Cano Island - Tuesday

This morning we set off at 9am to go to Cano Island, the best place for snorkelling... but it'd been raining quite heavily all nights and the clouds had not quite cleared when we woke up. It was a pity as, stating the obvious here, visibility is much clearer on a sunny day !

Again, our friendly dolphins decided to race with us and we made sure we let them win ! :) Sometimes one can spot whales in the same area, but we didn't see any (not that I minded myself as I've got zero interest in them).

We didn't have a ladder to get off the boat easily enough so we had to jump but at least the water was so warm that it was ok. But I was very disappointed by the state of the corals, hardly any decent shape left at all... my guide explained that El Nino had destroyed everything in 98. I explained to him that the very same phenomenon happened in India that same year as the warm currents kept going Eastwards. It seems amazing how much damage global warming can do, on such an enormous scale.

One US tourist had actually brought over an article that was published in the NY Times just last month, highlighting the fact that Corcovado had had twice its annual rainfalls in Sept, Oct & Nov last year (most likely caused by global warming). This deluge had triggered a ripple effect of disasters that had killed half of the monkey populations and countless tucans, macaws, etc. This was explained by the fact that the trees were too 'drowned' to produce fruits, so all the birds who are fruit eaters starved to death, the monkeys who also eat fruits were also decimated... millions of insects also perished, which then meant that thousands of bats died of starvation too... they said that this micro disaster in a very small area of the planet showed exactly what will happen on a grand scale if we don't get our acts together fast. I couldn't help but wonder if it explained why we had spotted nothing on our walk... if 50% of the wildlife had died just a few months earlier!!! My guide felt it was seriously exaggerated... but I guess we'll never know for sure.

Anyway, after 45mns of snorkelling in strong currents, I was exhausted (but I cheered myself up thinking it was good exercice for toning my thighs!). We went back to the shore for another picnic lunch and we had 2 hours to spare to explore the island or snorkel some more, but, shame on me, I dozed off - again. See what I mean about getting older ? Scary ! I'm starting to worry that I've been bitten by the tse-tse fly ! (my excuse...).

We snorkelled some more in the afternoon, in a deeper area, to try and spot bigger species, such as sharks, but I only saw a little one (fear not, we were not going to try and spot the BIG ones for fun !).

We got back to the lodge at 3:30pm and then someone kindly told me that the hotel around the corner from ours do have internet access, via sattelite. Bliss ! Now, why the manager of my hotel couldn't tell me that 2 days ago, God knows, but I thought I'd grab the chance to say a quick hello whilst I can.

Tomorrow I'm going to be on the move again, travelling to the next place, my flight is at 9am, and I have no idea if they will have internet access when I get to the next lodge -- so I no longer dare commit myself to 'daily' updates !!!

I'd better sign off and wait for the sunset, which is going to be any minute now... I have a 5mns walk back to my hotel, on the edge of the jungle and a very weak torch, so I want to make sure I'm back before it's pitch dark in case I step on something unpleasant.....

Bisous and keep well and keep warm ! It won't be as hot at my next stop so I'm enjoying wearing very little here whilst I can... :)

PS- sorry these posts aren't as elaborate as I'd like but I was constantly aware that I could lose the sattelite connection at any minute and was very wary indeed..... hard to relax ! :)