Tuesday 9th June 2015
0 degrees 34.692S
130 degrees 16.991E
15 meres depth, surrounded by reef
Pulau Penumu
Fam Islands
Raja Ampat
Yesterday we left
our cheery mooring at Raja Ampat Dive Lodge and made our way to the Fam Island
group, recommended by Made and Wayan.
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| Pete Made John |
We are anchored in
15 metres of water, surrounded by coral reef.
In the middle of
the night – around 2am to be precise – the depth alarm went off WHEE OOOO WHEEE
OOO. Very very alarming! I was alarmed indeed but very happy to be
woken from a particularly ghastly dream about…torture, my least favourite dream
scenario. The boat had moved a bit and
was now just over the reef at a rather uncomfortable depth. Or shallowness… We sat up for a while. Pete discussed various scenarios and I…yawned
and nodded, not very helpfully, occasionally making a soothing humming
sound. In the end all was well, no
problems, so we went off back to Snoozyland.
This morning John told me that he hadn’t come out to join us – he had
thought we were up, at 2am, making bread… I thought this was too funny – he
must think we are VERY keen bakers, or very keen bread-eaters!
Our second dive
with Wayan and Made was great. No
current so no huge adrenalin rush but it was all very lovely. We saw turtles, a few reef sharks, some
nudibranchs, some big boofy somethingfish majestically swimming along
overhead. Made found a wobegong shark
for us, lying dopily under a rock. It
was quite big and very floppy… He gave it a bit of a poke with his pointer
stick and it barely flipped a fin. I got
down into the deeper water mores successfully.
The day before I didn’t have enough weight on my belt – nobody ever
believes me when I say I need A LOT. But
Made and Wayan had seen me, the day before, bobbing back up to the surface
like cork, so they load me up and I sank
successfully and found it all much less stressful.
Today I have been
swimming around our encircling reef; John has been protecting his sunburnt body
from the sun and the water; Pete has been under the boat scrubbing at a new lot
of vigorous life forms which are colonizing the hulls. I got in again and helped with the scrubbing;
very satisfying.
John and I had a
little trip in to shore in the dingy. I
saw a nondescript looking black bird
and went clickety
click with my speedy camera just as it took
flight and revealed itself not to be nondescript at all!
We crossed over to
the other side of the island where there was a glorious white coral beach
unfortunately
covered with…crapola
featuring many
many ubiquitous blue thongs.
In the afternoon
all three of us wended our way through the shallow coral maze to the Star
Lagoon, a place of extraordinary beauty and splendour. I very cleverly did NOT
take my camera… We walked up to the lookout (puff puff pant) and admired it all
most extravagantly.
Fortunately John
had his camera, small and cheap but wonderful, and he took gorgeous photos.
Thank you!
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| The mast of 2XS just visible behind us |
Wednesday 10th June
00 degrees 26.576S
130 degrees 638E
Pulau Pef mooring
So we are back in
sight of the eagle’s nest, mooring at the back of Pef Island in a peaceful
passage. It is drizzling and birds are singing – lovely!
When John got on
board he had not yet unpacked his bags when he unfurled a nifty new fishing
line… He is an indefatigable hunger gatherer!
Until now there has been no sign of a fish at the end of this line but
this morning, on our way from Penumu to Pef – a big mackerel! Beautiful and delicious!
The resort is
closed for renovation and stocktake but…it is beautiful, and most impressive!!! (And they are very kindly letting me use the
internet…)
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| Approaching the resort form the landing, through the mangroves |
Lovely photo of you...........and the not so ordinary bird! xx
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