Sunday 7th June 2015
0 degrees 34.418S
130 degrees 36.725E
Mansuar Island
Raja Ampat Dive Lodge mooring
Depth 35.1m
We are once again trusting
a mooring…This one is smaller and more modest than the disastrous one in Waisai – surely it will be big and strong
underneath, and faithful to its task??
The mooring belongs
to Raja Ampat Dive Lodge, a very beautiful Balinese-style resort on Mansuar Island.
This morning we
went for a dive off Kri Island, with Made and Wayan, Balinese dive masters, who
were very kind and gentle and trustworthy.
It was absolutely spectacular. Crystal
clear water, many thousands of fish including some very big ones – napoleon wrasse,
white tipped sharks, tuna, barracuda. As
usual I did NOT want to go for a dive. I
am not scared of the water or the fish; what I fear is The Gear. I can never remember which thing to press for
up or down (yes of course I really do know, but I get panicked by the whole process
and my mind goes blank.) When it came time
to put on our wetsuits I got an acute attack of claustrophobia and just couldn’t
pull the wretched thick rubber HOT HOT clingy thing up over my ankles… So I
hurled it off and went swimming in my bathers which was much MUCH better. The water is about 32 degrees – not sure why
we need wetsuits in these conditions??
 |
| Bird! |
There was a very
swift current and we were swept along very speedily – no chance of trying to
resist! I held on tightly to Made and
enjoyed the ride…
On the way back we
stopped for coffee and light refreshments on a small desert island and they
said we had time to go for a snorkel. I thought
this was actually even nicer than the dive… Pete and I went out to the edge of
the reef where there was a steep drop off and there were THOUSANDS of fish, big
and small. Plus a beautiful turtle, oblivious
to our presence, with a white-tipped reef shark cruising along behind it.
John has been
having lots of activity – a few trips in the dinghy; so much better than the
old inflatable which sank beneath us in the Kinabatangan River last year…
And he has the odd
moment of peace and quiet where he can lie on the deck and read his book.
It is very
peaceful here. This morning we saw the children
on their way to school; this afternoon they have just gone past us on the way
home, with much cheering and shouting.
What a nice way to go to school!
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