Both Phil and I LOVE snorkeling. The feeling of slipping into that blue water where a whole new underwater world opens up, it's just amazing. I really think it could work as a happiness medicine, it sure works for me every time. And we have truly missed it all along Borneo's coast, the last good snorkeling we had was in Philippines, way too long ago.
Getting to Tioman was therefore something we were really looking forward to. And it was so worth it, because the snorkeling was really good. OK, it wasn't Palau-good, but there were turtles and sharks and the water was pretty OK clear. The only downside to Tioman was that all four different anchorages we stayed at, were rolly. Not gunwale to gunwale rolly, but still pretty annoying rolly which means poor sleep. There is a little marina where of course it's perfectly still, but it has no breeze, so it's hot. We only stayed there when we left Sophia to go to Singapore.
We have now day-hopped our way down towards Singapore and are now only one or two days away from crossing over to the west coast of Malaysia, just one crazy hub of busy harbour has to be nagivated safely through first.
My all time favourites: clown fish. They are just co cute and courageous the way they swim out to defend their home
Two Star Puffer fish. Their size is hard to judge in this photo, but they are both well over 50 cm long
Spot the cuddle fish, master of disguise! Right in the middle, this guy is also pretty big, maybe 60 cm long
pretty coral, these look like roses
I can't stop taking photos of them, but they always move, so are hard to get in focus
another puffer fish hiding under a coral
happiness drug
lots of turtles at Tioman, yay
and black tip reef shark, a sign of a healthy reef (Tioman is a marine sanctuary)
a mooray eel weawing across the botom to another hiding hole
This is about the animals we saw in the park, as well as the jungle itself. Read about our trip and the caves here in the first part.
Most of the animals we saw was on a night walk we did with a guide. We walked really slow while trying to spot all the animals that become active at night, many of them are masters of disguise, especially the stick insects.
All sorts of stick insects, green ones, thorny ones, barky ones, but my favourite is the mossy one! The person is pointing to a massive stick insect, at least 30 cm long I think!
Dwarf squirrel (very cute), moss eating snail, small wood snake and a frog
Jungle flowers, but to be fair, most were found near the part head quarters where they have been planted
Bats streaming out of the deer cave. The 2-3 million bats in that cave alone do a good job as there are hardly any mosquitoes in the park
Butterfly, spider, grasshopper and a big bees' nest high up a tree
Heading down the river to Clearwater cave. The mountain where the Pinnacles is in the background
It was fun driving on these river boats
Cave animals: a racer snake, spider, cave cricket and these weird critters that live of guano (bat droppings)
A snail with really long antennas, a lantern insect, a sleeping bird and yet another spider
Pretty big tree
Phil walking across a canopy skywalk
But even up high at the canopy skywalk it still wasn't possible to see the jungle for trees
Lots of geckos, I like the tiny one on Phil's wrist, we found it in the sink by the hostel
Lots of millipedes and cousins, the fluffy ones are fun, the stripy one is actually as thick as a man's thumb and that's not including its hairs. The top left is a hammerhead worm.
After one week away from Sophia and lots of adventures, we're now both back onboard and boy oh boy, she sure is home sweet home. It's been so much fun to be off her and do something totally different (well, still visiting beautiful islands and snorkelling), but backpacking is different from cruising. One of the biggest differences is we have met so many young white people, haha. Probably the most since New Zealand. Backpackers are young, most even younger than us, and cruisers are old, broad generalisation, but pretty true. Maybe I'm getting old, but I really like my own bed every night, being able to do my own cooking, and having all my things handy.
As already mentioned in the last blog post, we left Sophia in Carmen and travelled to Apo Island where we had two great days. It's a tiny island with great reef life, lots of big turtles and fish, even just right off the beach. I did two dives, the first one a drift dive, soooo much fun and beautiful life and we probably almost covered about a third of the island's coast because we drifted so fast. The other one I did was a night dive, just off the beach, but it was super cool and we saw huge sleeping turtles, big nudibranches, scrimps, tiny baby squid (half little finger nail sized), a tiny frog fish and a scorpion fish.
After Apo Island we went back to Durmagete where we celebrated Phil's birthday (35, he's getting pretty old) with a nice German backpacker couple. They also told us of this place south of Cebu City called Oslob where you can see whale sharks right off the coast, so we had to give that a go, as we had otherwise planned to go way up north to Donsol where you can also see them.
We weren't really sure what to expect, but we got into this little banka (the Philipino style outrigger boats) and were paddled out to several small tiny bankas that are feeding the whale sharks squid or crill. The whale sharks were basically like puppies following the bankas, sticking their head right up inbetween the ourrigger and what looked like begging for food!!!! OK, so it wasn't quite the wild life experience, but nonetheless, it was still really cool to see the whale sharks right up close in the water with them. They are in family with sharks and look a bit like a gigant flat-ish shark, but they eat plancton like whales. The ones we saw (there were seven in total that stick around although they are free to leave) were maybe 3-5 meters long. You're supposed to keep a distance of at least 4 meters, but in reality they were much closers and I kept having to move back so they wouldn't touch me.
