Finding Nemo

Took a day trip on Saturday to a beach within Majuro atoll. The boat ride took about a half hour or so to get there, and we were warned to stay on our best behavior since the president of the RMI was there that day as well. The beach was so incredibly pristine and beautiful…we were all just in complete awe that here we were on this fantastic place in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. The snorkeling was AMAZING. I’m not sure if I’ve ever seen water this clear.

When we snorkeled, I literally felt like I was in the movie “Finding Nemo”. Saw huge coral, clown fish in the anemones (and baby ones that seriously did look like Nemo), angel fish, and schools of fish that glittered when they moved. Took my underwater camera and got some neat pictures, but I’ll have to send that back to the states to get developed.

We also snorkeled and dove down to see a plane wreck, which was apparently a Japanese plane. The side of the plane had “Seastar Pacific” written in huge letters, so if anybody knows what that means please let me know! A little ways out from the beach was a swimming platform with a high dive that everyone was having a great time on. I remember standing on the top of the board and thinking how crazy it was that I’m in the middle of the Pacific Ocean going off a diving board!

A few of us took a “jambo” (walk) to the ocean side which looks like another world to the lagoon side. Since it was low tide, the landscape looks really rocky and the water is really hot since it’s just been sitting in puddles, baking from the sun. Even though there’s big waves, the coral reef breaks it up into ripples. We decided the closest thing the area looked like was the moon with palm trees in the background.

It rains pretty much every day here, and the beach day was no different, except that we actually loved having it. The rain gave our skin a break from the sun and we just kept playing in the water like usual. There were wild pigs roaming the beaches which took a bit of getting used to…I can’t say I’ve ever seen a huge pig on a beach before until now. Yesterday was by far one of the best days we’ve had so far for sure and was the closest I’ve ever been to being on a deserted island.