I've just got back from my repeat whale shark tour and the three spotter planes couldn't find any whale sharks for me again! I don't get another free repeat and can't shell out another AUS$350 to try again, so I have to say good bye to this opportunity to see whale sharks. There will be another time one day somewhere...
I did do a dive on the reef though and we snorkelled, I saw a huge rough-back sting ray on the sandy sea bed, quite a few turtles, and another few manta rays - one at a cleaning station surrounded by little fish eating its parasites - but nothing anywhere near the mantas of 2 days ago. We also saw a pair of minky whales swimming & breaching ahead of the boat for about 15 minutes. They were pretty cool.
I have 4 more dives booked before I leave Ningaloo Reef so hope to see a lot more stuff.
Thursday 31 May 2007
Wednesday 30 May 2007
Manta rays rock
Wow!! I went out on a boat to swim with whale sharks yesterday. No whale sharks were found by their spotter plane (so I get a free re-run tomorrow) but we did come across a group of manta rays feeding at the surface.
I know I'm new to diving, but this was the most spectacular experience I've had yet and we only had to snorkel to make the most of it.
There were about 10-12 huge mantas - I'm talking as wide as I am tall and bigger - swimming all around us and right under us so that I thought a huge wing would flick me. They swam directly at us in lines of 2 or 3 then swam away underneath us, they were doing back flips, barrel rolls, circling us, all sorts. They seemed to be enjoying it as much as us.
We were with them for about an hour and I took over 100 photos, I have selected some of the best below. Sorry there are quite a few, I've put the better ones at the start in case you get bored.
The most magnificant, huge, graceful, beautiful underwater creatures I've ever seen. It definitely made up for the whale shark no-show.
I know I'm new to diving, but this was the most spectacular experience I've had yet and we only had to snorkel to make the most of it.
There were about 10-12 huge mantas - I'm talking as wide as I am tall and bigger - swimming all around us and right under us so that I thought a huge wing would flick me. They swam directly at us in lines of 2 or 3 then swam away underneath us, they were doing back flips, barrel rolls, circling us, all sorts. They seemed to be enjoying it as much as us.
We were with them for about an hour and I took over 100 photos, I have selected some of the best below. Sorry there are quite a few, I've put the better ones at the start in case you get bored.
The most magnificant, huge, graceful, beautiful underwater creatures I've ever seen. It definitely made up for the whale shark no-show.
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| Manta Ray, Ningaloo Reef |
Monday 28 May 2007
Skip back to South Africa (updated)
I wanted to upload a few more photos of South Africa, mainly places we stayed and some of the best views we encountered.
I only have my 2nd memory card with me right now, so these start from Mkuze and the game reserve. We stayed in some beautiful places. Highlights for me were Clarens, Hogsback and Franschhoek (much prettier than nearby larger Stellenbosch).
I only have my 2nd memory card with me right now, so these start from Mkuze and the game reserve. We stayed in some beautiful places. Highlights for me were Clarens, Hogsback and Franschhoek (much prettier than nearby larger Stellenbosch).
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| South African highlights |
Exmouth at last
After a good night's sleep at the Overland - good cos it is so isolated and empty I worried about being robbed in the night! - and a hearty breakfast from the staff (my newest friends) I tried to hitch a lift to Exmouth. It was either that or wait all day in a petrol station forecourt until 8.30pm for the bus.
My search started badly as it was all really old retires turning up in their RVs and caravans, no thanks. Other guys turned up with fishing gear, singlets & moustaches - no way I was sharing a ride with them, I'd probably end up as bait!!
To make things worse I had my north & south mixed up so cars pulling into the garage on their way to Exmouth I actually thought were heading south to Perth so didn't even consider asking. The car of 3 young girls was the best opportunity that I let slip by...
At about 2pm my luck turned. The roadhouse owners daughter arrived and was going to Exmouth so the staff introduced us and she was normal and more importantly happy to take me with her. She had just got back from Nepal with her Mum and dropped off her Mum at the roadhouse then heading back to her boyfriend in Exmouth. She was very friendly and I got all the gossip on Exmouth town life and some good tips on what to do and see.
What a result! So I arrived last night at 7pm rather than at 5am this morning on the Greyhound.
I tried to get on a whale shark boat this morning but they were fully booked, so I'm signed up for tomorrow then a 2 dive trip to the reef on Wednesday. I'll post photos as soon as I can.
Today I'm hiring a bike and riding 14k to Bundegi beach which is supposed to be much nicer than the town beach. Plus good snorkelling from the beach.
My search started badly as it was all really old retires turning up in their RVs and caravans, no thanks. Other guys turned up with fishing gear, singlets & moustaches - no way I was sharing a ride with them, I'd probably end up as bait!!
