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DIVE THE DREAM - UEPI ISLAND RESORT
October 2008

Following on from an awesome September, diving conditions in October have been great.

Having suffered a 'trade wind season' with very few trade winds, we have belatedly had a few late blows from the south-east. The winds have been refreshingly moderate at times which has provided opportunities for the Hobie Cats to be let loose. Our two kiteboard rigs, SLINGSHOT 11 & 13, have also been providing some action & spills. Whist we were trying to get some good images Josh really grabbed some air. John Kavai, our Office Manager was driving the photo-chase boat & remarked "good thing Josh jumped over onefella big Manta" Sure enough there was the flash of a very big Manta feeding. As it turns out Josh saw nothing "What Manta? You are joking!"

The large schools of fish have continued to gather on both Uepi & Chara Points. As the incoming currents strengthen the action builds & Chara has been especially dramatic. We think there have probably been more large GTs or Black Trevally than ever. Also plenty of large mackeral are swimming by although they have been reluctant to take a lure as we troll in the renown fishing areas away from Uepi itself. Monstrous schools of Sailfin Snapper have been congregating on the deeper regions of Uepi Point, dominating the lower Point itself.

The visibility has been variable & dynamic, ranging from good to spectacular, but with so many choices of divesites we have usually managed to find some outstanding visibility for everyone during their stay. Most mornings, divestaff Lamae, Robert, Rabagnaki or Joe have been checking out the lagoon for Mantas in the early morning & most mornings guest have been out snorkelling with these magic stealth bombers of the sea before breakfast. It’s been an amazing season for Manta stretching over many months now, with the sightings of feeding Manta now becoming less frequent as the weather warms. But many of the mantas are now cruising the drop-off reefs providing an even more colourful background in very clear water.

Last night after dinner we had a fierce electrical storm with one burst of thunder & lightening rattling the iron roofing on every building. The Uepi staff sitting on the main deck watched the lightening strike the sea nearby. At breakfast this morning a steady rain set in & a few divers sat out the mornings dive. Our Dive Instructor Pita together with a lone diver Mike, sat on Chara Point where the visibility & action was 'just unbelievable". By this time the sun was shining. During the dive 10 pygmy mantas circled overhead for a while before gliding up the channel to Inside Point where DM Robert & three other divers watched the mantas circle about overhead. Those who sat out the morning dives had to endure the raves of those who dived.

This month the cuttlefish have been mating constantly & laying eggs all over the place, day & night. We have carefully relocated a pair of eggs near the diveshop, hoping to witness the emergence of some baby cuttles. Taking the eggs from within the protection of the fire coral on North Log was not so easy. The eggs are in pairs, arranged rather like a horses saddlebags. They are slung across a span of coral within the mass of coral a few centimetres or so. I chose an egg pair near the surface with minimal protection or shelter. But once I raised an egg a little I found they were rather negatively buoyant & quickly slipped deeper into the coral mass. This is an amazing example of evolutionary design by nature & it astounded me how effective it was. The instance you unbalance the equilibrium of 'the sling' the unsupported egg drags the other deeper. So it took me a while to work out how to extract an egg pair, which had seemed a very simple task initially. So far we have had no action on the birthing front, nothing seems to be happening. Maybe our information on the cuttlefish gestation period is wrong? We were certainly wrong about the length of pregnancy for pygmy sea-horses which we now learn is only 10 days. Last Dive Log report we thought that we had evidence of the 'birth' of a pygmy 'denise'. But we have now learnt that the female pygmy produces the eggs then transfers them to a chamber within the male. It now seems that the pygmy Carol Buchanan photographed, as mentioned last report, was most likely a female who had just passed on her eggs to a male: And that the opening photographed in her lower front stomach region was her birth canal for the eggs. And even more surprising to us was to learn that the hatchlings are black in colour.

Binusa is a dive site a little past General Store. It tends to be undeservedly overlooked as it is a beautiful dive. Binusa has a great wall with a narrow edged point slicing into the deep. This edge is beautifully arrayed with multi-coloured seafans & invertebrates. The wide-angle opportunities are excellent but it’s definitely macro country as well, a dilemma for the photographers. Both ends of the dive have very nice swim-throughs with coral gardens. Several times in October Binusa has really turned it on with great viz & brilliant sunshine. Always a chance of eagle rays, turtles & hammerheads too.

