havecarryonwilltravel

Peppermint Shrimp, Hermit Crabs and 3 Decorator Crabs

Our photos of Saba, both underwater and above the water are now posted!

Coral Banded Shrimp

To view photos, hover over “Photos”, in the main menu bar, until the drop down menu appears. Click on “Saba 2016” in the drop down menu. Wait until the photos load. Click on the first photo and a “slide show” view will appear. Scroll through the photos using the arrow on the right. Click on the “x” in the upper right hand corner to exit out of the slide show.

Enjoy!

Our last day on Saba is a non dive day. Feels weird not to dive. We hike up to one to the hills for a view of Windwardside. The hike is up steep mossy steps in the forest, the view is wonderful.

We laze by the pool, nap, go “downtown” to settle our dive bill and do our shopping. Easy day.

As we sit outside the bakery eating lunch, I notice that almost every vehicle that passes by has scrapes on the side or corner of the vehicle. The roads here are so narrow and are bordered by stone or concrete walls, that it is easy to accidentally rub against them. Murray and I decide that if we were to drive here, we would choose the tiniest car available!

Saba is a very unique island. Living in a “mountain” setting but going down to the ocean every day to dive. We both have enjoyed our stay here and will one day return. Good bye Saba, until next time!

Another last day blog. It doesn’t matter how many time I travel, the last day is always a sad one. It seems as if we have been here always, the routine is easy, get up eat, dive, dive, back to base, shower and eat, do the blog, rest, eat, chat and sleep. How can this be bad??? Some might not like the simplicity but I can live with it. Tomorrow is a hike day, we will replace ‘hike’ for ‘dive’ on the routine, and see what that brings.

Regardless if the hike turns out, it is sad to finish diving. Our last two dives are just what we require. The first dive is one of the signiture dives on Saba, Diamond Rock. It is a deeper dive. Most of it is 85 ft. There are two coral pillars quite large in diameter with a ton of wildlife. Dive two is a repeat for Debbie and I, Tent Wall. I really like this dive too. The wall is interesting at any depth and off the end of the boat mooring there are several coral heads that house an abunance of things to look at. A prefect way to finish diving.

The climate here is such that we need tomorrow to dry our gear, so even though normally we would dive to the last day, because wet gear weighs a ton and we are slightly overweight as it is.

I really like the diving here. I learned to find a couple of new fish. Slender Filefish, he hides in very wavy golden colored coral. If you see him don’t take your eyes off him, just stare and wave at your buddy, if you blink he will disappear into the coral and you will not see it again. The other thing I find often is Fireworms. Have found them before but they are in abundence here. There is no too much unusual here but the diving is really consistant. On every dive site the reef is in good shape, there is lots of fishies, and tons of color. Two of the dives we had horrendous current but the others were peaceful, easy adventures.

We will be back underwater soon and we know the dates, so it is not overly depressing but as I said above, it is still sad to say good bye to our sea friends.

Interesting place this Saba. There is basically one road. From the north-east end of the island up to the top and down to the south-west side of the island.

There are a few branches of the main trunk but roads there are few and the roads are all very steep. The flattest is about 300 M across the saddle between two peaks in the village of Windwardside. The views from most places is stunning when you are not surrounded by clouds and moisture.

The days around here are quite calm. There is the occasional cooing of a dove or two and maybe a dog barking but both are rare. There are not too many cars but because there is only one road there is minor conjestion but that only means you may see three cars go by in a bunch. After darkness falls though is a different story. The sun goes behind the mountain and the tree frogs start to crock and creak and whistle. The noise constant and really quite loud. The symphony will continue all night. I suppose if you let it bother you it will but if you just let the random sounds become background, the white noise of it all is very soothing. This calm will soon be broken at dawn when the roosters start to tell you it is time to get up. Cock-a-doole-do is not a gentle way to be awoken but hell it’s daylight so you might a well get out of bed especially since the rooster will eventurally win the battle.

The folks here are all very friendly. Almost simple in that respect. They have absolutely no barriers that might inhibit a stop in the middle of the street conversation. We know absolutely no one yet anyone yet everyone we meet wants to know how are day is going, where we are from, how the diving is and what we think of the island.

Today is delivery day. There is a big ship moored at the dock and there is major hub bub off loading semi loads of goods and distributing them all over the island. Everyone waits in anticipation to see if what they have ordered from the mainland has arrive. It might be a new TV, a computer, something as utilitarian as a fridge, or it might be new car. If it is not on this boat, oh well, after all we are on island time. Maybe it will show up on next weeks boat.

Today after diving we are doing the shopping tour.  Beside the two grocery stores, a couple of dive shops, a hardware store, there are 5 tourist type shops. They sell Saba t shirt, shorts, souveniers of all kinds, a small bit of fancy clothing, and some high end jewellery. Even though one of the stores is up a steep (22+%) side street it takes of all of 1 hour to complete our entire tour.

Yards are not the quite the same as they are in our home town. They are more ‘natural’. The ‘grass’ is a cover of green plant material not the ubquitous carpet of fine bladed green material as it would be in the northern climes. On our way up to the jewellery store we walked by a fellow cutting his lawn, Saba style.

If you want to ‘get away from it all’ Saba is a place to do it. There is not much to do here, you can dive and you can hike but for the most part you ‘chill’. There are not hoards of tourist types and the whole place is laid back. You can come to Saba rest up and go home without any of the built up tension you arrived with.

Trunkfish are one of our favourite fishes. They are triangular in cross section, spotted and have big eyes and cute lips. They search for food by blowing on the sand and then gobble up lunch. This is what an adult looks like…..

We are always in search of juveniles. They juvenile trunkfish is very special as it looks like a dice. They are hard to find because they are so tiny and they flit around under neath corals, never staying still long enough to be spotted.

Today, K makes the big find and spots one on our second dive. He is gorgeous! I take six photos hoping that one comes out clear and recognizable. If you look closely you can see his eye and his nose.

Isn’t he cute! What a find!