To make things worse I had my north & south mixed up so cars pulling into the garage on their way to Exmouth I actually thought were heading south to Perth so didn't even consider asking. The car of 3 young girls was the best opportunity that I let slip by...
At about 2pm my luck turned. The roadhouse owners daughter arrived and was going to Exmouth so the staff introduced us and she was normal and more importantly happy to take me with her. She had just got back from Nepal with her Mum and dropped off her Mum at the roadhouse then heading back to her boyfriend in Exmouth. She was very friendly and I got all the gossip on Exmouth town life and some good tips on what to do and see.
What a result! So I arrived last night at 7pm rather than at 5am this morning on the Greyhound.
I tried to get on a whale shark boat this morning but they were fully booked, so I'm signed up for tomorrow then a 2 dive trip to the reef on Wednesday. I'll post photos as soon as I can.
Today I'm hiring a bike and riding 14k to Bundegi beach which is supposed to be much nicer than the town beach. Plus good snorkelling from the beach.
Saturday 26 May 2007
Unscheduled stop: Overlander roadhouse
Sam said I'd get in trouble without her there to think for me and I'm in my first spot of bother already, only the 2nd day after reaching Australia! To be fair though it's not my fault and it's not serious bother.
I made it to my bus at East Perth station no worries this morning and have been fine for the first 11 hours of the bus journey. We got to the Overlander Roadhouse for a pitstop and a change of drivers and the new driver spots something up with my ticket. It turns out that my connecting bus from Minilya to Exmouth does not run on Saturday nights and the roadhouse there is closed too. Luckily he spoke up otherwise I would have been stuck up there at about midnight for 24 hours with nowhere to sleep. The travel agent in Perth should not have sold me the ticket, but also the Greyhound website he made the booking on should not have allowed him to book it. I'll have strong words with both tomorrow or Monday morning.
As a result I am at the lovely Overlander. To say this place is in the middle of nowhere is an understatement - it's in the middle of effing nowhere!! The nearest town is about 200k away. All we have here is the petrol station and minimart which shuts in a few hours. That's it. No houses, no pub, no corner shop, no tourist attractions, no nothing. Plus I have to check out at 10am and hang around watching the road-trains rumble past for 10 hours until the next Greyhound bus picks me up. Joy.
Mercifully they have (occasional) internet access, so at least I can fill an hour or two...as long as it keeps working.
In summary, I'm annoyed that I'll get to the coast and the reef a day later than planned. But this is one of the twists and turns that travelling is all about.
I'm getting friendly with the staff who work and live here - one guy spent 6 months straight here without returning to the real world. Wonder what or who he's hiding from??! He gave me a cold Corona though so I like him.
Possibly there might be a bus to Shark Bay I can jump on tomorrow morning. That's about 140k away and has a great beach, so maybe there is a lining to this cloud. I'll let you know.
Quick final word about the accommodation here - BASIC. I'm in one of 4 rooms built into a tin portacabin. It will not be hosting any cat swinging contests if you know what I mean. It's tiny but clean enough and the showers are just metres away in the next door portacabin. Think I'll treat myself in Exmouth and get ensuite.
I made it to my bus at East Perth station no worries this morning and have been fine for the first 11 hours of the bus journey. We got to the Overlander Roadhouse for a pitstop and a change of drivers and the new driver spots something up with my ticket. It turns out that my connecting bus from Minilya to Exmouth does not run on Saturday nights and the roadhouse there is closed too. Luckily he spoke up otherwise I would have been stuck up there at about midnight for 24 hours with nowhere to sleep. The travel agent in Perth should not have sold me the ticket, but also the Greyhound website he made the booking on should not have allowed him to book it. I'll have strong words with both tomorrow or Monday morning.
As a result I am at the lovely Overlander. To say this place is in the middle of nowhere is an understatement - it's in the middle of effing nowhere!! The nearest town is about 200k away. All we have here is the petrol station and minimart which shuts in a few hours. That's it. No houses, no pub, no corner shop, no tourist attractions, no nothing. Plus I have to check out at 10am and hang around watching the road-trains rumble past for 10 hours until the next Greyhound bus picks me up. Joy.
Mercifully they have (occasional) internet access, so at least I can fill an hour or two...as long as it keeps working.
In summary, I'm annoyed that I'll get to the coast and the reef a day later than planned. But this is one of the twists and turns that travelling is all about.
I'm getting friendly with the staff who work and live here - one guy spent 6 months straight here without returning to the real world. Wonder what or who he's hiding from??! He gave me a cold Corona though so I like him.
Possibly there might be a bus to Shark Bay I can jump on tomorrow morning. That's about 140k away and has a great beach, so maybe there is a lining to this cloud. I'll let you know.
Quick final word about the accommodation here - BASIC. I'm in one of 4 rooms built into a tin portacabin. It will not be hosting any cat swinging contests if you know what I mean. It's tiny but clean enough and the showers are just metres away in the next door portacabin. Think I'll treat myself in Exmouth and get ensuite.
