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| Good place to sleep if you like sand flees and stars |
14/07/13 little behind with my internet at the moment so blog is officially on island time, phone dead, internet cable cut
I needed some lone
time this past Friday after a very intense first week of work here. That worked
out better then I had planned. Looking back it might not have been a great idea
to hike down the islands most isolated jungle trail one hour before sunset
wearing flip flops, a pair of short and a very small pack with necessities
(Ginger Ale, snorkle gear, camera). The idea of getting lost flickered past my
mind as I navigated barefoot through the dense bush following a tiny overgrown
and poorly marked trail down the steep mountain side. Once I got down to the
lowlands it turned into a bushy maze but in daylight it was fine. I watched the
beautiful sunset at the beach and started to head back in my usual fashion - at
the latest time possible. Lesson one. It gets dark fast here. Lesson two. It is
a lot darker in the woods. Lesson three. Bring a flashlight and a fully charged
phone when you set out on poorly planned spontaneous adventures. Have I learned
these lessons before? Yes, but I believe they are good to repeat once in a
while. Also, I didn’t really get lost, I could hear the roaring ocean all the
time. But that trail head was gone. I was wandering around in the darkening
bushy lowlands looking for my tiny trail thinking about the native sand tarantulas
the staff at Fish And Wildlife had shown me earlier that day. Realizing that I
better try and find the beach again before it get pitch black I turned around
(and almost got lost again). As I found the beach I looked at my phone to
discover I had no cellphone coverage and almost no batteries. Great. From there
it mostly got better. I managed to text my colleage Will that I was not dead or
unfaithful to my wife - just stuck at a remote beach and back in the early morning.
Then I found myself a soft rock to make my home and dosed off for some well
needed sleep under a milkyway sky of twinkling stars.
20 minutes later I
suddenly woke up, two shadows was moving towards me. As my heart rate slowly slowed
down I found myself observed on a very close distance, 2-3 meter or so, by two
curious night herons. They did not want to move and I decided they where there
for my protection and drifted back to sleep land again. Aaough!! !! 20 minutes
later the first but not the last little sharp bite from an evil sand flee got
me in the side and the mosquitoes were hovering above my poorly concealed body.
(Luckily I had brought some m repellent which partly saved me). I woke up next
at dawn next morning covered in little small bites. I may or may not have gone
for a naked run and swim on the remote deserted beach, and may or may not have
felt a tiny bit like a stranded pirate on a desolate Caribbean island. Then I
got busy snorkeling as the sun snuck over the horizon - once there I might as
well do some work- and some time later hiked back to now easy trail, filled
with cute snakes heating in the morning sun. Culebra mean snake island for a
good reason. Back out at 7.15 with a day of some pretty awesome
work ahead of me.
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| The irresistible trail head |
Island time. I thought
we would get at least half the work we had set out to do done here. It turns
out that is probably very optimistic. With only one week left to do our habitat
mapping work around Culebra we are hopelessly behind schedule. What I though was going to be at least 6 hour
of fairly efficient ocean time each day have averaged around 2-3 hours per day
for a million different reasons. I think they can all be cut down to this:
Island time.
I got lots of stories
to to tell about the work we do here and the awesome waters around this magic
little jem of an Island, but now it is time to catch some sleep before another
hectic week start (we still work in DC time!). I’ll get you some good stuff
from the work we do here soon... Manjana!
Also, today I busted out my fly rod to try and relax my brain with some
fishing at the dock where we live. I waded/swam out to a sea grass shallow in
the mangrove and was soon transfixed by the sight of a large tarpon fin chasing
bait fish in the shallow water. 10 minutes later something that felt like a
smaller train in full speed took my fly and immediately broke my line in a
whale of a splash. Covered in mosquito bites I waded back home to go searching
for a stronger line. Next time.
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