Fish and things

I think I was pretty nervous the whole time I was snorkeling,trying hard not to think of sharks,  but it was still lots of fun.  I was in so long I managed to get sunburned on the back of my knees. Mixing this with a sandy bed is a bit painful!

We saw lots of fish - probably not like on an outer reef- but cool nonetheless. Parrot fish, butterfly fish, blue fish, orange fish, purple fish, a flute nosed fish poking his nose into the coral, stingrays doing their creepy crawly job over the bottom, a few green turtles eating, sea cucumbers, a red and white patterned eel and some big fish yawning.  It was amazing.  I can't believe how many diffent fish are out there .

Cooper had a good time playing in the sand, and after a brief snorkel Oskar joined him digging a big fort.  The tide was coming in and it wan't long before their big sandcastle was back to flat beach.  So they moved up the beach and went to digging deep holes instead.

Cooper grew braver as the morning went on and once, while I was talking to a couple from Cornwall, I looked over to see him happily walking through the waist deep clear water, cooling down I guess.  I quickly got down there, however, because the sea bed starts off nice and shallow, but drops away pretty quickly!

This couple have been here four times, and the first time the coral was beautiful and colorful.  but since then there have been a few cyclones which have destroyed a lot of the coral.  They thought it was starting to grow back on this visit though.  Although a lot of it was brown, we saw some big blue corals and yellow and green.

There are beaches all up the coast here, but the one we went to, called Turqoise Bay, was a reef bordered lagoon and pretty calm for us to swim in.  The waves broke out over the reef, which also hopefully kept nasty sharks on the other side too.  On the other side of the reef the ocean bed drops away down to the continental shelf.(?). It's supposed to be pretty deep out there, so I was happy where I was.  I find the sea very scary.

A wind picked up after a bit and the water was a bit choppier.  I wouldn't like to snorkel if the water was really rough, your snorkel would fill up all the time.

Everyone enjoyed the snorkeling, although it got a bit cold for Joseph and Oskar.  Dominic really enjoyed seeing the cone shells sitting up on their rocks, waiting to shoot you with their poison darts.  Not sure about that one, but he assures me it's true.

We stopped at the visitor centre on the way home and learnt all about whale sharks that visit the area every year, massive blue spotty fish with gynormous mouths that live on plankton.  People come to swim with them every year.   They grow huge.

There is very little known about whale sharks, except they can dive down to 1500m.  They have young that hatch inside the mother's body, but we don't really see whale pups under about 2 or 3m long.  No one knows where their breeding grounds and nursery are, so they are having trouble rescuing them...Might be an interesting field for someone to study.

We watched a great video about life under the sea in the area.  A group of jelly fish can be called a smack....probably the sound they make when dropped from a great height.  The turtles like to eat the lion's mane jellyfish, who's tentacles can stretch out 30 meters in the sea.  That doesn't seem to bother the turtles, though, who chomp into the jellyfish, tentacles and all.  The jelly fish just kept swimming while it was being eaten bit by bit...  they look very much like a plastic bag floating in the water, and many turtles die from mistakenly eating plastic bags.

Grant particularly liked the manta ray. (he was asleep for the rest of the video). Their name comes from the spanish word for blanket, and they  look like a huge black and white sting ray. They have no sting, and a huge mouth like the whale shark.  They live on plankton, unlike a stingray which sifts through the sand on the bottom of the ocean.  Manta rays are supposed to have a relatively large brain mass and are thought to be quite intelligent. We pictured all the animals of the sea coming to the manta ray for advice.  The lady running the caravan park once jumped in the water with a whole pile of manta rays who were frolicking, as they do at certain times of year, and got the biggest fright when one swam right up to her at speed, then swerved up, just touching her chest lightly.  It might have confused her for some plankton.

Apparently they used to use Exmouth as a centre of operations for whaling, until the population of humpbacks dropped to three percent and they became protected.  Now it's a national park.  Funny how things change.

After our educational hour at the visitor centre, we headed back for lunch and school work.  We passed the emu family that seems to come to the entrance to the caravan park every day, to drink from the water tanks set up there.  There are seven teenagers.

The caravan park we're staying at is not a four star park. Not even rated.    The signs are faded and some of the maintenance is a bit relaxed.  Not that I'm complaining, it just explains my fear in the shower the other day.  I was in a small cubicle,  with peeling paint, rusty hooks and support beams, and slightly yellowed tiles.  I'd spent some time adjusting the water, first too hot, then too cold, then too hot, etc etc.  I'd finally gotten in when suddenly, the water pressure went up, as it does in caravan parks,  and water started squirting everywhere, out the top of the shower rose, all over the walls.  I was a bit worried the whole fitting would fire from the wall and hit me in the head, so I quickly turned all the taps  down, and began my whole adjusting routine again.  Then the water pressure went down....

It's still a lovely place to stay and we're having a great time.  Grant finally put up the big tent yesterday, the one we've been carrying on the top of our car the whole way and haven't got down once.  Well, he pulled everything off the roof rack as we're staying for a week, and now our campsite includes the big tent, the big white table, the camp kitchen...it feels very crowded.  We're talking about shipping some stuff back.  You certainly get used to living with less.

So the children have decided to sleep in the big tent tonight instead of the caravan, and have carried their blankets and pillows out there.  With the wind that's picked up,though, it's getting a bit cooler, so we'll see how we go.  Joseph is making very clear rules about who can sleep where in the tent.  He likes his own space.

I haven't mentioned this one before...and now I think we are far enough away for no connections to be made...We were swimming in a waterhole when Cooper suddenly announced that he needed the loo.  There weren't many options, short of walking a long way to the drop toilet, and around the water hole were cliffs of rock with people sitting everywhere.  The water was running in and out, and one little three year old's pee couldn't make that much of a difference, so I told him just to go in the water. A look of concentration later and he was happy.

After we'd all cooled off and got out and dried ourselves, Joseph announced to me "I pee'd in there." 
I didn't have time to answer before Oskar piped up with "me too!" 
Then Dominic reported "me too!" and Nadine quietly "me too.". 
I was just about to tell them about Cooper, when Grant cleared his throat.  "yes Grant?"
"I did too.".
Well, that was almost a full house.  
I didn't.  Just so you know!

A little later Joseph read out of the animal records book about some south american worm that enters your body if you pee in the water.  Someone also told me that you're more likely to be attacked by a shark if you regularly use your wetsuit as a loo.  It certainly prevented Grant from relaxing in Turqoise bay today.

Just before sunset today, Cooper and I headed off to Trisel beach where we were told the female turtles come to rest during the mating season, which is now.

As we walked up the beach we passed about twenty turtles, just at the edge of the water, resting on the sand while the waves washed over them.  From a distance they looked  like rocks.  I think the males might have discovered their secret hideaway, however, because there were a few "pairs".  One turtle would swim up to the other, go to great effort to climb up on her shell,not an easy job because their shells are so high and sitting out of the water, then hold on with his flippers for dear life.  Because it was so shallow and the waves were washing over them, a few became top heavy and toppled over, but that male turtle just didn't let go, and there were flippers flapping and water splashing until they were righted again.  Good thing turtles can hold their breath for such a long time!  I'm amazed turtles manage to have any young at all.

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Vicki