SV Thyme

It was still another 3 days before Amanda’s parents were due to arrive so with previous crewmember Josh and his friend Ben in the neighborhood the plan to head out for some diving was hatched.


While to four of us were diving the sound of boats could be heard above us and after surfacing we discovered Trevor from Gadfly, Darryl from Matana and Dave from Mirage were anchored in the next bay. As we hadn’t seen Trevor for 4 months beers seemed like a good idea. This of course led to a bombing competition with moves like the Flying Wombat, Star Horsey, Staple and the Layback all being demonstrated.



Trevor managed to lose his sunnies but with the assistance of dive gear recovered them after a 15 min search.


That night we had a fire on the beach with marshmallows before heading from Gaya around to Edgell Patches the following morning. The plan was to do the open sea dive before the wind came up but conditions weren’t great so we dropped Josh and Amanda off and returned to the general area ½ an hour later. I kept thinking if the GPS was to lose the waypoint or there was a strong current below the surface how would we find them? None of these things happened so alls well that ends well.
With the arrival of Amanda’s parents we hit the Tourist trail heading over to Poring hot springs.

They also have a rain forest canopy walk, which consists of Aluminum ladders bolted together, overlaid with planks and hung in the treetops.



Town also had its sights such as 6-foot long Monitor lizards living in the street drains and some pretty interesting cuisine being live stonefish at 10 RM per 100 grams.



After a few days I was pretty much touristed out so moved onto boat jobs giving Amanda, Derek and Janet some time alone to visit the wild life park, Islands etc. They got a good taste of local safety on the boat trip having to wear kids life jackets that won’t do up and a life ring that’s going to the bottom of the sea with the boat if it sinks.



Amanda says – I had an absolute ball with my parents here – 8 days was too short! Wildlife spotting, mountain and jungle walks, hot springs, islands – we enjoyed it all. I hope you come back to visit soon – miss you already.