A giant mangrove forest, a freshwater upwelling in the middle of a saltwater bay, sponges and corals we’ve never seen. And white dolphins.
I wake up and write my last day’s diary while parrots and animals whose names I don’t know turn on the soundtrack to an old Tarzan movie.
We find a workaround to the rangers’ fuel issue and buy some for them. If my $100 allows them to patrol this place one more time then it’s doing more good than it will back home spent on something I don’t need.
We head out for a big day on the bay. The environment here is incredible. It’s like someone took Lake Pedder in Tasmania and its surrounding mountains and dropped them in the Amazon rainforest.
Like yesterday we meet fishers along the way, but today the highlights are natural.
A giant mangrove grows 67 of the 72 known species of mangrove plants.
A freshwater upwelling in the middle of a saltwater bay has both freshwater and saltwater fish living in and around it.
A quick snorkel reveals sponges and corals that my marine biologist friend has never seen despite almost 10,000 dives in this region.
And we see the white dolphins that are endemic to this area. I take photos from the boat while Kevin flies his drone above them and they really are toothpaste white.
When the patrol ends in the late afternoon I go for a dive in the mangroves with Lynn. We see all sorts of weird stuff, from juvenile barramundi cod with their black and white polka dots and ungainly attempts to hover, to razor fish that hang vertically in the water and look like blades of grass.
In the evening we have fresh crepes cooked by Kevin’s wife Emilie, a professional horse trainer and stunt rider from France who used to perform horseback acrobatics in the circus.
Tomorrow, we cave.
Source: LinkedIn | Greg Johannes
Photo: Greg Johannes
Past Entries:
About The Author: Greg Johannes, Ambassador – The SEA People. Greg spent 2 weeks aboard the Galaxea with us and documented his experience in his daily entries into ‘The SEA People Diaries’.
Day Five – Read here
Day Four – Read here
Day Three – Read here
Day One and Two – Read here
Day Zero – Read here