Super Buffet Saturday in Pralin

Woke up hanging like a bat from all the beers last night. There’s something about ice-cold beers in this hot climate that makes them go down far too easy.

We are all heading to Pralin this weekend and staying over at Mango Lodge. Breakfast was a buffet at Praradise Sun for 300 Rupee. Expensive but seriously worth it. Chocolate croissants, cheese and cold ham, omelettes, pancakes, fruit and lots of bacon. Harry always tries to “beat the buffet” by eating as much as he possibly can, but this morning his was not on his usual form.

One other benefit of eating at Paradise Sun is they will let you use their wireless. So no need to go hunting around for an internet cafe this morning.

Mango Lodge is situated on the top of a massive hill. You literally have your hands on your knees when walking up. It’s all worth is when you see the view from the rooms. Absolutely amazing, you really feel like you are in island paradise.

Us guys got a crate of beer for the evening and had to trek it up the massive hill to the lodge. I thought harry might have a heart attack the way he was breathing so hard. The evening turned out to be a guys evening, with all the guys pilling into our room for a fry-up (of which we found out included fruit bat sausages) and beers.

We headed out to the nightclub called Oxygen, us guys and Estee as our quota girl. Harry fed us shooters called “Golden Showers”, of which the name is enough to put you off. It was similar to a Jager-bomb but instead it is a shot of Zambuka in a glass of Lemonade. Estee had one too many of these and ended up being sick and carried out of the club. Harry looked after her outside for most of the night. Sven has a habit of attracting the local girls and his was on particular form this evening. This was probably my best night out while here.

Fry-up Friday

Did another double tank dive, one of them being a spot of all the new things we had learnt for the LIT Line. We saw identified Acidians, Sponges, Bi-valves, Fan Worms, Anemones, Corallimorphs and different types of algae.

Finished the day off with a barbeque and drinks. With the theme being “Tight and Bright” there were some great outfits. Dan was wearing a lifejacket and a hard hat, Calum had a bight pink shirt with tight, tiny shorts, Jax had tights and a tutu, and I was in my speedo shorts.

Everyone was on the dance for toward the end of the night. The generator was off by then but guys still carried on with torches. Only got to bed at about 3 am.

Triggerfish Thursday

We did our first practise LIT Line in our dive today. It was so intensive, recording every change in biotic and abiotic lifeforms as well as substrate. You spend your whole dive in a vertical head-stand over the tape. A whale shark could have swum right past us without us even noticing.

We started our Mangrove surveys methodology off with how to identify the different mangrove trees and a walk through the mangroves with Jax as our guide.

Zoe got stung by a blister bug a couple of days ago and now she is getting a serious infection. Apparently what works well to draw out the gunk is to soak a piece of bread in iodine and strap it to the wound. This is exactly what she did. We joking with her about the possibility of the rats having a proper feast with the bread strapped to her leg.

Can’t believe I already been in the Seychelles for a month now.

Wacky Wednesday

Used my bit of free time today to do a bit of washing. You kind of lose count of how many times you’ve worn something and start relying on a smell check. Luckily for guys it’s just mainly board-shorts.

Harry made sure everyone at camp knew he was suffering from ball chaff by complaining every chance he got.

Today is the first day of the murder game and I am officially out of the running. Emma played a huge bluff asking me to help her kill Harry when instead she was out to get me. I walked right into her track. I have to give it to her though, she did some great acting. My money is on her to win it.

Emma and I are on Friday drinks and blog this week. We wrote a killer blog entry for the GVI blog, that’s definitely worth the read. We also decided that the theme for Friday is “tight and bright”, so hopefully we’ll have some winner outfits.

I’m also busy putting together a photo DVD for the 5 weekers and possibly creating a small video. The leave on Wednesday and I’m already quite sad that they will be leaving us.

Tyrannosaurus Tuesday

We did our first 2 tank dive where we take an extra tank on the boat and change over tanks after the dive. It works well but its taxing on the body to dive one after the next. The rest of the day I spent chilling out and getting bored.

Ellie has introduced a new camp game called murderer where each person is given someone to kill and if that person is killed then their killer inherits their person. The way to give someone is to pass them a predetermined object in a predetermined place. Past examples include a volley ball in the shower and a fork underwater. So everyone at the moment is paranoid that they’ll be killed

I think the mosquito’s in this place are becoming immune to my bug spray. I’m going to have to update to some hard core chemicals to get these things to stop biting me. The staff at the camp don’t get bitten anymore for some reason. Hopefully I get to that point soon.

