11/02/2 Getting Busy at Cap Ternay

Week 4 at Cap Ternay!! This week has made us all aware of how strong the forces of nature can be! Due to the weather there has been no diving this week. Unfortunately the strong winds have made it impossible to take the boats out for fear of sinking them. Not to worry the staff have found plenty of fun activities to keep all the volunteers happy and very busy! The week started out with 10 of us heading over to Port Launey for an afternoon of snorkeling with the kids from the President’s Village Orphanage. Every one of them couldn’t wait to get geared up and into the water! Although only 10 kids were supposed to be snorkeling that didn’t stop every single kid from the orphanage from having an amazing afternoon in the water. We started out snorkeling however for some snorkeling quickly turned into water fights and jumping off the volunteers shoulders! All of us had an afternoon we will never forget! I can’t wait until I get to go again! Back on base we have all had at least one new experience this week. For some it was gardening. The vegetable garden has finally received some much needed attention! We all worked together to weed and clear the garden and plant a few more banana trees. For others it was watching a few amazing documentaries about the ocean. Every one of us was able to get a little taste of the important mangrove survey work our fellow GVI Seychelles volunteers are doing over on Curieuse Island. There have also been a number of hikes organized for the volunteers. Some people hiked to the top of Cap Matupa and were rewarded with amazing views of base, back beach and Baie Ternay! Others ventured to the top of Mahe Island to the Tea Plantation.

Even though there hasn’t been any diving it has not kept us out of the water! There has been a guided snorkel organized every day and Joe has been a wonderful underwater tour guide. It doesn’t matter how many times you snorkel in one place there is always something new and exciting to see! One day we saw a school of bumphead parrotfish. Another day we swam through underwater caves.

Wednesday meant 6 new volunteers and myself took a turn teaching the grade 5 class of the International School Seychelles all about the Forces of Nature! We met the kids down at the beach at 9am (I wish I had lessons at the beach when I was in school!) The kids were all very eager to learn which made the whole morning a lot of fun! After we finished our lessons everyone joined in to play our educational games which included tidal wave tag, coral reef tag, and an exciting game of earthquake, tsunami, volcano!

This week has been full of birthdays! Simon D. (Saturday), Elie (Monday), James (Tuesday), and Ash (Thursday) all got to celebrate their birthday in the Seychelles! Every single person on base has benefited from the birthdays because it wouldn’t be a birthday without birthday cake!!!!

With this being week 4 it means 7 volunteers have come to the end of their amazing adventure in the Seychelles. We have all had an amazing time together and every one of them (May, Paul, Marie, Qing, Ash, Danielle and Simon D.) are going to be missed! For those of us staying hopefully we will be diving again very soon……

11/02/2 Getting Busy at Cap Ternay