Tisa's

Tisa's is always a good place to spend an afternoon - delicious pina coladas, a beautiful beach, and great snorkeling - at least on those rare occasions when the ava isn't trying to pull you out to sea. It wasn't a great day for snorkeling since the ava was pretty strong, but we hung out in the ava for a little bit and were able to see some beautiful fish while we were out there.

a rainy day at the beach

We went to $2 beach on one of the rainiest days we've had in weeks. When Clif handed the lady the money to use the beach, she looked up at the sky, looked at us, and shook her head. I'm sure she was thinking we were crazy palagis.

But it had been raining since Ruth got here and we figured we'd be wet anyway. We just needed to find a beach with fales to keep the towels dry. So we went to $2. It's a nice little beach on the East side of the island, just past Alega (Tisa's). There's a great little snorkel spot to the right of the little island that always has needlefish somewhere nearby. When I first headed out, I was surrounded by a circle of them that moved as I moved. I love how they stay close by, but are always just out of reach - there's nothing else like it. We also saw a bunch of cornetfish, which was especially fun since some of them were huge!

As an added bonus, we were able to get some pictures of Clif's favorite type of dog on the island. There are tons of dogs here, most are mangy and malnourished. It's pretty appalling. There are really just a few different patterns on the dogs here, and most tend to be similar in size and shape (small gene pool on a small island, go figure). There's a lot more I could say about the dog situation here, but I'll leave it at that for now -actually, I won't. I'll leave it to the Court to explain. Go to asbar.org, click legal resources, and search for Savage v. ASG, 1 ASR2d 102. It paints a pretty accurate picture of the dog problem here.

Anyway, Clif's favorite look on these island dogs, and probably my favorite too, are these that are white with brindled spots - pretty cool, huh?

Sailele

We hadn't been to Sailele in a while (previously blogged about in this post) so we decided to spend our Saturday there. It's a quiet village on the Northeast side of the island. When we go there, I can easily imagine what life would be like in a Samoan village a hundred years ago.

As we drove through, some of the villagers were sitting along the edge of the road pulling weeds and others were raking up leaves and other debris to burn. It's just a very idyllic setting. One of the older women was sitting in the water with some young kids. When we walked by the littlest started yelling, "palagi, palagi" and pointing at us while she tried (unsuccessfully) to get him to stop. The others just waved and smiled.

We had heard that there was good snorkeling near a rock by the beginning of the village. It wasn't a huge spot, but there were lots of different fish. I love longnose filefish - I can't really explain why. It's probably because when I first saw a pair of them it was so surprising. I had never seen a fish that shape before and the colors were so bright that it seemed unreal and cartoony. There were several pairs of them in the little pool in Sailele, along with a few juvenile emperor angelfish, Clif's favorite.

Airport Lagoon

It's been a while since we'd had a good snorkel day so we headed to Airport Lagoon. It wasn't the best snorkel day, but good enough.

And then Everett found a treasure at the beach! It has hardly left his head since Saturday.

Simon started dancing around on the way back.

snorkeling at Tisa's

When it's calm, Tisa's (Alega Beach) has some of the best snorkeling we've seen on the island. We've tried to snorkel there a lot, but it's usually so rough that Clif is the only one who ends up going out. So I decided not to bring my snorkel gear on Sunday, but on the drive out there I noticed how calm the waves were along the ocean road so we turned around to get the snorkel stuff. It turned out to be a great decision. I had one of the best snorkel days I've had on the island. There were tons of fish! Some of my favorites were the raccoon butterflyfish, regal angelfish, achilles tangs, huge schools of white-spotted surgeonfish, groups of orangespine unicornfish, black snappers, and flagtail triggerfish. I didn't want to come back in!

Larsen's Bay

We hiked to Larsen's Bay last Saturday. It was a beautiful day to spend at the beach. It wasn't so great for snorkeling except in the shallows, but we still had a lot of fun. The kids even found a coconut palm to climb and swing from.