At Oslob Phil and I split up, I went to Moalboal to do a freediving course, but Phil wasn't as keen, and especially not with a broken toe, so he went back to Carmen to Sophia. It was again the first time in we don't even know how long, that we didn't sleep together, and first time in over nine month that we weren't together 24/7 round the clock.
Over the weekend I did a beginner freediving course and I loved it. I learned a lot of interesting things and did much better than I had ever thought I would. Total brag, but I held my breath for 3.38 minutes, and my best freedive (one single breath of air) was to 26.4 meters. It was also fun to do some learning (super teacher does that) and being part of a 'team' with the other guys on the course. Now I just look forward to even more enjoyable snorkelling.
Now we're back in Port Carmen and are heading off to Camotes tomorrow morning and will continue cruising through Philippines.
We love Ha’apai. Period. Vava’u is nice too, but different, both got
their good points and bad. Ha’apai is nicer, wilder and less busy, but the only
downside is the anchorages aren’t as protected as in Vava’u. We have spent
quite a few rolly nights where sleep is often interrupted. A big plus to
Ha’apai are all the whales. They are everywhere. One night in bed at an
anchorage we heard the tell-tale breathing splash and when looking out the
front hatch had whales right next to the boat, which was pretty cool.
The absolute highlight so far is swimming with them! At our
last anchorage, a tiny island by a big reef/lagoon called Hakau Lahi we spotted
a couple just as we were coming in to anchor. The anchor was hardly set before
I was in the water swimming towards them and Phil wasn’t far behind. It was a
mother and a calf with a male around as well (apparently not the dad, but the
next suitor). The visibility wasn’t the best, and I stayed a good 30 meters
away a while looking at them above the water. Slowly the mother and calf dove
down and approached me underwater. Talk about adrenalin kick when they became
visible underwater just in front of me! It’s one of the coolest experiences I
have ever had, right up there with New York marathon and micro plane flying.
They hung around the anchorage a while and I jumped back in and approached them
again, this time the male was checking me out.
We have been snorkelling lots, fishing, beach combing,
making bon fires and just hanging out with Sala. We didn’t find any lobsters at
Uonukuhihifo but it was a great place anyway. At Haafeva we snorkelled on a
super cool wreck, an old Korean fishing vessel, ideal for snorkelling, the top
of the bow was above water, and the deepest part of it was probably only 5-6
meters. Near the wreck Phil and I spotted two lobsters, but we weren’t wearing
gloves and Sala were too far away to call. Helen did go back a little later and
caught one, pretty yummy eating.
Our time here in Ha’apai is almost over, we gotta go back up
to Vava’u later this week to pick up our new water maker membrane and get
ready for the passage to Vanuatu. We are going to rent bikes tomorrow and cycle
around Lifuka, the island where the main town (Pangai) is.
I’ll try and upload photos to facebook, but I’m not sure it
will be successful, if not it’ll have to wait till Neiafu.
One of the top high-lights of the whole trip for me was to see Kiwis.
They are a New Zealand national symbol and everyone loves these funny
little birds that can't fly. If you ask around, I'm sure only 1 in 10
kiwis (as in the people) would have seen one, and most then only in
captivation. Stewart Island apparently is one of the best places to see
them. Most see them on Mason Beach on the west coast, which is part of the big northern circuit tramp (or if you're rich you fly).
You can also go on a tour with Bravo Adventure
and see wild kiwis on Ocean Beach. Or if you're lucky enough to have
sailed your own boat to Stewart Island, and are lucky to get the DOC
permit visit Ocean Beach by yourself (quite a mission to get the (free)
DOC permit, we were lucky to get one), you can simply go there yourself!
You're allowed to go there during the day, but from 6pm to 6am you need
a permit. We first went there during the day, and that itself is a
lovely trip. There's a wharf in Glory Bay on the eastern side and
there's a short walking track over to Ocean Beach which is on the main
coast of Stewart Island, just south of the entrance to Paterson Inlet.
It's quite a long and wide beach and we were
quite excited when we spotted these prints.
We
went back a few days later with our permit and after the tour operator
had finished his tour (after 11pm), and weren't quite sure what to
expect. Would we be able to spot any kiwis on the big beach? We
certainly wouldn't be able to hear them beforehand, as the surf was
quite noisy. Our dim lights (not to disturb the kiwis) didn't help a
whole lot. But suddenly we spotted one a bit ahead of us. WAUW. I was so
excited, I couldn't stop pulling at Phil's arm. The kiwi couldn't
have cared less about our presence, it was very busy picking out bugs
from the seaweed. It's impossible to take photos in the dark without a
flash, so I only got some video of it. The photo below is a snap shop of
the
video, obviously very poor quality, but it's a kiwi :-) Don't worry
about the light beam from our torch, it really was very weak and from a
good 5 meters away. I was surprised
how big it actually was, and very round (or fat?) too, kind of like a
soccer ball! And a big long beak. We continued along the beach and saw
several other ones, equally busy eating insect.
