Thursday, January 29, 2009

Under da sea (Jan. 25/09 - Phu Quoc Island, Vietnam)

Today we got a taste for Vietnam from below the waves. Since tomorrow is the Lunar New Year, the dive shops are closed, so they were going to take out more people today than they normally would - 14 to be exact! We groaned at the thought of 14 people diving in a group... that will be a mess! But it turned out that only five of us were diving, two were doing Discover Scuba, a few more were snorkelling, and the rest were just along for the boat ride. These guys had the best dive boat ever - huge, wooden hull with two big tables, benches, head, sun deck, and a full on kitchen! Luckily, the water was nice and calm for the hour long boat ride upu to Doi Moi Island (Turtle Island), which turned out to be right offshore from the beach we were on yesterday.

The bottom was scattered with coral heads of various shapes and sizes, decorated with hard and soft corals, gorgonians, and a variety of fish (though mostly small). The visibility wasn't very good (about 30 feet, although that would be great at home!) and the divemaster tended to swim so fast that it was almost hard to keep up with him! We really prefer to take it slow and have the chance to actually see all the stuff you would otherwise swim over... but not knowing where we were going, we had no choice but to stick with him. There were some interesting flatworms and nudibranchs, lots of urchins, big schools of colourful little fish, and even a small cuttlefish that was quick to squirt us with ink before zipping away. We stayed down for 20 minutes after the group ascended, which gave us a chance to poke around and see some stuff. Despite ascending exactly where the group did, we surfaced at least 500m from the boat. The captain spotted us and was nice enough to come pick us up, saving us from a long swim. For the second dive, we motored over to another little islet called Mon Tay Island (Nail Island), just a few kilometers south. The water is so shallow (max 30 feet) that we were back in the water after only a 35 minute surface interval. Some weird white sea cucumbers were seemingly taking over the reefs, as they literally covered the coral heads and were so densly packed on some of the barrel sponges that you could barely see the sponge itself. Unlike the bigger sea cucumbers we have seen elsewhere, these ones looked almost like little white snakes. Wierd. Also wierd was the huge Crown of Thorns seastars that we came across. I had heard about these but never seen one - they look like our big sunstars at home, with 18 or more legs but covered with hundreds of thin spiky thorns. These guys are some of the biggest threats to a reef, as they feed on coral and can decimate a substantial area in a matter of weeks.
The boat crew treated us to a great local lunch on the boat before puttering back to the harbour. We did enjoy our dives here, but in all honesty, they didn't live up to the "pristine reefs" and "up and coming dive destination" reviews that we had read. There are a bunch of dive sites at the south end of the island though, so maybe they're better. But it was a great day on the boat, with nice warm water and some interesting sea life, so we're happily waterlogged!

Back at our beachside bungalow, we lounged around for a while, scheming with the guidebook to decide where to go next. At sunset, we found another place to eat dinner on the sand, which is becoming a fabulous daily routine!

p.s. - I think it's noteworthy to add that today I had proof that Ken is a changed man, adapting to life in Asia, as he said all of the following:
1. "I think I need some sunscreen."
2. "That cold shower is going to feel great tonight." and
3. "Please pass the tofu."

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