Two Fish Divers Bunaken Manado

... is scratched and sweaty) we managed to reach the waterfall. Showering below it has never felt so rewarding.

Tomorrow we are off to the Togean Islands. A little secluded piece of land rising out of the Gulf of Tomini, a few kilometers south of the equator with white sand beaches, little beach resorts and great snorkelling. Or so we heard. Let's see if we will really find this piece of paradise. The 13 hour boat ride better be worth it...

... the bottom composition of most of this area is dark black and gray volcanic sand. It's really pretty barren if you just looked at it and didn't take a closer look. But get closer and things start popping out at you. There's bizarre life all over the place, and it seems like just about every critter makes its way through life mimicking something else. It's also home to some of the ...

... that. They were all really cute and so happy to see us. We were thinking that Angelina Jolie might want to adopt one of them. Further down the road, we made a quick stop at a tree none of us would recognize. At least, not until you smell the bark. It was a cinnamon tree, and the smell was incredible! Next stop, Pottery Barn. Ooops, we mean, village. The whole village was ...

So it's time to make you all jealous & shoot over the last month or so... there's been holidays galore as a result of the post-Ramadan break, alternatively known as Eid-Al Fitry, Lebaran or "Let's shut down the country for an extra 2 weeks!". It was an interesting experience being in Indonesia for Ramadan and I tried to fast with my students & colleagues between sunrise & sunset everyday. I couldn't quite do the no-water trick for 13 hours ...

... you have the island then a shallow coral area and then a several hundred meter drop offs. The dives consisted of diving down to 20+ meters, moving a long the wall, either under your own steam or drifting with the current and gradually working your way up to the shallow reef. I got in a days dive before having to take two days off due to my hands swelling up and me been unable to close them. I don't know whether ...

... running aroun Manado trying to get a cheap flight to KL before next month, payed way too much, but just needed to be done. But I feel like one last excursion before leaving the wonderful Island of Sulawesi, so off to Tomohon w/ Sidharta and his friend Rodjo. Feeling good about my last few days and am getting excited about heading back to the U.S. for some political and economical termoil.

... suffered accordingly. Things are more expensive there and there are more jobs, but the island has been carved into nasty subdivisions and there are pits that look like open wounds everywhere. What a contrast to Singapore. We got to the airport only to find that the ticket we had reserved on Lion Air to Manado had expired....I guess we hadn't actually bought it and had to pay in advance at the airport or ...

... The diving certainly lived up to its reputation, although Raf claimed that it wasn't that great, comparatively. I think he was referring to the visibility, that, at times, dropped to as low as 10-15 meters where you would normally expect 20-30 meters. It was fantastic. The diversity of coral and fish was mind-boggling, even compared with other prime dive spots we've been to in the Philippines and Malaysia. Most dive sites were wall diving ...

... what to expect but the diving turned out to be awesome - on a par with the best we've done so far. There is that much marine life that almost every dive is like putting your head into an aquarium, coupled with regular sightings of turtles, sharks and barracuda, with enough variety between dive sites that it doesn't ever get boring. We stayed at Two Fish Divers (www.twofishdivers.com) and hoped to meet other travellers to work out where we should go in Indonesia - one recurring ...

... offered, this was really nice. It had a nice cement floor, 1 mosquito net, 1 bare hanging light bulb, peeling paint on the walls, 1 wc that didnt flush, 1 dripping tap and 1 handheld bucket to get water from the tap to flush the toilet. I knew by now that you can't hope for more in this parts. The good news is that the electricity is on 24 hours. We saw the notice on the wall: 'Please spray insect repellent ...