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Lowering themselves to the floor of the pool, an especially
deep one built to train scuba divers, they swim to one end where
their restaurant awaits, five meters (16 feet) below the
surface.
"The Pearl" is a two-meter wide white sphere tethered close to
the pool's floor. The diners jettison their weighted belts
before swimming underneath and up into the pod that looks like a
cross between a lunar landing craft and a giant spaceman's
helmet.
Food is served by expert scuba divers who deliver foie gras,
lobster salad and champagne in waterproof cases before leaving
the diners peering out of the portholes, enjoying the strange
tranquillity of eating in an air pocket, completely submerged.
"We are launching a new era of restaurants," said John
Beernaerts, who founded the NEMO33 pool in the Belgian capital a
decade ago.
The restaurant, where an underwater meal costs 99 euros ($106)
per person, took more than a year to build and multiple attempts
were needed to perfect the design, mechanics and food delivery
system.
"It was a wonderful experience," said Mouchart, 41, his hair
still wet after the return swim through the warm - 33 degrees
Celsius (91 Fahrenheit) - water to the pool side.
"It was the first time in our life that we ate underwater, which
was really fun. It's a unique dinner and we will remember this
all our life."
($1 = 0.9297 euros)
(Editing by Robin Pomeroy)
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