Day 2

If you hate sunshine, rainbows and happiness you should probably stop reading now, especially if you hate photos of all three because that is what my day has been so far.  My to do list today included: morning stroll on the beach, breakfast, studying, more beach time, lunch with two other volunteers I met, snorkel time, walk to internet cafe, walk home, watch sunset on beach, go to bed. So far, I've accomplished 7 of 10 and it is barely 6pm. Successful day 2 I think. Tomorrow I head to the research center, and my internet access will most likely be rather limited and it could be a while before I post again. Don't worry, I'll take 3 times as many photos to make up for it.

Morning stroll on the beach

Morning sun, before the rain began

Rainbow #1

Georgina's Cottage, my hotel

Breakfast at Georgina's, overlooking the beach and yes...

...another rainbow

Studying hard on the balcony

Snorkel break

Another beach stroll

Panorama of all Beau Vallon in the morning

Arrived!

After two long but painless flights, I arrived in Seychelles! We flew in right at sunrise, so I got a nice view of the islands - particularly Mahe, the main island and it is just as spectacular as I imagined. The center of the island is full of steep granite covered in dense trees and the island is surrounded by crystal clear turquoise water. 

I'm staying in Beau Vallon on Mahe for the next two days before I head to the research center on Saturday. Below are some pics from my afternoon on the beach, the water is the perfect temperature, whatever that equates to in Celsius and the sand is silky soft. Tough life so far. Tomorrow will be more of the same - relaxing on the beach, playing with my camera in the water, and of course - studying my corals.

Flying in to Victoria

A Kate Poss must  - the feet on beach photo, Indian Ocean

Beach right outside my hotel

Feet photo, with the GoPro

Beau Vallon, Mahe Island

Playing in the water with the GoPro

Wave! (Right before it knocked me over)

Just Leave Already

My final preparations have looked something like this...

Acquire Equipment

• Make 47 trips to Walmart (stop judging, their toiletries are cheap and I'm on a strict budget!)
•  Hemorrhage money at the dive shop
• Wander aimlessly around Target asking myself if I need the small notebook or the medium sized notebook and will they have paper in the Seychelles? Ooooooh, those are cute sunglasses.....
• Buy another bottle of sunscreen and add it to the pile, yet forget to buy shampoo, again. 

Yes, those are 4 bottles of sunscreen on the right.
Not pictures: 8 additional bottles of sunscreen. 

Pack Bags

• Step 1: put like things together in ziploc bags and clearly mark what they are
• Step 2: pack everything inside 2 bags with the 50 lb limit each
• Step 3:  Realize I have extra space and weight, panic that I'm not bringing enough clothes and add too much stuff that I will end up giving away once I get there anyways.

Yes, I am bring extra ziploc bags. I hear everything gets moldy otherwise! 

Spend time with family

• Self explanatory

Note: Not my actual siblings

Note: Not one of my siblings

Note: One of my actual siblings.
He'd be so pissed if he saw this photo, but he doesn't read this blog, so it's cool. 

Golf

• Continue to fulfill a promise I made to my dad 15 years ago to play a game of real golf with him. Turns out, it ain't so bad. 

Yes, I lost. Again. And will continue to lose, because I am a good daughter.

Test New Dive Camera Housing

• Less blurry, more fun! 

Defensive little guy

My mom, dangling her feet in the Comal

Bucky, drinking out of the fish tank. Fisheye view, literally. 

Dinner

• Dine at a restaurant that has a giant Texas flag, heaven forbid I forget where I come from. 

Yes, they only serve fried food. And it was delicious. 

Now all that is left is to pack up my carry on with enough stuff to entertain me for 30 hours (perhaps I should study those corals) and get to the airport on Tuesday and I'll finally be on my way!  

Camera Test

I decided it was probably wise to test out all of my gear before I find myself on an island 10,000 miles away with a camera/fin/mask/snorkel/wetsuit/computer that doesn't work. This is rather important since shipping things there is incredibly expensive and can take weeks (particularly if the cargo ship gets captured by pirates). So I took all my gear and went snorkeling in New Braunfels in the Comal early one morning before all the vacationing kids came out to play. All of my gear worked great, so it was mainly a camera test with my new GoPro Hero 2 that involved me chasing bubbles, fish, crawfish and stalking one turtle.  I am getting special diving case that just came out for the GoPro to make the images and video clearer underwater, so don't judge the fuzziness of these, the ones you'll see from the Seychelles will be much better (I hope).

Packing Highlights: Random Rolls of Film

Highlight of packing so far: coming across two rolls of undeveloped film. Film, you know, those yellow Kodak rolls of actual film that you used load into a camera, take a bunch of photos without knowing exactly how they'd turn out, unload, take to Walgreen's and wait impatiently while they were developed hoping that at least a couple of them came out okay? In college, it was kind of a rule that you always had to get double prints of every roll of film so you could share the good ones with people. I have a feeling that will come back to haunt me one day, but I digress...

