We were the first to the boat at 8pm and we were shown to the boat but John the captain wanted us to wait near the front of the docks to show the others where to go. When they got there we all made our way to the boat and John told us which beds we were sleeping in. We got the best bed at the top of the boat which was big and had a cool breeze coming through. We had a welcome beer and was shown the boat which was a beautiful traditional wooden yacht. It was cool to be sailing in a real yacht. John told us to take sea sickness tablets even if we didn't think we would need it.

We set off sailing into the open ocean at about 9.30pm which was a scary thought that we would be sailing in the night. The sea sickness tablets knocked everyone out so people slept OK apart from occasional being tossed in the air from a particularly big wave.

The journey was 36 hours sailing the open sea and John stayed awake steering the boat none stop and attending to the sails all through the night.

We woke for breakfast and had granola and yogurt and people sat around but all in a daze because the pills made us drowsy. Everyone went back to bed and to sleep after breakfast while John and his wife Sindry attended to his boat. We slept well but it was unnerving when you lifted your head and you could see how big the waves were, the boat would dip and the waves would be a few metres above us and then we would shoot above it and back down.

We had lunch of sandwiches and then went t bed, then had dinner of pasta. Then went to bed. The whole two nights and one day felt like a blur to everyone because we were asleep for most of it. I don't know how john stayed awake for two nights and a day steering the boat.

The next morning we came into calm blue waters dotted with uninhabited white sandy islands with nothing but palm trees on. It looked like something off of a national lottery advert. We were given snorkels and fins and the day was ours to do whatever we wanted while John slept.

We headed straight to the shore, it felt amazing jumping into the warm clear water and seeing lots of massive starfish and exotic fish. The island was a paradise and we snorkeled around the corals just off shore which were really pretty. Lunch on the boat was hand made hamburgers which were delicious. It was the. That we realised we were badly sunburned from the scorching sun we couldn't feel in the water. Despite us putting sun cream on our backs were red raw and the backs of our legs were really painful. Everybody on board was the same. After lunch we snorkeled some more but with t-shirts on trying to see some more coral, we luckily saw a mantaray in the water which was cool to follow and was absolutely massive and a purple colour.

After dinner that night we made a bonfire on the beach and all sat around for some drinks, we had a tiny 2 man boat to ferry us between the boat and beach which was really unstable and kept having to come back and forward.

We slept better that night as the boat stayed anchored and we sailed to the next set of islands early in The morning.

We did some more snorkeling but the coral was hard to find and we were snorkelling in really very shallow water sometimes where we were being scraped on our stomachs. We had a barbeque on the beach, baked potatoes, salad and a ton of pork which was really really delicious.

There was no wind on the side of the island we were on and to even stand in the sun for a second burnt your skin and our sun burn was in pain. We chilled out on the boat under a canopy that paul put up for shade.

Everyone sat on the bow of the boat for some drinks that evening while we were given a seafood marinara which was absolutely delicious and tasted really fresh. We even had a lobster tail each which is the first time we've tried it and it was really good.

That night was really hot, there was no breeze what so ever. Gráinne even slept outside because it was so hot, so did a few others that were at the bottom of the boat because they didn't even have big windows.

We were glad to move on the next day to get some breeze, we anchored in between three islands but these had bars on that weren't as nice as the last two points but here had the best corals and variety of fish to watch. We swam between the islands which was quite far, and you could see quite a lot of litter which was sad. There was some really shallow water which was extremely hot to sit or stand in so had to try and find deeper water to swim in.

That evening for dinner we had spaghetti with lobster tail which was again a really nice treat apart from everyone got two tails apart from me.

We set sail that night again so everyone took pills and went to bed relatively early, we weren't supposed to open windows because waves can come over the boat but people were so hot they kept them open.

We arrived at about 8am in the morning and we had to wait in a bar while John took our passports to the customs office. We planned to do some diving as it was cheap in portobello but it turned out it didn't include an online course you had to do which cost over $100 per person so we decided against it and went to colon with the others to catch the train. We jumped on a chicken bus which is a pimped out old american school bus with deafening loud music but only costs about $2 each.

PS. The captains name was Paul not John. My mistake.