Globular

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Singapore and remote Indonesia

This trip had two distinct parts: Singapore and snorkeling.

For us Singapore is a place to catch up with friends and to eat the city’s delicacies. We enjoyed several meals with longtime Singaporean friends eating our favorites and theirs. Some of the specialties we were happy to return to: mantis shrimp, sambal stingray, chicken rice, laksa, bak-kut-teh, Nonya cuisine, fresh soursop juice, the whisky culture, and the tea culture.  

Snorkeling took us to two remote Indonesian islands – Alor and Sumbawa – with very different types of snorkeling. Alor was beautiful underwater and concentrated on small critters (see Alor). Many of my photos focus on the very cool and weird fish we saw. The specialty around Sumbawa was “muck” diving where the sea floor was mud and/or stones. In some cases, the muck background made the colors or shapes of the fish stand out. Both of these kinds of snorkeling were new for us.

It’s incredibly difficult to share with you all the colors and shapes activity that we see underwater? Every time we snorkel, I thank the marine inhabitants for letting me peek into their lives. So what I depict here are some of those peeks – pun intended.

We may have missed many of the small critters if they weren’t pointed out by the dive guides. At depths of 10-15 ft (3-5 m) they were difficult to spot even if they weren’t camouflaged, ranging from 1-6 in (2.5-15 cm). To most of us floating on the surface they looked like rocks or leaves, except for the nudis (nudibranchs) whose colors stood out.

On this trip I saw all of my favorite fish: honeycomb grouper, sweetlips, longnose filefish, and Mandarin fish. Also saw reef sharks and a nursery area of baby sharks. I won’t usually post repeat photos. If I have a good photo of an octopus, shark, turtle or my favorites, they won’t be repeated in this posting of the blog.

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Our foodie adventures in Singapore were in a variety of locales: elegant, casual, quirky, hawker centre, and hole-in-the-wall.

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Juvenile Komodo dragon headed for the hills as soon as he saw us coming. We understand!

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Sumbawa is near Komodo Island so we were able to go into the national park to see the dragons. Luckily we saw a juvenile Komodo dragon who started walking away as soon as he saw us coming.

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We saw two unique fishing methods on Alor - bagan triangular floating platforms and bubu bamboo fish traps underwater. Pink sand beach. The islands are volcanic so we saw steam clouds rising and underwater bubbles rising as evidence of active volcanic activity. Sumbawa was BYO so we did. Finally a Christmas tree worm that struck me as funny.

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Mantis shrimp, manybar goatfish, mandarin fish, crab, nudi egg mass, flame scallop, sea cucumber, feather duster worms

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Around Alor we depended on the guides to spot the little critters the area is known for. Salp which is a mostly transparent chain of smaller critters, a couple of shrimp beauties, razorfish, seahorse, a couple of white nudibranchs, and a juvenile flying gunard. Here's what we were looking for: Juvenile flying gunard 0.5-5 in (1.5–12 cm), Peacock-tail anemone shrimp 0.8-1.5 in (2-4 cm), Blue coral banded shrimp 1.5-2 in (4-5 cm), Nudibranchs 2-3 in (5-8 cm), Seahorse 3-4 in (7.5-10 cm), Razorfish maximum size 6 in (15 cm)

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Sumbawa's waters and those of the nearby islands were rough. At this time, we mostly did muck diving. But the muck provided a background where some colors stood out like with the radiant urchins. The giant clam looks like a couple of snakes. A juvenile batfish hovered near the surface. What looks like an urchin or starfish is actually the feeding end of a sea cucumber. The spiral tubes of worms reminded me of petroglyphs.

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Frogfish and scorpionfish. Here is what we were looking for at depths of 10-15 ft (3-5 m): Leaf scorpionfish 4 in (10 cm), Warty frogfish up to 6 in (15 cm), Orange scorpionfish 6.5 in (16 cm), Giant frogfish/Commerson's frogfish up to 15-18 in (38-45 cm)

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These critters were easier to spot than many of the small fish. Juvenile harlequin sweetlips, moray eel, redtooth triggerfish, octopus.

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VIETNAM and LAOS

We spent a month touring around these countries, using Saigon, Hanoi, Da Nang, and Vientiane as bases. Enjoyed the people, food and drink everywhere we went. Lucked out by celebrating holidays and seeing how they celebrated their holidays. Also lucked out by some rain only two days and never enough to bother what we were doing. The hotels and especially the concierges were excellent at arranging what we wanted to see and suggesting what we should see. Occasionally for some attractions, we had guides, but they were also insights for us into Vietnamese and Laotian life. Easy traveling even with the 86-94°F (30-34°C) temperatures that the weather apps said felt like 100-115°F (38-46°C). The beach and ocean breezes at Da Nang were the perfect end to this trip.

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VIETNAM

For our three weeks in this country we stayed in Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City), Hanoi, and Da Nang as bases for exploring the cities and taking day trips to notable places in surrounding areas. Everywhere we went the people were kind and accommodating. The countryside was beautiful and varied throughout. We enjoyed excellent traditional dishes, especially the seafood. Notable food: banh xeo, white rose dumplings, tom tit, lotus tea, o mai, mang gut, and chili salt. We learned to like dipping certain fresh fruit in chili salt and that it makes a great rim for a margarita. At one bar, we got a sort of pina colada but it was clear, and yet it tasted exactly like a pina colada. So we talked to the server and the bartender and found out the secret…and the bartender gave us his recipe!?!?

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Saigon / Ho Chi Minh City was our first stop and we were lucky to see the city on a 3-day holiday weekend. Lots of activity in the parks including kite flying. Enjoyed the night market on food street and learned that you eat the roe of horseshoe crabs...very little meat inside those shells. Saw a gold hotel and figured out which Vietnamese gin is my favorite.

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When I saw a "mangrove forest" listed as an attraction near Saigon, I couldn't imagine what that would be. We are used to mangroves hardly taller than we are. But these mangroves are 30-50 feet high (10-15meters). We walked, canoed and motorboated in the Vam Sat eco-park and Can Gio biosphere reserve in the Mekong Delta. Spotted a lot of large flying foxes (megabats) hanging in the trees, which was a first for our guide.

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The Cai Rang floating market is a large boat collection where mostly bulk goods (like on the onion, potato boat) are for sale. We were hosted for fresh fruit by a couple who live on and sell from a pineapple boat.

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Hanoi was for us the best walking city, mostly in the old French quarter, so we spent three days on foot to parks, temples, and a tea house. We would walk along a typical shopping street and step into a riot of color and smells inside temple grounds. Ho Chi Minh is still revered at his mausoleum and with images of him everywhere.

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Ha Long Bay is pictured in glorious sunshine on almost every kind of media that is about traveling in Vietnam. But the day we visited, there was no sun penetrating the fog and clouds. Spent the day on a small cruise boat and took a side trip on a rowboat through a cave into a secluded bay.