22nd October 2011 - MotoGP Malaysia Qualifying!

Today, we woke early, and caught the monorail to the KL Sentral (the main station), where after searching for ages... we caught the "official" bus.

An hour later we were at the track, and we walked around checking the usual bike stuff out, trying to find where to get our caps and t-shirts that were in our ticket deals... It wasn't easy... they wanted my passport AND credit card as proof of who I was... Lucky I had it!

Anyway, on to the qualifying. An exciting day, we popped from view to view, checking out the best bits of the track, and figuring out where we want to see on raceday.

The noise of a MotoGP bike is something astounding... it hurts! I cannot believe the sound that those bikes make... stunning... the video below does not do it justice....

We settled for the back straight, as besides seeing bikes do 300km per hour, you can also see about another 1/3 of the track... so a good vantage point... At one point I was watching Rossi come into a very tight corner, and bless him... he crashed... He was fine, but it has put him quite far down in position.

I was experimenting with HDR, a technique that involves taking the same photo with several different shutter speed settings and then merging them into photoshop... Such as, this photo below.. which is actually made up of 8 separate photos merged together... I would like to know what you think..?

After qualifying, we headed out of the circuit to catch the bus home... we had to wait 90 mins before one appeared, and then 90 mins to get back to the city centre....JOY!!

Then we decided to take a walk to a market... After miles of walking and being sent in the wrong direction by some "helpful" person, we found it.... TAT!! They sold the cheesiest crap... we left, and went home to bed, ready for raceday!

x

SD

20th - 21st October 2011 - MOTOGP Travels!!

We left Koh Tao at 3pm on the high speed catamaran.  This boat usually takes 2 hours to get to the mainland, but 10 minutes after we left..... it was dead in the water.

After a while, the boat engineers managed to get the thing running on half power, and the ferry took 5 hours to get to Chumphon..

Luckily, we had a 4 hour window in between the ferry and train we needed to catch... so we arrived at the train station with 30 mins to spare.

Once the train had pulled up, we searched for our seats / beds for the 10 hour journey to Bangkok. Our seats were in the 2nd class carriage (but at least we had air con!)...

As you can see below... it was a bit tight, and click on the last picture to see what I was saying at the time...

I slept barely an hour of the journey...Sadly, almost none of our 70kg of luggage, is clothes... Dive equipment and filming equipment make up the bulk of it.... A pain, but once we hit Sipadan, it'll be worth it...

Arriving at 6am at Bangkok Station, we caught a taxi to the airport, and with 6 hours to wait.... got bored! When check-in finally opened, we had a little debate over the luggage ( I had ordered extra baggage, but they were denying it...) and finally checked in... a quick munch and it was on to the plane for our 2 hour flight to KL....

Arriving in KL, another 1 hour taxi ride to the hotel.... and relax... maybe... after doing work, planning what we do tonight, planning how we get to the stadium tomorrow... etc etc etc...

xxx

SD

17th October 2011

Where the time goes  ..I just dont know....

We've been busy diving and finishing off the last of the transplants at Junkyard which are now looking fantastic.  All of the trays have been filled and we've only got a couple of the rope nursaries to move.  So only a few more visits should be needed in order to transplant everything.

The really good news is that  'Buoyancy World 2.0' has finally been deployed.   We were beginning to think it would never happen due to the multiple cancellations and monsoon season looming.

Here is a video of the ship going down...

And here are some pics of it underwater with some of our nursery transplants...

13th October 2011

What a  productive day!

Simon and I spent the last few days at Junkyard, transplanting corals to and from the coral nursery whilst Nathan,  collected broken coral fragments and met us back at the boat.  After many dives over the days dive carefully cutting the coral fragments down to size and placing them in plastic tubing, ready to refill the empty nursery trays

Now, we have refilled the trays, and have a new batch of babies to grow!! Wish them luck!!

10th October 2011

 

A dive at Chumphon Pinnacle a few days ago... this is my favourite dive site..

HD Version here: http://vimeo.com/30270483

xxx

SD

8th October 2011

The last couple of days, I have been back into the water testing my ears, which are slowly improving. While doing this, we have been working quite a bit on Junkyard.

Recyling our fragments from last year, we have repopulated the nursery with some very nice healthy coral, and after the first couple of weeks, we shall see if they survive..

x

SD

3rd October 2011

Jen was called in for a 1 person Discover Scuba Dive this morning... nice and simple. She went in the pool with her student for the morning session, while I went and worked on my laptop.

At about 11:30am, I got a called requesting me to come in and do 4 x people Discover Scuba Dive.. I hate 4 x people DSD's as its their first time ever in scuba gear, and is a real challenge for me. When I arrived at the dive school, things turned out to be even worse....

Jen (looking rather sheepish) told me that the group were Chinese (who are rarely comfortable) in the water.... and to top that... 3 of them could not swim. In my mind I think its absolute nuts to be able to jump on a boat and go into the ocean with a load of scuba gear when you are incapable of swimming, but the requirements for a DSD do not stipulate that you need to swim.. very odd.

After trying to convince them to have a pool session and then go from the beach for a dive, they refused, certain that they wanted to go on the afternoon boat. I knew it was going to be a hard day!

Once at the dive site, I kitted them all up, and jumped in, dragging 4 x students to the shoreline where they could stand, keeping them as calm as possible...

To be able to do a DSD, you need to be able to do a couple of skills... these usually take from 5 to 10 minutes... It took an hour of panicking etc... In that time, Jen had completed her dive, and came over to help... It was welcome!

Anyway, the dive was manageable with 2 each, unfortunately my ear was blocked, so I suffered 25 minutes of pain (I couldn't abort the dive and leave Jen with 4 people)... Eventually, I had enough and got everyone to the surface.. I then endured 2 hours of agony, due to massive pressure in one of my ears which could not escape... believe me... I was not very pleased with my day. The pressure finally subsided, and now I remain deaf in one ear (temporary)... so no diving for me for a few days :-(

On a lighter note.... we had a request for a personal message to Mr & Mrs Mandry... so here it is!! (Click on the picture to make it larger!!!)

xxx

SD