Sunday, October 5, 2008
New Video Uploaded
A new video of our recent corals collection in our Jakarta's holding facility has been uploaded. As usual, it's located at the bottom of this blog right above the previous video. Enjoy, guys!
Saturday, October 4, 2008
Nha Trang - Vietnam Part 3!
Hello everyone. So let's finish off the "day in Nha Trang Bay".
A fellow tour boat parked in the same area as us.
We got back to our boat from looking at the reefs. Some of the other tourists were in the water swimming.
Nearby was this rest stop.
A floating rest area. Note the water slide on the left of the picture.
Some of other floating platforms were makeshift houses. People live on these things fishing for a living.
And finally lunch was served. The bench chairs were straightened out to form a table.
And here is the congee made with the urchin eggs. This little bowl cost $3, quite expensive considering the whole tour only cost $6 -$10. Good thing the other foods were free though.
And here is a close up of the urchin eggs. I must say, it tasted pretty good!
Some entertainment after lunch. Kind of old equipment but the guys were good!
It turned out that the crew knew how to play old folklore songs from every country! Our tour guide started out by singing an old Vietnamese song.
Next up was an Australian! They tried to get me to sing a Korean song but I told them I didn't know the lyrics:) Surprisingly I was the only Korean on board. We had tourists from all over the world - France, Holland, Germany, Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan, American Vietnamese, Australia, and even a Kiwi (New Zealand).
After our entertainment, everybody went swimming. Note the tour guide serving wine in the water!
Then we were off again. Me and Anne, enjoying a nice breeze!
A close up of that amusement park Vinpearl Island.
Another shot to the left of the picture above. Note the ferry on the left.
More construction being done on another part of the island. Definitely someone has some serious money to play with!
And here is our final destination, a kick back lounge area where you can swim in the bay or just relax on a beach chair.
A floating platform to play around.
Check out these dragon fruits growing over the ledge on this hillside of the island. I bet you didn't know that dragon fruits are a cactus fruit!
After about an hour of resting, it was time to go home. Fresh fruits were served on our way back to the mainland.
A local fishermen on its way out to do night fishing.
The same little van that picked us up took us back to our "2 star" hotel!
After cleaning up, we hit this local restaurant for dinner. I tried to take a picture of the crew but they were kind of shy.
After dinner, we took a walk along the main beach street. A carnival was going on!
We stopped at this table for a little gambling.
And here is Anne, trying her luck at "Nha Trang roulette"!
Conclusion
Ok guys that is it for today. The whole tour for $6-$10 is totally worth its money. A great way to meet people and have fun on the bay. I will do one more post about Nha Trang and then it's back to "Coral Adventures"!
Cheers,
Eddie
A fellow tour boat parked in the same area as us.
We got back to our boat from looking at the reefs. Some of the other tourists were in the water swimming.
Nearby was this rest stop.
A floating rest area. Note the water slide on the left of the picture.
Some of other floating platforms were makeshift houses. People live on these things fishing for a living.
And finally lunch was served. The bench chairs were straightened out to form a table.
And here is the congee made with the urchin eggs. This little bowl cost $3, quite expensive considering the whole tour only cost $6 -$10. Good thing the other foods were free though.
And here is a close up of the urchin eggs. I must say, it tasted pretty good!
Some entertainment after lunch. Kind of old equipment but the guys were good!
It turned out that the crew knew how to play old folklore songs from every country! Our tour guide started out by singing an old Vietnamese song.
Next up was an Australian! They tried to get me to sing a Korean song but I told them I didn't know the lyrics:) Surprisingly I was the only Korean on board. We had tourists from all over the world - France, Holland, Germany, Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan, American Vietnamese, Australia, and even a Kiwi (New Zealand).
After our entertainment, everybody went swimming. Note the tour guide serving wine in the water!
Then we were off again. Me and Anne, enjoying a nice breeze!
A close up of that amusement park Vinpearl Island.
Another shot to the left of the picture above. Note the ferry on the left.
More construction being done on another part of the island. Definitely someone has some serious money to play with! 
And here is our final destination, a kick back lounge area where you can swim in the bay or just relax on a beach chair.
A floating platform to play around.
Check out these dragon fruits growing over the ledge on this hillside of the island. I bet you didn't know that dragon fruits are a cactus fruit!
After about an hour of resting, it was time to go home. Fresh fruits were served on our way back to the mainland.
A local fishermen on its way out to do night fishing.
The same little van that picked us up took us back to our "2 star" hotel!
After cleaning up, we hit this local restaurant for dinner. I tried to take a picture of the crew but they were kind of shy.
After dinner, we took a walk along the main beach street. A carnival was going on!
We stopped at this table for a little gambling.
And here is Anne, trying her luck at "Nha Trang roulette"!Conclusion
Ok guys that is it for today. The whole tour for $6-$10 is totally worth its money. A great way to meet people and have fun on the bay. I will do one more post about Nha Trang and then it's back to "Coral Adventures"!
Cheers,
Eddie
Friday, September 26, 2008
Nha Trang - Vietnam Part 2!
Hi everyone. So let's continue on our tour of Nha Trang Bay!
I took this shot from the upper level of the aquarium. The clowntrigger looks pretty cool!
Another shot from the upper level. I saw what appeared to be a school of fish in the enclosure to the right of the boat.
I walked down checked out the action. A school of giant batfish!
Another view of the aquarium as we were heading out.
While our crazy tour guide was babbling on, I decided to check out what was happening in the back of the boat.
The crew were preparing lunch.