Friday 25 May 2007
Welcome to Perth, Western Austraila
Country number 2 on my great big trip. I flew in over night via Jo'burg and landed at lunch time today. I've already booked my bus out of town too! It's not that bad here though, I just want to get up to Coral Bay and dive off Ningaloo reef with the whale sharks ASAP. I'll check Perth out a bit more cos I need to get back here to fly to Alice Springs in 2 weeks.
The flight was fine, although South African Airways seats are small and they don't have individual TVs in the seats! Plus I was sat next to an old granddad who spent the 9-hour flight coughing and popping pills & medicine...I worried he might die on me during the night!!
For tonight I have booked into a backpackers - I'm in a 4 bed dorm (2 bunk beds) with 3 other English guys who have been in Perth about 6 weeks. They are out for a birthday tonight and I need to be at the bus station by 08:30 tomorrow, so when they wake me up tonight I'll get them back by waking them up in the morning! I have plenty of time sleep on 19 hour bus journey though. I'm totally roughing it like normal people!! A big change to the 5-star guest houses and top notch restaurants I enjoyed in South Africa.
The flight was fine, although South African Airways seats are small and they don't have individual TVs in the seats! Plus I was sat next to an old granddad who spent the 9-hour flight coughing and popping pills & medicine...I worried he might die on me during the night!!
For tonight I have booked into a backpackers - I'm in a 4 bed dorm (2 bunk beds) with 3 other English guys who have been in Perth about 6 weeks. They are out for a birthday tonight and I need to be at the bus station by 08:30 tomorrow, so when they wake me up tonight I'll get them back by waking them up in the morning! I have plenty of time sleep on 19 hour bus journey though. I'm totally roughing it like normal people!! A big change to the 5-star guest houses and top notch restaurants I enjoyed in South Africa.
Saturday 19 May 2007
Flowers & trees of South Africa
South Africa has inspired me to take photos of flowers even, this travelling lark is changing me!!! Here are some of my favourites:
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| Flowers of South Africa |
SHARK!
I took my underwater camera out for a dive at Sodwana Bay - one of South Africa's and even the world's greatest dive spots. We dropped in for my first dive and I couldn't believe that 2 short-nosed blacktail reef shark were waiting down there for us! Between 1.5m and 2m in length I'd say.
As well as the photos here, on my second dive I saw one very large turtle, a giant moray eel and a couple of potato bass (grouper family), as well as a juvenile Emporer angelfish which was stunning. Check out google images of one:
http://images.google.co.za/images?hl=en&resnum=0&q=juvenile%20emperor%20angelfish&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&um=1&sa=N&tab=wi
I loved my diving and recommend it at Sodwana Bay. Other groups at Sodwana who went to deeper reefs than I did saw whale shark! We stayed at a place called Coral Divers which has individual chalets, it's a training centre for PADI open water, dive masters, instructors etc so is set up very well.
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| Sodwana Bay, South Africa |
As well as the photos here, on my second dive I saw one very large turtle, a giant moray eel and a couple of potato bass (grouper family), as well as a juvenile Emporer angelfish which was stunning. Check out google images of one:
http://images.google.co.za/images?hl=en&resnum=0&q=juvenile%20emperor%20angelfish&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&um=1&sa=N&tab=wi
I loved my diving and recommend it at Sodwana Bay. Other groups at Sodwana who went to deeper reefs than I did saw whale shark! We stayed at a place called Coral Divers which has individual chalets, it's a training centre for PADI open water, dive masters, instructors etc so is set up very well.
Animals I've seen in South Africa
There have been loads, I have photos of a few on them here, but for the full list of land animlas I've seen in Leopard Mountain game reserve and Hluhluwe National Park, see list below:
Impala, nyala, buffalo (BIG 5), warthog, wildebeast, crown eagle, franklins (bird), robin (bird), frogs, gecko, bats, fork-tailed drongo (bird), yellow-billed hornbill, duikers (red & common), vervet monkey, terrapins, spiders (various, including funnel web & huge golden orb spider), kudu, cat (domestic tabby!), waterbuck, scrub hare, nightjar (bird), baboon, scorpion, zebra, fire finch (bird), steenbok, giraffe, elephants (BIG 5), white rhino (BIG 5), and a crane.
My favourites were the elephants & zebra because we got so close and they were so beautiful. And the crown eagle was a rare sight, so huge and impressive. We saw a mother and baby wildebeast who had been separated re-join each other and the young suckling mother. That was a special thing to witness. And cool baboons trekking down a hill in single file towards us and end up in the tree right above us eating their favourite berries.
We spent about 30 mins sitting watching a herd of 30-40 elephants at a watering hole slowoly come towards our land rover until they were in the road right in front of us. They are so big and so peaceful when undisturbed. Got some great photos of a young female in the road very close to us.