Methodology Madness Monday

Our research is split into different groups focussing on coral and invertebrates. I have a whole lot of new algae, black and soft corals to learn in addition to the hard corals. We’ll hopefully start our surveying next week.

Had a terrible dive at APC. The vis was about 3 meters and there were four of us doing a coral spot. I think I must have kicked everyone. My ears were also giving me problems.

Thai from Cap Turnay come across to join us for a week. He’s from Cape Town, so our South African presence is growing.

Sven is off diving for the whole week because of a middle ear infection. This is the worst thing for diving, luckily he went to the hospital and got meds before it got too bad.

I’ve decide that a kindle is my next toy. I could kick myself for not bringing a book. Everyone just reads in their spare time and with a kindle they can download books in Pralin for 5 dollars. My laptop doesn’t quite do the job because of the battery restriction and I only charge it once every 2 days.

Island Easter Sunday

Woke up decide to do a run to Anse Bladimir on the other side of the island. It took me only 25 mins to run there, but I was absolutely finished by the end of it. The beach is so secluded that even the trail going there is overgrown. I must that this is one of the best beaches I’ve seen in the Seychelles with granite boulders and palms scattered across the beach and coral reef dominating the crystal clear water. I will be making a trip back to this beach on the future weekends.

My run was followed by an intense gym session at the make shift gym camp. Then pancakes were made by Noor for breakfast. Tess gave everyone a small Easter egg and made home-made hot-cross buns (referred to by her as angry buns) to celebrate the occasion.

Spoke to the folks and girlfriend just to wish them happy Easter. It’s really good to hear their voices. I’m really started to miss home quite a bit.

The rest of the day was spent sun-bathing (more like burning for most) and in the water. Saw 6 eagle rays and one turtle while snorkel and took my camera out. The shots were ruined by back scatter because of all the plankton in the water.

Saturday in Pralin

I went to Pralin with my only intention being to update my blog and check my mail, but after a half hour mission across the island to Anse Grande, the internet cafe was closed. We waited around for almost an hour hoping that someone would come and open, playing eye-spy and charades to pass the time.

The rage of spices we have to cook with is limited to salt, pepper, curry powder and a couple of dried chillies. I was eager to find some more so that we are so limited when it comes to cooking a good meal. I searched everywhere on Pralin and came up short every time. Most of the spices I did find were in small packets (be finished in one meal at our camp) and expensive. I did however find Easter eggs 🙂

Lunch in Pralin was an amazing coconut fish curry for only 40 Rupee at one of the take away place in Anse Grande. The other group paid 300 Rupee for a full buffet breakfast that sounded amazing. Next weekend I might just do the same but make sure I’m starving when I go because there is so much food.

When we got back to camp, I went for a quick snorkel with Estee. We saw 2 green turtles and 6 eagle rays.

Dive into earth day Friday

Today was international Earth Day and us being true to the cause we were going to set up new permanent transects of some of the reefs. Dan, one of the staff was sporting the tightest wetsuit ever just for such an occasion. He also had to dive with a 15 pound sledge hammer to knock in the iron stake under the water.

I got to dive with Zoe and Noor for the first time which was awesome. This was the first dive where I could take my camera, so a went nuts and ended up with some fantastic shots. We saw a hawksbill turtle that turned and swam right at me, giving me an awesome pose.

That evening I had my home-made wooden sword and eye patch for the Pirate evening. Emma dominated the treasure hunt but then was beaten by booze by the end of the evening.

Thirsty Thursday

Still feeling sick today, so no diving for me. Instead it was spent mostly in the kitchen and learning corals.

We did our first coral exam today. We have to get 95% on 50 corals to pass. I got the highest marks with 97% and Estee got 95%. The South Africans were out-performing everyone else. Feels a bit like varsity again with all these exams.

The theme for tomorrow night party has been decided on, “Pirates”. I’m going to have to spend some time tomorrow trying to come up with something. A group of us are also planning a fun dive for Saturday and it might be a night dive. I’m so keen to get my camera out on a proper dive.