There was a group of guys sitting on the floor splitting open sea urchins!
I didn't know you can eat these long spiny things!
Actually they were taking out the eggs, just like those expensive silly things at Japanese restaurants!
I've had fresh sea urchin eggs from freshly cracked open ones back in the Tonga days. The divers loved these and would bring on board huge specimens (short spined ones). We would scrape off the eggs from the inner sides of the urchin with boiled casava roots! My divers loved it but it was hard to swallow for me. Perhaps if I had some of that hot green stuff or soy sauce, it would have tasted better. But these bits of eggs from the long spined guys here would be made into "urchin egg congee"!
A basket of sea food for the stir fry!
Here is Anne and her brother Kye. Kye is the youngest of the siblings. Check out the shirt he is wearing, one of my old Bali ones that got too small for me.
Our next stop would be a reef area where a glass bottom boat was waiting for us. As we were closing in on the reef, I noticed a familiar structure on the water.
Wow, looks just like the floating platforms in Northern Bali! Remember those days when I used to walk on the small wooden walkways picking out aquacultures without trying not to fall in the water?
For sure any one of these floating platforms can easily be converted to an aquaculture station. The water conditions looked similar to Northern Bali too. But these floating platforms here were used to hold live fish and other seafood creatures!
So we anchored in a deep none reef area. While some of the tourists went swimming, we went on this glass bottom boat to check out the reefs! This wasn't part of the tour and it cost an extra $3 per person.
So here is what it looks like. The idea is great but someone needs to keep the viewing glass clean! It looked like a reef tank that wasn't cleaned in a week!
Some German friends were nice enough to take our group picture.
As we were heading out, this little "house boat" cruised by. Reminded me of my Tonga days. The local boats were similar to this design. I used to lay down on top of the house when I got sea sick!
We chugged along the shore and got into some shallow water. Unfortunately, I was very disappointed that this part of the reef was not good looking at all. I've been in this bay before and saw some really nice corals and reef structure but not in this spot. I couldn't really see under the glass bottom so I took some pictures from the side.
A huge patch of soft corals. These were growing literally within yards from the shore.
An acropora and some fungias.
Some porites, acroporas, and look to be echinoporas or turbinarias in the center.
You can see where the shore drops off in this picture.
Assorted soft corals.
As were heading back to our main boat, this guy came cruising along. For about a dollar, you can hop on this glass bottom boat instead!
Conclusion
Ok guys that is it for today. I have returned to Jakarta from coral hunting and have some exciting pictures to share after my "Vietnam Adventures" series.
Cheers,
Eddie
I took this shot from the upper level of the aquarium. The clowntrigger looks pretty cool!
Another shot from the upper level. I saw what appeared to be a school of fish in the enclosure to the right of the boat.
I walked down checked out the action. A school of giant batfish!
Another view of the aquarium as we were heading out.
While our crazy tour guide was babbling on, I decided to check out what was happening in the back of the boat.
The crew were preparing lunch.
There was a group of guys sitting on the floor splitting open sea urchins!
I didn't know you can eat these long spiny things!
Actually they were taking out the eggs, just like those expensive silly things at Japanese restaurants!
I've had fresh sea urchin eggs from freshly cracked open ones back in the Tonga days. The divers loved these and would bring on board huge specimens (short spined ones). We would scrape off the eggs from the inner sides of the urchin with boiled casava roots! My divers loved it but it was hard to swallow for me. Perhaps if I had some of that hot green stuff or soy sauce, it would have tasted better. But these bits of eggs from the long spined guys here would be made into "urchin egg congee"!
A basket of sea food for the stir fry!
Here is Anne and her brother Kye. Kye is the youngest of the siblings. Check out the shirt he is wearing, one of my old Bali ones that got too small for me.
Our next stop would be a reef area where a glass bottom boat was waiting for us. As we were closing in on the reef, I noticed a familiar structure on the water.
Wow, looks just like the floating platforms in Northern Bali! Remember those days when I used to walk on the small wooden walkways picking out aquacultures without trying not to fall in the water?
For sure any one of these floating platforms can easily be converted to an aquaculture station. The water conditions looked similar to Northern Bali too. But these floating platforms here were used to hold live fish and other seafood creatures!
So we anchored in a deep none reef area. While some of the tourists went swimming, we went on this glass bottom boat to check out the reefs! This wasn't part of the tour and it cost an extra $3 per person.
So here is what it looks like. The idea is great but someone needs to keep the viewing glass clean! It looked like a reef tank that wasn't cleaned in a week!
Some German friends were nice enough to take our group picture.
As we were heading out, this little "house boat" cruised by. Reminded me of my Tonga days. The local boats were similar to this design. I used to lay down on top of the house when I got sea sick!
We chugged along the shore and got into some shallow water. Unfortunately, I was very disappointed that this part of the reef was not good looking at all. I've been in this bay before and saw some really nice corals and reef structure but not in this spot. I couldn't really see under the glass bottom so I took some pictures from the side.
A huge patch of soft corals. These were growing literally within yards from the shore.
An acropora and some fungias.
Some porites, acroporas, and look to be echinoporas or turbinarias in the center.
You can see where the shore drops off in this picture.
Assorted soft corals.
As were heading back to our main boat, this guy came cruising along. For about a dollar, you can hop on this glass bottom boat instead!Conclusion
Ok guys that is it for today. I have returned to Jakarta from coral hunting and have some exciting pictures to share after my "Vietnam Adventures" series.
Cheers,
Eddie
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