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Bunaken – Sulewasi Indonesia

Sunday, September 28th, 2008

Alright just wanted to post a quick note (Internet isn’t the best here).  We arrived safely in Manado three days ago, boy what a flight, I really do hate flying.  This side of Indonesia is pretty nice, much better than Banda Aceh on the west side of Indonesia!  We were picked up at the airport in Mando and taken to our boat for the 45 minutes to the island we will stay on for a week right in heart of the Bunaken Marine Park! Oh we had a one night layover in Kuala Lumpur thankfully we had enough time to download a few episodes of Heroes, House, Prison Break and Chuck.  We need something to do when we aren’t diving!  The resort here in Bunaken is pretty nice, way better than Pulau Weh.  The rooms are not as nice as Pulau Weh but the food and dive boats are much better.  The diving is pretty nice too!  The view from the resort at sunset is fantastic, nice volcano which the sun sets right next too!  Plus we can freely drink beer and eat during the day!!  Much different than Pulau Weh!  We will be here till Friday and then off to Lembah Straits which is the other side of the island we are staying on.  There we will meet up with about 8 people we dove with in Koh Tao so it should be a pretty nice reunion!  We will try to post more in a few days also maybe actually respond to some emails!!  Miss you all!

And the currents keep rolling!!

Saturday, September 20th, 2008

Oh the current that is Pulau Weh!  Since our last posts we have been basically alternating between dives with current and dives without.  Once we went to a site called something drift, obviously to do a drift dive and there was no current!  Go figure!  Well Mark, Deb and Maryanne are getting better diving in the current, however we have learned that I am shit in the current!  Twice I have had to end a dive, once because just getting to the bottom I was breathing hard and could never catch my breathe once down there which really freaked me out, so that dive lasted all of 12min to include a 3 min safety stop.  Luckily the rest of them came up and said the current made the dive not so fun anyway.  Then today the current proved too much for me as well.  This morning we were supposed to do a check dive to 45 meters for our dive on the wreck.  So we hop overboard and swim like crazy down by the time we got to 30 meters the current was too strong to make it to the wall and drop to 45 meters.  While everyone was close to the guide I was taken far down current no where near the wall, oopss.  I really struggled just to get to the bottom of this ledge to grab a hold of some rock to hold onto since there was no way I could kick upstream to get to the group.  I could see Maryanne looking around trying to find me but I was 25 meters away (not good in a current)!  Finally they started swimming towards me, once Maryanne was close I had caught my breathe but wasn’t excited about the dive so yeah I ended that dive.  Maryanne and I drifted off into the blue to do our safety stop, well that proved tricky!  We got stuck a few times trying to swim up during times of down current!  Then during our safety stop we were bouncing between 3 and 7 meters.  Once to the surface we were so far from the boat we had to use our whistles like crazy to get the boat to see us since we drifted so far away!  I did learn two things though, one I suck in the current and two if you wear a wetsuit you need to add more weight!  Here is not like Koh Tao it is a little too chilly for me so I thought I would just wear a wetsuit.  Well I didn’t compensate enough for the extra bouyancy, duh!  So I was working harder to get down then everyone else!  At least now I know, that I don’t completely suck at diving in a current!  We are getting a workout for sure, definetely no 5 dives a day here!  [read on]

The first few days and the dive from Hell!!

Monday, September 15th, 2008
Well I will start this out with how things have been going since we got here and end it with my dive from Hell.  So we are on Palau Weh, Indonesia. This island is beautiful and our room at Lumba ... [Continue reading this entry]

Pulau Weh and Happy Birthday Dad!!!

Thursday, September 11th, 2008
Boy is it tough to call home from a small little island in northern Indonesia!  Sorry about that dad but it was good to hear your voice! Alright the trip here was awful!  We left Boreno two days ago to head ... [Continue reading this entry]

Sepilok Sandakan Borneo Photos

Thursday, September 11th, 2008
I am ready for my close up!sepilok-17.jpgsepilok-15.jpgNice views[Continue reading this entry]

Sepilok Borneo

Tuesday, September 9th, 2008
Well we left Seaventures Platform to a nice farewell from the staff, we sure are going to miss it there!  However we were headed to Sepilok and the orangatang reserve to see the nice orange monkeys!!  The trip was over ... [Continue reading this entry]

Sabah, Borneo

Thursday, September 4th, 2008
<Well the flight over here sucked really bad, not only did we have to wake up at stupid o'clock in the morning, the turbulance was awful!  I know Maryanne, Mark and Deb all enjoyed it but it freaked me out ... [Continue reading this entry]