It took Jean and I six hours of busses and a one hour ferry to get to Utila, the small Caribbean Island known for its parties and SCUBA diving. On the way, Jean ran into a couple he’d met in Nicaragua several weeks before. Cedric is a gregarious and talkative French Canadian with a childlike penchant for doing backflips off of every dock and boat he could get his feet on. Jenny is a multilingual Swede with icy blue eyes, a radiant smile, and a contagious and enthusiastic disposition. The four of us spent most our time on the island together, which turned out to be much longer than the four days I had planned. It was low season on Utila, but world-class diving, a handful of chilled-out bars and cheap restaurants, and a close-knit community of tourists, locals, and semi-permanent dive instructors made it easy to extend my stay. I picked up a freelance project, which added two days, I tacked on one extra day of diving, and when I thought I was ready to leave, I happened upon a captain looking for crew to sail to Guatemala three days later. I’d spent nine days on Utila by the time we embarked, but I left the Island in style.