Bioluminescence

One of the things that I enjoy most about living aboard is seeing the bioluminescence in the water late at night. We’ve seen different types of bioluminescence but most of what I’ve seen has been microorganisms called diatoms that light up when something moves through the water near them. We’ve all tried taking pictures of this but none of our cameras are good enough to really capture it. It often looks like blue flickering fireflies are in the water when something splashes or as the bow of the boat moves through the water. The lights are an electric blue and even though they aren’t bright enough to be caught on camera they seem pretty bright at night when everything is pitch black!

The diatoms light up when something moves in the water as a defense mechanism, in case a fish is trying to eat them. By lighting up, the diatoms hope to attract bigger fish to eat the small fish that are trying to eat them. It’s their way of saying; “Leave me alone or I’ll light you up so you can get eaten too!’.”

On this last crossing from Thailand to Sri Lanka we were lucky to see several pods of dolphins. They would come up to our boat in groups of four to twenty and like to ride and play in the waves that our bow creates. Sometimes we can hear the dolphins chirp and click to each other and its very clear that they are playing and having a good time. They usually don’t stay very long and after maybe ten minutes or so they dart off like torpedoes all at once and are gone.

One of the nights on the crossing the bioluminescence was very strong and we were visited by some more dolphins. Seeing dolphins swim in bioluminescent water was probably one of the coolest things I have ever seen. It’s hard to explain, but the diatoms would light up as the dolphins swam, making them sparkle and glow and leaving a bright blue trail behind them as the darted around underwater.

Since then we haven’t really seen much bioluminescence and there isn’t any here in Galle’s harbor. But I’m hoping that we’ll continue to see more on the rest of our trip. I’m also hoping to see some bioluminescent squid that some of the crew has already seen!

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My Laptop Adventure in Phuket

When I joined aboard in September I didn’t bring a personal laptop or cell phone with me. I sort of had the idea that I would be “off the grid” for a little while. It would be a huge change from back home where I never went anywhere without my cell phone and used my computer several times a day. At first it was a nice break to be a little disconnected and not spend so much time staring into a computer screen. But eventually I started to miss having a computer and found myself often searching for an internet café when traveling through different cities so that I could check my email, transportation schedules, travel guides, or get in touch with the rest of the crew, friends, or family. Also, I’ve taken hundreds of pictures and I’m starting to get bogged down with them!

So not too long ago I decided that it was time for me to get a laptop, something that I’d been considering for a long time. I decided to get one before we crossed to Sri Lanka so that I could get some work done while on the long crossing. On December 14^th I had one mission: to visit every store selling laptops in Phuket and purchase the best deal! The night before I did research and knew exactly what kind of laptop I wanted and I also looked up where all the major stores and malls were located on the island so I had a rough game plan of where to go. So I woke up early that morning, grabbed a map and my camera, hopped on my rented motorbike, and headed off!

I visited five places across the island. Big C, Festivus, Tesco Lotus Superstore, Super Cheap, and Jungceylon. These were all either stores like Wal-Mart of big indoor shopping malls. At each store I would take pictures of the laptops they had and their prices so I could comparison shop as I went to each place.

Tesco didn’t have any laptops like I was looking for but it did have a really cool food court. There were several stalls each selling a different type of food, Japanese, Thai, Chinese, drinks, soups, etc. Each of the food stalls was run by Tesco and they did not take cash. In order to buy food you had to go to a nearby counter to purchase a card which the food vendors swiped when you bought your meal. My meal cost less than $3 US and was very good!

While I was driving around I saw a sign for an orchid farm so I stopped to check it out. Not much was flowering at the time but the farm was huge!

Super Cheap was probably one of the biggest single stores I have ever been to. It was a massive building with a roof but it was open to the air so there was no air conditioning. It was like a Wal-Mart, Lowe’s, Office Max, famer’s market, Sam’s, Costco, food court, fish market, auto store, bakery, and Best Buy combined! It seemed like everything you could want was in there and I wandered around for a long time. There were very low priced shoes but none that were really big enough for me!

The last place I visited was a massive shopping mall called Jungceylon in Patong Beach. Patong is the main tourist area in Phuket and is a pretty big city. Jungceylon is a fancy mall complete with a lagoon/fountain with a pirate ship in the middle! I decided to go ahead and get my laptop here since prices were pretty standard at every store that I went to and it was starting to get late. After I picked out the one I wanted I wandered around the main street area as the store installed Windows 7 for me. It was dark by the time they were finished and I started heading back to the boat. I found that leaving Patong was much harder than following the signs to get there! There weren’t any signs pointing back to the small town where our boat was and I think the locals would tell me one of many ways to get there! I ended up driving around Patong a lot and somehow kept ending up where I started. Eventually I found the right road that took me back up over and the down the mountains (sometimes 40% grade!) and back to the boat after a very long, but successful, day.

I’m very happy with my new laptop. It works great and now I can use it for all sorts of things. Plus, the keyboard has those cool squiggly Thai letters on it!

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