MAILMAN, MAILMAN” a local island man yelled. Dressed in a wetsuit and scuba gear he walked to the waters edge with his mail bag and to the bewilderment of half the suntanning tourists on the beach dove into the water disappearing with a flick of his fins.
For us this only made us more excited, scrawling our message quicker on our waterproof postcard we had picked out earlier. This was Hideaway Island Resort home of the worlds only underwater post office and while it’s only open for an hour a day that’s pretty cool. Struggling into our flippers and suctioning a set of goggles to our faces we jumped into the water. The oddest feeling I think I have ever felt came when I took something that felt very much paper and and dove into the water with it flapping in my fingers. As the water covered me and I hit that zero gravity floating phase, so did the post card. Letting go of it, I watched to a back drop of fish and coral as it hung suspended in front of me, rippling with the current.
The post office was a few minutes out so we snorkeled out to it looking at the incredible electric and neon fish that danced and zipped around the coral heads and sand landscape. The office had bubbles coming out of the roof from the scuba postman inside. Swimming up above him I dove down post card in hand and handed it to the man who’s huge Afro bobbed and moved with the water. Holding my breath and the side of the office I peered inside the small hut past the counter and then swam for air a few feet above. We then grabbed lunch and burgers at the restaurant and after a couple hours took the quick shuttle off the private island to continue our exploration of Vanuatu.
How hillarious. We’ve all heard of airmail but watermail is new to me, at least. So then do they hook the mail bags on the underside of a tanker or cruise ship to get it to its destination? A fascinating concept. BTW, Jade, I love your writing.