Black Coral

Left to right: Purple/blue starfish in reef at low tied; sunset second night, our hut looking out at the ocean at low tide.
September 10, 2006

Our first camping experience

There are some people who like to camp, there are others that positively hate it. I am one of the ones that love to camp, the more you have to rough it the better. But I have to say that island camping is the best, no two ways about it. Now picture a beautiful island out in the deep blue sea, with a reef around it and cute little huts and trees and lizards and hermit crabs. The island that we went to was Black Coral Island, 14 of us took the boats the long way and the other 11 piled onto the yellow and red trucks and headed out to the drop off point about an hour away. Mr. B was driving our boat (the bigger of the two boats) while his son drove the smaller boat. In our boat along with our gear we had Rusty, Eric, Mark, Marla, Mr. B and me. The waves inside the coral reef boundary were smallish and our boat bounced happily along. After a good half an hour we bounced out of the protection of the coral reef and into the big blue ocean. Our little boat would ride the first wave up and then skidder down the other side and another large wave would swell up in front of us and the boat would bounce up and then smash down into the trough in between just in time to ride yet another wave. As Marla and I shrieked with delight and glee, Eric shouted above the roar of the engine that it was like riding a roller coaster, and we all agreed between shrieks of laughter and surprise when the boat pitched and rolled…thankful to be in the larger and lighter of the two boats.
Marla and I were cheerfully talking about sharks, the difference between cold water sharks and warm water sharks, how the only sharks that we were going to see were small reef sharks…I now know a great deal about sharks, more then I ever wanted to know before…but hey sharks are cool…especially close up, but more on that later. We were also trying to figure out which island we were heading too, we would see the different islands out there when we were on the crest of each swell and then they would disappear for a few seconds and reappear slightly farther away (that was because we had guessed wrong, the islands we were looking at happened to be a group of islands called Ant), but some were closer and one of the closer ones was where we were heading.
The cute little island of Black Coral showed itself to be a sturdy island that was continually beaten by the waves. Our boat bucked and threw itself into the channel, riding wave after wave…and there we were starring at the most beautifully clear water and a little island that was going to be our home for the next two days. Once on the island Marla and I scouted out the little huts and decided that one facing the calm water would be nicer. After we set up our hammocks and grabbed our snorkel gear we trotted down to the reef. Two girls, Carry and Jennifer, were floating around on a buggy board. I cheerfully asked them how the water was and if they were going to go out any farther…they promptly shouted back that they weren’t going to leave the comfort of the shore because someone had spotted a reef shark cruising around. I was like “Cool, Come on Marla let’s go!” and I put my fins on and stepped into the nice cool water…slipping on my mask and snorkel I submerged and found myself looking at the cutest little fish and big fish that anyone ever saw. Both of us swam out to the where Peter was enjoying the sights…but before we got there he shouted out “Shark!” I responded “Where” he was like “Over here! Hurry!” but when we got there it was gone, so I swam around the coral looking for any signs of life…I saw lots of fish and all…but my highlight was when I looked up and there in front of me was a white tip reef shark, about 3 ½ feet long and just cruising along, not really caring that I was there. I just swam closer and watched it, you know sharks are really beautiful and graceful creatures…never thought of it before, but you have to see them swim. I surfaced and screamed shark, but the others didn’t get to see it. I was like “Oh man that was so cool, I just got to see and swim next to a white tip reef shark!”
Now most people when they go snorkeling out in the ocean want to see and swim with dolphins…now I have seen the dolphins here in Pohnpei, and they are real cute and all and it would have been cool to swim with them, but I have gotten to see and swim with sharks…it was so cool, I wouldn’t exchange that experience for the world.