Sharks

Yesterday I went diving at Fagaalu with a few of my dive buddies. It looked like it would be a pretty drab dive. The visibility was poor from the rain the night before. We decided to swim across the bay and drop in on a different part of the reef because the visibility is usually much better on that side. It was an excellent choice. The visibility probably went from 15 feet to around 100 feet. The coral was amazing and there was a lot of interesting sea life. We cruised around the reef farther than I had been before. About ten minutes into the dive I saw my friend Paul Brown motioning enthusiastically. I looked to my right and two Great Hammerhead sharks swam out about 7 to 10 feet over my head. One was around 6 feet long and the other around 7. They get up to 14 feet so these were younger sharks.

Hammerheads are an extremely rare site here so it was neat to see. What is funny though is that these are the first sharks that I have seen. The more common sharks have yet to be marked off on my checklist of sightings. We also saw a giant moray eel, longnose filefish, and some other interesting sea life. Suprisingly seeing my first sharks was not too scary. Maybe Paul's clapping in the background helped me feel a little safer. I mean sharks cant be dangerous if someone is clapping...right?

the best snorkeling in American Samoa

I know people are looking for it. I get searches on this topic all the time from curious people, so here is my opinion based on the limited number of beaches I've been to:

Blue Hole/Airport Lagoon are my favorite snorkeling spots so far. They are deep enough to get around (the main problem when you try to snorkel most places in AS) and there isn't much of a current. Two ways to get here - the garbage walk around the airport fence from Lion's Park or the blowhole walk from Maliu Mai (can you guess which one is more scenic?). If you get to either side of the radio tower on the southern edge of the runway, you're there. Blue Hole is on the east, Airport Lagoon is on the West.

Alega Beach (Tisa's) has amazing fish, but snorkeling can be tricky. If the sea is calm you can go in the 'ava to see big fish, but be careful or you'll get pulled out to sea. If you're new or visiting, be sure to check with Candyman before you try anything - he can tell you how safe it is on a particular day.

Vatia is another one of my favorites. It's fairly protected, but there is a bit of jostling from the waves at the edge of the reef where the fish are. Sometimes murky, but when you get a day with clear water, it's incredible.

Faga'alu is more polluted than most other places on this list, but it has easy access to pretty good snorkeling. It's very protected so currents and waves are almost nonexistent, which makes it a great place to explore for beginners.

Fagatele Bay is incredible for it's crystal clear water, but when I went the currents were much too strong to do anything but hold onto the reef and look out as far as I could see. Lots of fish and clear water make this place worth a try in spite of that.

Masefau

Last weekend Everett & I went to Masefau, Simon had a little sore throat so he stayed home with Clif. Masefau is like a lot of villages in American Samoa - it's long and fairly narrow and follows the inside curve of a bay. This was the first one where I was able to get a great shot of the village and the bay from above.

When we were snorkeling I saw a ray and a white sea urchin. The ray would have been really cool if I could see it better, but it was so murky that I didn't get a great look.

New Years

We had a few people over on New Year's Eve. The kids were so excited to stay up until midnight, and they really enjoyed all the glow stuff that came in a Christmas package. Those things provided hours of entertainment -thanks, mom & dad!

In the morning, Everett actually slept in.

We spent the first day of the new year at the beach in Vatia. We went diving, snorkeling, and kayaking - it was a great way to start the new year.

Return of Computer = pictures

Yeah....we got our computer back from the Police - thanks to Aaron. Our pictures were erased, but they were still in the recycling bin so we were able to recover them and download them onto our external hard-drive. The computer was also locked and Julia was able to find a way to unlock it on-line. It is still running slowly, but now we can update our blog and post some pictures. So here is a nice picture of the kids at the beach.


[diving at Liz's B-day]

Diving is awesome. This is a picture from my favorite dive so far. It was a really beautiful spot. My gear is on the way and I have met even more divers lately so I should be getting out a lot more pretty soon. Not to mention that with Carol gone Jay is available to go almost any day.

Simon v. The Librarian

Simon recently had a conversation with our friend Naomi at Moi's birthday party. Naomi, of course, was trying to convince Simon that reading is a good thing because it makes you smart . Unfortunately Simon disagreed, at least on some of the finer points. The conversation went something like this:

[Simon running to catch a wave w/ kickboard]


Naomi: Do you like to read?