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| Animals in South Africa |
Impala, nyala, buffalo (BIG 5), warthog, wildebeast, crown eagle, franklins (bird), robin (bird), frogs, gecko, bats, fork-tailed drongo (bird), yellow-billed hornbill, duikers (red & common), vervet monkey, terrapins, spiders (various, including funnel web & huge golden orb spider), kudu, cat (domestic tabby!), waterbuck, scrub hare, nightjar (bird), baboon, scorpion, zebra, fire finch (bird), steenbok, giraffe, elephants (BIG 5), white rhino (BIG 5), and a crane.
My favourites were the elephants & zebra because we got so close and they were so beautiful. And the crown eagle was a rare sight, so huge and impressive. We saw a mother and baby wildebeast who had been separated re-join each other and the young suckling mother. That was a special thing to witness. And cool baboons trekking down a hill in single file towards us and end up in the tree right above us eating their favourite berries.
We spent about 30 mins sitting watching a herd of 30-40 elephants at a watering hole slowoly come towards our land rover until they were in the road right in front of us. They are so big and so peaceful when undisturbed. Got some great photos of a young female in the road very close to us.
Road Trip: it's all over
After 23 days & nights driving the length of South Africa, we are back in Cape Town.
To complete the list of places we visited, it goes as follows:
Hluhluwe - Sodwana Bay - Kosi Bay (right on the Mozambique border) - Vryheid - Golden Gate National Park - Clarens - Hogsback - Jeffreys Bay (J-Bay to the locals) - Tsitsikama National Park - George - Swellendam (again) - Worcester - Cape Town.
We drove almost 6,000k. What a trip, totally varied people & places - mountains, desert, green rolling hills, seasides, 3rd world, 1st world. South Africa has it all.
To complete the list of places we visited, it goes as follows:
Hluhluwe - Sodwana Bay - Kosi Bay (right on the Mozambique border) - Vryheid - Golden Gate National Park - Clarens - Hogsback - Jeffreys Bay (J-Bay to the locals) - Tsitsikama National Park - George - Swellendam (again) - Worcester - Cape Town.
We drove almost 6,000k. What a trip, totally varied people & places - mountains, desert, green rolling hills, seasides, 3rd world, 1st world. South Africa has it all.
Friday 4 May 2007
Road Trip: Day 8 - the route so far
For those who know the country or have a spare 10 mins at work to kill by looking ast a map, this is the route we have taken in the past 8 days:
Cape Town - Swellendam - Mossell Bay - Wilderness - Knysna - George - Uniondale - Willowmore - Graaff-Reinet - Middelburg - Aliwal North - Barkly East - Rhodes - Elliot - Mthatha - Port St. John - Flagstaff - Kokstad - Underberg - Howick - Nottingham Road - Pietermaritzburg - Durban - Stanger - Hluhluwe.
We are in Hluhluwe (said, "Shush-lewy") right now about to head to Leopard Mountain for our 2 night stay on safari. We arrived yesterday but were a day early - what amateur travellers!! I blame my tour guide Sam. So we spent a lovely night near by at Ghost Mountain Inn, Mkhuse.
Cape Town - Swellendam - Mossell Bay - Wilderness - Knysna - George - Uniondale - Willowmore - Graaff-Reinet - Middelburg - Aliwal North - Barkly East - Rhodes - Elliot - Mthatha - Port St. John - Flagstaff - Kokstad - Underberg - Howick - Nottingham Road - Pietermaritzburg - Durban - Stanger - Hluhluwe.
We are in Hluhluwe (said, "Shush-lewy") right now about to head to Leopard Mountain for our 2 night stay on safari. We arrived yesterday but were a day early - what amateur travellers!! I blame my tour guide Sam. So we spent a lovely night near by at Ghost Mountain Inn, Mkhuse.
Road Trip: Day one - 3 motor offences!!
What a start. We'd only been driving a few hours when Sam got trapped by the cops with a speeding camera. We knew she'd been caught cos all 3 cops waved and smiled as we flew by them! At a place called Swellendam I took over driving and hadn't even been driving 5 minutes when I went through a Stop sign getting back onto the main road. Apparently Stop signs are a big thing over here and the police car that saw me do it sped after with lights flashing - she was very nice though as she wrote out my R500 ticket. To top it all I think I got flashed by a fixed camera just outside Mossell Bay that evening.
So an expensive first day on the road, but lessons have been learnt!!
So an expensive first day on the road, but lessons have been learnt!!
Sorry I've been lame at blog updates
... South Africa isn't as switched on as I thought to internet yet! But I'm online now, but it's a slow connection and no USB port on this old desktop so I can't upload photos yet. On the plus side, it's cheap - R1 per minute, so 14 minutes is 1 quid.
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