Tuesday, January 05, 2010

Diving in the lagoon

At Arajilla restaurant. We booked tonight's meal after we couldn't get in for New Years. It seems to be the most expensive and exclusive place on the island. The restaurant seems to be associated strongly with the hotel. That is, the hotel guests get first preference for tables and others come second. Arajilla also seems to have some health spa/massage for guests.Today I went diving with Howea Divers. Unfortuneately the sea was too strong to go outside the reef and I was stuck on two boatloads of beginners. We went to Comet's Hole and I was buddied with a Howea diver called Rachel. She seemed to get all the photo shots first but the water was full of sediment so there weren't any really good pictures to be had. LHI waters, although claimed to be clear, have really been a bit mucky during our stay.The next dive was at Hooks Peef, also known as the Horseshoe.Uschi and I visited both these sites on our snorkelling tour. Rachel had to go and on the second load there was only one leader.A young boy and his father made up the rest of the group and it took a while for them to get down. I waited under the boat for them. After they did their exercises we spent about 15 minutes on the reef then they retired to the boat, leaving me alone in about 2-3m of water. I spent maybe another 20 minutes there and saw a few good fish. Large Parrot Fish, smaller Puffers and Lizard fish on the sand. Then when my air was down to about 70 bar I went back to the boat. I was last one on board. After I got back I found Uschi had been to Sylph's Hole at the high tide and seen 4 (!) turtles. Three smaller ones and a large individual. By this time it was mid afternoon and Uschi and Christl had a snooze. I went up to the museum to see if I could use the internet, but the museum was shut. I went back to the guest house then on to the cemetery near Ned's Beach. I found the grave of Thompson (the first school teacher) and his student wife, buried in the same grave.
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