A couple of hunters were staying in a hut in Glory Bay, and one of them was tell us about how they sometimes track something noisy through the bush, slowly closing in on what they think is a deer. When they are really close they look all over the place and just can't spot the deer. Then they look down and there's this little kiwi clumsily walking around, making a lot of noise. Very funny and cute!
Stewart Island is renowned for its wild life and it really
was spectacular. Tons of birds and prolific sea life. While you may have seen
the odd one during the previous posts, I have tried to gather them all in here.
Starting with the birds. Lots and lots of Bellbirds around.
They sing lovely songs, ALL the time. And to each other. The one is the photo below was singing with two other
bell birds nearby. I have also added a
shaky video (partly the wind’s fault, not all mine...).
Next are the albatrosses, or Mollymawks to be exact. Amazing and impressive creatures. They provides hours of entertainment during watches while at sea. The way they soar over the waves, and hardly ever flap their wings make them very majestic. I think they were used to feeding from fishing boats coming into Port Pegasus, as we had several of them following us for a while, each time landing right behind Sophia.
Oystercatcher are noisy and territorial birds hanging out on the shore. Almost all the ones we saw were black, but many are also while and black. I like their super bright orange beaks. There's a photo of a mussel covered rock further down, so there's definitely no shortage of food for them.
Little Robins were cute and quite tame, especially on Ulva Island (second photo). I'm not sure if what were saw were South Island Robins, or Stewart Island Robins, possibly both.
The Kaka is a forest parrot, related to the Keas. There were lots and lots of them around Oban, so probably they like humans and the food that goes along with that, just like Keas.
We only ever saw a couple of Yellow-eyed Penguins in the water a distance away from Sophia. They always duck into the water right as I get my camera out, just like Little Blue Penguins. We had hoped to see them on land as well, they must have been hiding. This particular one was at our anchorage in Sailors Rest in Paterson Inlet.
Before moving on from the birds, you might wonder if we saw any kiwis! The answer is YES, but that story deserves a whole separate post (plus this post is already super long).
In the Magog tramp post I mentioned we saw sharks. Sophia was anchored just inside Seal Creek (also called Cook's Arm) behind a little island. The water wasn't quite as clear as some the other anchorages, but you could still see the bottom when it was about 4 meters deep. Anyway, when dinghing along further into the creek, looking for the start of the track, we suddenly saw a big shark-looking fish near the shore. We turned the dinghy around and tried to see it again. We were wondering what it was. A little further along we saw another big something , and agreed it sure did look like a shark. Pretty cool! Then suddenly there were at least 10 of them swimming around on the bottom, just 3-4 meters deep! Wowsa. The bigger ones looked bigger than Cherry (our dinghy, 2 meters long)! They were greyish with white spots and a broad nose and only a very small dorsal fin. We both got very excited and tried to turn around and spot more and get photos, and we did see a few more, but not the same amount. It's also really hard to get a photo through the water. But you can definitely see a grey something in the photo. We later found out they are Broadnose Sevengill Sharks.
Seafood lovers would love Stewart Island. Tons of mussels everywhere, as well as paua (abalone) and scallops if you know where to look. Unfortunately Phil and I aren't big fans (read what crime we did here).
Stewart Island also has lots of Sea Lions and Seals (bit tricky to tell the difference, but apparently sea lions have ear flaps which seals don't). This one below was really cute, super curious, he (or she?) slowly came closer and closer, popping its head up every so often to look again. By then we had come ashore and he was halfway out of the water thoroughly checking us out.
However, our first experience with seal (lions) at Waterlily Bay wasn't quite as cute and fuzzy. When Phil got in the dinghy to get the stern line set up, this big sea lion came charging out from the beach. Phil quickly retreated back to Sophia and he (gotta be a he :-) ) swam right out to us and underneath the dinghy. He then went into the other beach and Phil tried again, but with the same result! It was pretty obvious that this was his bay and we were not welcome. Finally he left the bay and we could get our stern line set up. After this experience we always carried our fog horn with us when we went ashore, but luckily we never needed it.
If we're not seafood lovers, but we love fish, and especially Blue Cod. Yummy yum. And they were so easy to catch! Definitely not like the Marlborough Sounds. I had to restrict Phil when he went fishing, only one or two. We had fish as much as we wanted, pretty much every second day, or more even. The limit on Stewart Island is 30 a day per person! According to Phil, the fisherman on Sophia, they live on rock, so often you just got to dinghy a bit away from your anchorage (usually sand) to a rocky outcrop and you'll be able to see them, the water is that clear and there are that many. Phil would usually use some soft bait and catch a Spotty and use that as bait for the Blue Cod.
We had thought we'd snorkel more than we did. We only went once together, and Phil once by himself. We had lots of excuses though: cold water (brrrr!), angry sea lions, swarms of red jelly fish with tentacles and sharks :-) We eventually did go and it was actually really nice (albeit a bit cold), heaps of little fish, and lots of big kelpies and spotties. Phil also speared a delicious butterfish (and I cut his hair immediately after taking this photo!).
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