Simon: Yes.

Naomi: Reading makes you smart - huh.

Simon: Well...reading doesn't always make you smart. Sometimes it makes you dumb.

Naomi: No, reading can't make you dumb.

Simon: Yes it can. If its not true. Like if a book is non-fiction and it says that dinasours are still alive. If it was in a fiction book that would be alright but if it is in a non-fiction book it wouldn't be true so that would make you dumb.

Naomi: (Im not sure if she actually spoke at this point or if she just stared at him in shock and with the realization that a five year old had just presented her with a perfectly sound argument about why books can make you dumb and that he was in fact right - not the best moment for a librarian).

Simon: [cute little knowing smile].

I dont know if I got the conversation exactly right but that is the gist of it. Darn kids. Hopefully Naomi keeps pushing book reading on our kids. We know reading books does make you smarter....well....most of the time.

[Beach at sunset]

[Ila]

A lot of people have asked about our dog, Ila. He is doing much better now. However, we let him hang out with the local dogs for a few weeks and now he has mange again. We are going to get him cured of it again and he will be an inside dog only - mainly because mange freaks me out, but also because no one wants to touch the dog and so he gets very little attention.

Alright lest you think that it is all play and no work. I put a picture of the view from my office in here. The rolling surf and swaying palms make it really easy to concentrate while at work.

[view from office]

Sharks!!!

Well, not really... just one shark. We went snorkeling at Airport Lagoon on Sunday and I saw my first shark - a blacktip reef shark that was probably about 5 feet long, but it's hard to estimate underwater. I was a little scared at first, even though it wasn't big enough to eat me or anything, so I swam as fast as I could to Deepa who was out snorkeling with me. Deepa wanted me to show her where I saw it so we turned around to look for it! Six months ago I never would have believed that I'd voluntarily swim toward a place I had seen a shark just moments earlier! It was pretty amazing to see a shark in the wild - a bit intimidating, but still a very cool thing to see. Even better than the 2 unicornfish I saw at Faga'alu the day before - I think they are so funny-looking with the little horn bumping out.

The weekend before last we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves too. We went to Tisa's with a group of friends, three of us were celebrating birthdays that week so it was a perfect excuse to get babysitters and enjoy a night out. The dinner was delicious, but it was the great company that made the whole evening most enjoyable. The next day we went to a group of fales between Vatia and Ofono, in a small village called Amalau for Liz's birthday celebration. It was a great location - the guys went scuba diving, we bbq-ed some hot dogs and had a great time talking and playing in the waves. Then we hurried home, I showered and changed and headed over to Maliu Mai for a dinner and night of Polynesian dancing.

Fa-ilolo & Airport

Last Saturday we woke up to rain and rain and rain. The rain clouds looked like they covered the whole island. Luckily they didn't. Just a little way past Leone, the storm clouds stopped. The rest of the island looked like it was being rained upon while we were treated to a beautiful day of sun and a nice sandy beach at Failolo.

Sunday we hiked out to Airport Beach. It was a beautiful hike through the bush and past the blow holes.

The first time we went there, we had to leave quickly because Simon fell and cut himself on the coral. This time we were able to spend all day there and the snorkeling was incredible! It was the first time that I found myself in the middle of at least a thousand fish -twice! I was surrounded by schools of several different kinds of fish. They were all fish I'd seen before -six barred wrasse, clematis, moorish idols, and in such huge numbers all at once. I was impressed. And I saw a long-nose filefish. I love the colors and unusual shape of its nose. I hope we can get a digital water camera soon because I'd love to get some of my own photos of all these fish!

When we got home, we went through the usual routine of fighting over the fish identification books to mark which fish we saw. Simon, frustrated that he couldn't find the fish he had seen and really liked, sat down and drew this picture of a small blue and yelow fish with black vertical stripes. Even after trying to match his drawing with the fish identification book, we still haven't figured out which fish he saw.