrounds the peninsula. Coral forests are abundant here, and among these vast prisma of coral reefs is found a truly magnificent array of fish and pelagics - more than a thousand species in total.

It was in one of this trips that Jacques de Vos reported these natural wonders in a stunning video!

* Photo and video courtesy of Jacques de Vos.

AHIBA, ABAJO! SPAIN!

Time to take a break for competitions and what better than ..... freediving!
This time I set off to Spain, Canary Islands, Tenerife!
First stop Madrid! There I get together with  another great freediver from Spain, my partner at Sea Dragons, PepeArcos.
The first idea was to go diving in Almeria. So we took off together with other friends in a road trip that would last us 6 hours, squeezed in the packed car together with a buoy, rope,  monofins, and all the "light"paraphernalia which freedivers carry around.
The city is beautiful and the trip was wonderful but the conditions for diving were a bit messy.
Wind was blowing strong and it would not let us board the boat. That made the trip got cancelled day after day.
That's the beauty of the ocean. every day is unexpected. You can dive the same dive site every day and be a totally different experience... or not be able to dive at all!
So we followed to the third stage, Tenerife!

And with the support of Santiago Jakas, producer of super noseclips and his partner Carolina of Apnea Canarias we were back into the blue!
The sessions were more to enjoy and relax after all the mental and physical effort from the competition. And it was just perfect!

But the sea is not only to stay bellow! So SURF WAS UP! Together with some friends we headed to the other side of the isalnd and jumped in! Despite the cold and the rented longboard, we managed to catch some waves and best of all, have fun too!


Besides Wreck dives, much canas (as the locals call it beer) and delicious tapas, we had the opportunity to shoot with photographer  Marcelo Bilevich sub Argentine great, who flew especially to do these photo shoots with us.

The result is wonderful, check out the pictures bellow.

* Photos courtesy of  Marcelo Bilevich
   all rights reserved

Beautiful Video shot by Pepe Arcos in a trip to Ras Mohamed National Park in Sharm EL sHeik, Egypt. Enjoy!

Thailand!!

So after a year where where i devoted myself to the practice of Yoga, a couple of days ago  i decided to head to Thailand! Invited by a friend to substitue her to teach in the most beautiful Studio one can ever ask to have the oportunity to teach

I find myself in the beautiful island of Koh Tao, a tiny island on the western side of the golf of Thailand, with, get that, 21 square km and only around 1400 habitants.. yes that less than the amount of people that attend to a regular school. Nevertheless is the most beautiful place i could have ever dreamed to experience! The people are super welcoming and the scenary is waht gets close to the definition of paradise! the food....well, is just the best i ever tried!

Day2
Today we are doing the second part of the job, shooting the outside shots, the “above the water “ part of the TV Commercial and the still photos.
The morning went well and we got the filming over just after noon.
After some technical problems with the underwater photo equipment the plan was changed. Instead of the pics being taken underwater, we had to hang by harnesses on top and surrounded of big fans. After Zacs voice started to get thin the client decided it was enough. I’m not sure, but I think Zac managed to keep his manhood intact even tough the super tight harness.

So as the competition got cancelled an offer came that would bring together my two passions: Freediving and modeling. I was put in option for a campaign for a Portuguese Mineral Water to be filmed in Romania. And so I flew to Romania to film for Agua das Pedras. The crew was exceptionally professional, and everyone was really nice. Day1. After rehearsal I had a try of my beautiful extra long (over6 meters!) dress. Thermostat showed 26 degrees, which of course prove to be not enough after a couple of minutes of been immersed. A bar was constructed inside a green swimming pool (yes, I was really worried about my eyesight when I first saw it!) to imitate what was another bar that was built in an antique house. The task was not easy. In every breath to be taken in the surface, the weight of the dress would pull me back down. Besides that I had to take extra care not to hit my head in the huge lamps that where just hanging a few centimeters above the surface. But for me the fact of being underwater meant I didn’t have to represent at all. It was like a dream where I tried to show trough a mix of movements what I really feel while underwater. It whas for me the closer I got to be a mermaid.
Everyone was pleased and the results are here to be seen. :)

Just a couple of days before the competiton started , news from Eyjafjallajökull eruption crossed the world. The icelandic Vulcano spitted ashes to heights over 9 km causing significant disruption to European air travel. The whole competition came to a hold. From 55 registred athletes only 18 managed to arrive.The whole crew from the organization and the prizes where all stranded , spread out in many different countries. It was total chaos, every diver trying to travel by car train whatever it would take just to get to Dahab on time for some training or even to manage to get at least a day of participating of the comp. From there started a strain of events where one day the ashes would calm down and bring peoples hopes high to a next day with more ashes and more mess. Thats until the Organizer Sebastian decided to cancelled the whole competition and let other organizers make a smaller one to take care for the divers that were already in Egypt. Lots of frustrations but a good fair decision after all.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_travel_disruption_after_the_2010_Eyjafjallaj%C3%B6kull_eruption