One of my favourite dives is Inside Point, especially as an early dive. In October it been producing a great variety of small creatures, shrimps, seahorses, small hawkfish, blennies & gobies, whip gobies & shrimps, reef-fish from angels to grouper, GTs, circles of barracuda, grey reef, blacktip, tawny & whitetip sharks, eagle rays & pygmy mantas, nudibranchs, cuttlefish, flashing scallops & more. I think it has as nice a wall of corals as anywhere I have dived. Now we are waiting for the mating octopus which frequent this area providing great interactions, often at this time of year. One octopus has been occupying a rock at the divejetty for the whole month, right where the boat propellers pass close by, and he/she refuses to leave.

BOTCH has been a spectacle of garden eels lately with thousands peering at divers as they lay on the sandhill watching. Funny how divers love that sandhill, always a bit mystified how it can have so much impact. Of course BOTCH dives usually involve finning back through 20 or 30 sharks near the Welcome Jetty on the way back to the diveshop. Not a bad way to finish a dive!

The fight for control of the skies over the Coral Seas continues. Not since the Zeros were dog fighting with Hellcats has the competition been as fierce. Solomon Airlines, SkyAirWorld & now Pacific Blue are all out for victory with none of them shirking the issue. This can only be good for consumers, that is those divers who want to experience the magic of Marovo & the other great diving in the Solomons.

And finally, at last, after a long, long, long, long wait, the upgrading of Seghe airstrip is well under way. In fact they could use it now but there are finishing touches to be made. It’s gonna happen & boy are we happy.

One of the joys of living in a 'paradise' is sharing it with others who appreciate the wonders of an environment like Marovo. Many of these people become regular returnees. They are an important part of our motivation to try & keep this part of the world healthy. There is no doubt that the more 'natural' life, as it is lived in Marovo, has a quality not that evident in more modern societies. Currently we have two couples Cecile & Theo Van Uyen who are on their tenth visit to Uepi. Typically for returnees they are always ready to help out with practical projects & appreciate the exposure to the environment & the people of Marovo. Pam and Mike Carter also on their tenth visit and always give generously with medical supplies for the local people, love the diving, life, laughter and interaction with the Uepi Family. Their attitudes & of others like them keep us reassured that we are on the right track & are not wandering aimlessly on our own trip, in a world that is in overdrive & overdue for an oil-change.

Thanks also to all those who in 2008 have supported the people of Marovo with scholarships, educational materials, health supplies, direct medical assistance, community project donations & much more. We still have way to go in 2008 with a medical team from the USA (Charity organisation "Help a Friend Foundation") arriving in early November to install a substantial solar power system at the Seghe Hospital. They are also conducting clinics at 6 villages strategically sited around Central Marovo and a number of clinics at Seghe.

We wish you all a Merry Christmas & may 2009 be a very special year for you all.
Mifela olgeta long Uepi wishem iufela guest bilong mifela barava gud taem lo Christmas & Nu Yea.
'Leana uka' Grant, Jill, Lee, Colin, Lochie, Ben, Rhonda, Jason, Josh, Ben, Dick, Peter, Deliver, Lamae, Kilent, Robert, Joe, Rabagnaki, Naolyn, Janita, Jukili, Marka, Julie, Belinda, Trisha, Melissa, Malachi, Qula, Mebani, Miri, Ande, Francina, Nose, Tuilo, Sau, Margaret, Kemuel, Donald, Danny, Aeram, William, Jonah, Bonnie, JayJay, Wickless, Jepila, Marshall, Boyce, Judy, Harry, Agnes, Lloydie, Rodily, Tofa, Elsie, Douglas & Wesley (in China)

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We sincerely wish to thank the following people for use of their photographs in our website:

Peter Lange, Peter Pinnock, Oceania Films/Matt Guest, Eric Cheng, Fred Bavendam, Andy Belcher, Manuela Kirschner, Louise Murray, Roberto Rinaldi, Mark Strickland/Oceanic Impressions, Jill Kelly, Grant Kelly, Wes Kelly and Jason Kelly.