Anyway back to what I was saying, I had so far seen one shark and I excitedly told Marla all about it. I then went back under and continued to look at fish and tried to keep an eye out for sharks…the sun was starting to set and I knew that there had to be more. I eyed the large fish and soon out of the fog of the water (remember I told you that the sun was setting) I saw this huge shark swimming towards me…I was like “Oh my goodness! That thing is Huge!” I did the not so sensible thing, I took my eyes off the shark and shot up and shouted “Marla, SHARK!” Then I went back under and tried to locate the shark again, I never found it, but Marla said that it was a good five feet long…The biggest one that we had seen so far…I took a good look around me and then surfaced and looked up at the sky…the sun was setting, and I knew that the feeding time for the sharks was about to start and honestly I didn’t want to be apart of it. Marla and I called to Peter and told him that we found the Mama of the smaller shark that I had seen earlier and we thought that it would be a good thing to go in now, seeing that it was sunset. He agreed and we all clambered up the coral and back to our huts to get our cameras, just in time to see the truck crew coming up in the boats…and once they arrived things became like a small campus, only we were all stuck on this tiny little island. But it was nice to see everyone, including Joan…who when she saw which hut we had chosen whined and complained about how she liked it better on the other side of the island…at which time Marla and I had to tell her that the one hut that she liked best being reserved for the U.S. Marines (Joan perked up at that, but they were all girls, so it was a big disappointment for Joan, who had wanted to see hot boys).
That night after vespers and a chance to look at the stars and the moon we all went to bed, well at least our hut tried to, it took me until 3a.m. to figure out how to sleep in my hammock. Like you can sleep in it like people normally relax in it, but I am here to tell you that you will wake up with all the blood gone from your feet and unable to move them. You can try to sleep curled up in a ball, but your neck will start to hurt. The way to sleep is at an angle, it is so comfy, but I didn’t figure that out for quite some time…and when I did I was like “this is more like it” but once I was comfy I noticed that there was movement in our hut and outside…there was a storm that came up and the waves were hitting the floor boards of our hut and the wind was tearing at the roof and the windows…so the rest of the night I swung back and forth in my hammock, not sleeping the best but wishing that it would all stop so I could sleep…

Sabbath
I awoke in the early morning to hear Marla and Raz talking outside our hut…at first I was like “I’m so tired I just want to sleep” but then I was like…”Wait! Raz is outside, he might try to scare us and then oh I will be so mad at him…” but then it occurred to me, once I got up that Marla was outside, he wouldn’t try anything now. But by then I had already opened the door and stepped out. And it was a beautiful Sabbath morning, no rain just a beautiful day. I couldn’t wait to go out and snorkel, but the tide was out and there was a lot of exploring to do. Becky and I decided that walking on the dead coral would be very exciting; I mean who knows what we were going to see. So we recruited Raymond and Gene to come exploring with us. And then we started out, unfortunately Gene didn’t have the right type of shoes for this expedition so he turned back (walking barefoot on coral is asking for it) so the three of us continued on. We wanted to get to this ship wreck that had to be at least four miles away, and walking on coral takes time, you can’t go too fast because you will cut yourself and you want to go fast enough that nothing will bite you. But as we walked we saw the brilliant blue star fish and the live coral that was with the dead coral and the little fish and the eels. Yes I did say eels. There were tons of them, all hiding under rocks and when we walked past the fish would flee and the eels would come out and eat the fish and scare us as they darted past our feet. Lots of fun there, but as we walked we would keep looking back at the island and then at our destination and then at our feet as we saw that the tide was indeed coming back in.
Now those of you who have read Narnia might remember the book called The Horse and His Boy and in that book there is a description of them crossing the dessert and how after a certain point the mountains never seemed to get closer and Tashban (or whatever that city was called) never seemed to get smaller. Well that is how it was for us, after a certain point in our travels our little island wouldn’t get smaller and the boat that we were trying to reach was still just as far away and just as small as it had been when we started out. So I commented on this fact through out our walk, actually almost every time I turned around to see how far we had gone. Soon Raymond told us that we needed to turn back, because if we didn’t do so soon we would be swimming back to the island instead of wading or even walking for that matter. And we did wade in water that came up to the middle of our shins, back the way we came, it took some time and it was almost slower going, but the water was now cooler and soon we were back on our little island…and we were ready to swim around and see the sights to be seen. But first we had to eat lunch and then wait a little bit after we ate, and then we needed to put on sunscreen and that took some time, then that had to soak in…Then Becky and I were tired so we took a nap, then we sat around, I talked to Marla and then looked out our window in our hut and saw a little shark about two feet long swimming around in the water…Marla and I tried to get a picture of it, but alas we weren’t so lucky…but it was just the cutest littlest black tip shark you ever saw…that was when we decided that the sights of the ocean needed to be seen.
