Sixth Day full of History and Excitement

Sunday, June 15, 2008

What a day! It started for me at 6:00 am waking up to the sun. It was going to be another beautiful day for diving. We had our regular breakfast at our regular place. Our pick up was a bit earlier as we had lots planned for the day so we didn’t stay as long at the restaurant as we have done each previous day. We went back to our rooms for a short bit and got our stuff together. I made sure to pack my sneakers as we weren’t sure if we would need them or not. The driver picked us up at 7:45 am and once we got to Sam’s, we found our boat and geared up. Our plan was to drive out about 1.5 hours to Peleliu, an island of about 500 locals. It is also the island that the Battle of Peleliu was fought between the US and Japan in 1944. Our first dive was Peleliu Wall then to have lunch on the dock at Peleliu. After lunch, we were going to dive the other side of the wall then do a land tour of Peleliu.

We had a nice long choppy but fun ride out to Peleliu and I sat and chatted with Kelly about some of her journeys living in South America for almost two years and then traveling to Fiji, Honolulu, Yap and now Palau. She has done over 500 dives, hiked the Appalachian trails and just been through and seen so much in her two years as a “professional relaxer”. It was a good chat and I am going to get information about her blog that she has been keeping up with. We were also accompanied by a couple that had actually been working in Palau at Sam’s Tours for the past two years that were on their last day of diving. They just wanted to take it all in and I think Peleliu Wall was their favorite so they came with us.

So after our bumpy ride, we got t our dive spot and man was it choppy out. We were instructed by Jason to get in the water and head for the wall. Once we all grouped we would drift along the wall. If the currents changed, we would just turn around and drift the other way. The wall was incredible! There were tons of HUGE anemones with clownfish, enormous Sea Fans, Moray Eels, lots of Anthias, a couple sharks and huge Linkia Starfish. Each dive just keeps getting better! We drifted for about 45 minutes when I started feeling that urge. Being in the water with the currents and every now and then a slight cool current sweep in, it is not easy to not concentrate on that urge. Thankfully it was towards our dive and we stayed at our safety stop until the boat came to pick us up. You may ask why not just go in the water, well its because I was in a full wetsuit and there is a fine layer where the water gets trapped between the suit and your body to help keep you warm. Lets just say I didn’t want to get any warmer J. I hurried once on the boat to doff my gear, take off my wetsuit and then jump back in the water. Being that the current was strong I had to stay close to the boat and hang on the line, it is a very different experience relieving yourself right there in front of a boat load of people, but we all do it one time or another.

We made our way a very short distance to the dock of Peleliu Island and had lunch. I watched as a group of locals came around and seemed to have a session of some sort. There were children of all ages grouped together and being taught some thing. It was neat to see. We finished our lunch and then just relaxed while we did our surface interval for about an hour and a half before getting back on board for our second dive. This time we were starting at the other end of the wall. Jason called it the express way because the current just sweeps you along, and he was right. It was a fun lazy drift along, up and over the wall. We were only timed to dive for 45 minutes then did our safety stop over a sandy patch where I saw a few Hippo Tangs, or to you movie buffs, Dori from Finding Nemo. This time I didn’t have that urge and we got on the boat and headed back to Peleliu dock. We waited for about 10 minutes for our guide to arrive to give us the land tour of Peleliu Island.

The Battle of Peleliu, fought between US and Japan in 1944, when considering the number of men who fought, had the highest casualty rate of any Pacific side battle. Our first stop was the Monument dedicated to those men who died on the island. Approximately 1300 men died between September and November of ’44. We stopped to see the Landing Strip of the airfield, Bloody Nose Ridge, the Japanese Memorial and a few tanks and planes that were disabled on the island. We also sat many foxholes and housing structures. There was also a museum set up on the island that had lots of artifacts but we were not allowed to photograph so I unfortunately do not have pictures to share. I am not a history buff so I didn’t not absorb a lot but Andy and Joe seemed to really appreciate the tour being former Marines.

About 20 minutes on our way back, we spotted Dolphins! The boat captain looped around and we rode up along with the Dolphins and watched them swim along side the boat. I was up at the bow and there were just so many of them surfacing. They were Spinners but we didn’t see any jump out and spin, that would have been awesome but just seeing them up so close and watching them all was incredible! I got some video footage so enjoy.