I took these 2 rolls of film to Walgreen's tonight and waited rather impatiently while they were developed to see what part of my past they were from. It's been at least 3 years since I have touched my film camera, so there was no telling what was on them. Turns out, some not-so-bad pictures. One roll was from a trip to the beach at Mustang Island in 2006 and the other was from a short film that I worked on in West Texas in 2009. The beach and West Texas are two of my favorite places so it was rather awesome to see these before I depart and to remind myself how much I love photography (and how little I know about it). Lucky for you I'm taking 3 cameras with me to the Seychelles, all digital ones of course, so you won't have to wait 3 to 6 years to see how my pictures turn out. Here are my favorites...

Mustang Island, TX, 2006

West Texas: Near Terlingua & Alpine, 2009

Preparations, Part Deux

As a dear friend said to her husband on their wedding day, "shit just got real."  No, I'm not getting married, but shit just got real. No more pretending like eating P. Terry's again and going to another 80s dance night counts as actual preparation for this trip. It's study time. (Reminder: I am actually going over there to learn something new, not just read on the beach and play in the waves, though I do hope for some of that too.)

I received my assignment for my area of focus on during my time in the Seychelles - I will be focusing on corals. Before I arrive on base on Saturday June 30, I have to memorize 50 different coral types, their characteristics and perhaps the most daunting - their Latin names. Apparently "that really cool purple one" or "that one that looks like a brain on crack" doesn't work for their identification and research purposes. Darn.

Now, my preparations looks something like this:

Yes, those are flash cards, something I probably haven't made since Mrs. Mackner's 5th grade geography class. Nor have I had to actually learn anything science related since 10th grade biology. At least in biology class we could get the wonderful and amazing Mrs. Peeler off topic enough to avoid a quiz for another day. Unfortunately, I don't have a kind teacher quizzing me, so it is up to me to actually make myself sit down and study a little each day so I don't end up trying to memorize everything on my 30 hour trip there. Okay, truthfully I will probably still end up cramming on my flights, which sounds a lot like an all-nighter. Ugh. At least I'll have some really nice flash cards to use. 

Preparations

My weekend preparations to leave the country in 3 weeks look something like this:

1. Eat P. Terry's and Taco Deli, again. Because it is possibly the 3rd to last time this week I might have the veggie burger combo or a potato, egg and cheese breakfast taco with the verde salsa for 6 months.

2. Listen to this song, on repeat

 

3. Drink another one of my roommate's Fireman's 4. So what if it is 3 o'clock in the afternoon? Same argument as #1, it could be 6 months before I have another one. 

4. Nap from 4pm-6pm (which has nothing to do with #3). 

5. Breath a sigh of relief each time I get rid of more stuff. I swear my clothes and old electronics have been populating like rabbits in my closet and under my bed for the past few years. I'm pretty much on a first name basis with the fellows at Goodwill.

6. Make random trips to REI and spend hours on Amazon.com searching for the perfect/cheapest random pieces of equipment I still need - mosquito net, large dive slate, dorky but totally practical UV protective clothing, lots of pencils, etc. 

7. Work on my budget/equipment/nerd spreadsheet for my trip. What? Spreadsheets make everything better. 

8. Catching up on some much needed sleep while adjusting to waking with the sun in the AM and attempting to kick my caffeine habit. Unfortunately, I wake with the sun and then immediately fall back asleep for 2 hours, then stumble to the closest coffee pot and drink 2 cups before I remember I am trying to give the stuff up. Will keep working on that one. 

9.  Have fun, spend time with my awesome friends & family, laugh so hard my cheeks hurt, do lots of activities and enjoy all that Austin has to offer to remind myself how much I love this awesome town. 

Recent activities include: 

• Running along the Shoal Creek trail, stopping to admire the pretty flowers

• Finalizing the adoption of my two cats by a lovely woman 30 minutes away who will take great care of them AND let me visit them when I am back in town

• Crawfishin' with my family in NB

The biggest ones are mine, obviously

• Multiple movies at the Alamo Drafthouse (no picture available, they threatened to take my ass out when I whipped out my phone)

• 80s night dance party at the Highball, in full 80s gear. Injuries below from sliding across the dance floor/stage, again. Note to self: leg warmers protect my knees, but not the tops of my feet

• Day trip to Hamilton Pool with two of my favorite ladies

 

• Last but not least, listen nonstop to 103.1 Jammin' FM - "Austin's Old Skool." What other radio station plays hits from C&C Music Factory, Prince, Michael Jackson, TLC, Warren G, Boyz II Men and many other from my youth? None. 

Departure countdown: 21 days!