The sights to be seen were fish, coral, a shark or two, and more fish. Marla, Becky and I splashed into the now much cooler water. (it is amazing how hot the water can get when the tide is out) we swam around and enjoyed the sights, Becky tried to feed the fish with some rice crispy cereal she had brought with her…the only problem was that it didn’t sink and the fish weren’t stupid enough to go that close to the surface. So that really didn’t work all that well, but we had fun. Now something we all learned that weekend was that the rip tide was very strong, it always felt like the tide was going out, pulling you into the ocean, out to sea so to speak…but many of the times that we were out there, the tide was actually coming in, not out. Anyway there were these two poles at the entrance to the channel (the poles were there to keep you from crashing into the coral that was on either side of that small entrance when you came in on the boat) but the two poles were great to hold on to so that you weren’t swept out to sea. So as I clung to one of the poles I surveyed the things around me. There were really cool fish swimming around and I enjoyed watching them swim around me. Then I looked up and there in front of me swam a black tip reef shark, it was so beautiful…just gliding along…like it took no effort at all. I slapped the girl next to me and pointed then I swam closer and caught Marla’s attention, we followed the shark for a ways, looking at how beautiful it really was and wanting to reach out and touch it…but I have quite a lot of respect for creature that have a lot of sharp teeth and besides it was swimming into a dead end and we didn’t want to make it nerves.
Marla and I surfaced and then talked about how beautiful it was and then we swam against the current and bumped into Gene and told him about the shark and when Becky showed up we told her. She was disappointed, but the tide had sucked her out so I couldn’t see her when I saw the shark. We all decided to follow Gene to the other side of the island and look at the fish there and look for sharks. I saw one of those flat fish that have eyes on one side of their body…what is that a flounder? Anyway we also saw a long skinny fish with a long nose that looked like a trumpet…perhaps a kind of trumpet fish or something. We saw fish with stripes and spots and dark color fish and clear fish and then we saw no fish at all…then we ran into Raz and talked to him for awhile. Then I was like since we are just standing here in the water we might as well explore some more…so we swam back the way that we came and looked for more fish…we wanted to see another shark, but you know when you really want to see something it never just comes around…it happens when you are not looking for it.
But we got really tired and cold and decided that it was time to go back on to the island and take a “shower” also know as taking a bucket of cold “fresh” water that had drained off the tin roof of the biggest hut, and had mosquito larva living in it cause it just stands in a big red tub day in and day out…makes you want to shower in it now doesn’t it? So that was fun to an extent, because salt water isn’t very fun to have on you all the time…like it makes your hair feel gross and you feel sticky and everything sticks to your skin. So Becky and I took a big bucket of that “fresh” water and went to the shack that was the “shower” Becky told me to go first and so I did…I took a nice cold, but refreshing shower…after the shower I had to put on bug spray cause every insect wanted to bite me.
After supper the boys ran off to go spear fishing, we watched them go and told them to be careful, Micky came a short time later with Cable and told him that they could go in the same direction as the other boys or go to the left where the fishing was good, but there was a shark that chased people (it wasn’t a reef shark, but a different kind…there were three at one time, but there was only one now) Cable decided that fishing with the others wasn’t so bad after all. The rest of us watched the moon rise…it was so beautiful and we watched the stars that were so bright and saw a satellite pass above us twice (very cool) and then Marla and I talked and watched the moon and soon others joined us under the coconut tree and we all talked and laughed. We actually decided to go to bed early, which was nice.
The next morning, Sunday morning to be exact I enjoyed being lazy, I was unable to go out into the ocean, I mean I could have if I had wanted to attract every shark in the ocean, but since I didn’t, I decided that sitting around and doing nothing was a great idea…girls there are some things that you never forget on a camping trip, always be prepared, no matter what. So I was very relaxed the rest of the morning, did some sleeping, talked to Marla, swung in my hammock, talked to others around us…and well it was just nice. I didn’t feel good anyway cause I was getting sick, but I enjoyed just sitting around, but I was so ready to go when two o’clock came around.
But really it was a lot of fun, but I was glad to know that Monday was actually a holiday and that I didn’t have to teach the next day…and that I had a day to recuperate from my weekend. So you know all and all it was a great weekend, and even though I am sick doesn’t mean that I am going to stop teaching or anything, I will just teach the best I can, even if I do sound like a little frog. Anyway this teacher has to be going now, so long!