What’s that
you can see? Nothing you say? That’s right. Absolutely nothing but a wide
expanse of deep blue ocean, a light blue almost cloudless sky and sunshine. These are
the kinds of wide open spaces I crave, that I miss from Australia and that I don’t
get in Singapore. Just one of the many reasons I love my diving weekends.
Imagine spending
two days on a luxurious, Thai, long range diving vessel breathing in fresh air
(no humidity!) tinged with salt with the sun on your face. Looking out into a vast
and mostly blue expanse, dotted with the occasional island or rickety old
Malaysian fishing boat chugging by.
Then there
is the actual diving. On this trip we went to dive sites around Tioman Island
in Malaysia. We dived Chebeh, Labasa, Palau Jahat and Jack Rock. We got 6 dives
in over the last two days spending a total of 4 hours and 15 minutes underwater yesterday and 2 hours today. The photo below is us stopped in at the actual
Tioman Island getting our passports stamped out on Saturday morning …
Speaking of sunrise, this is what we woke up to this morning …
I love the process
of being woken up early by one of the crew ringing the hand held brass bell. Coming
out to the main deck to get an espresso (another reason I love this boat, I can
get a decent coffee in the morning). Waiting for the other divers to emerge for
the dive briefing, bleary eyed and slowly waking up as the sun comes up over
the horizon.
Beneath the
surface it is calm, serene, and magical. You start the slow decent beneath the
water and are all of a sudden alone with your own thoughts. There's only the sound
of your breathing through the regulator and a faint popping and crackling
sound. I call it the “sound underwater makes”, if you have been diving before you
will know what I mean.
They often
set up relatively permanent cleaning stations under rock boulders and operate
their “business”, solo or in pairs. The larger fish know where to come for their
cleaning and sometimes the service at a particularly good cleaning station can
be in such high demand you see fish seeming to “queue”, waiting patiently for
their turn. If you extend an arm or a leg close to a cleaning station they will
often try and give you the once over as well!
When I first
started diving I didn’t like to look up. Sort of like if you are afraid of
heights you don’t look down. Well I didn’t like to look up as it would bring on
strong claustrophobic feelings as I thought to myself “wow, that is a whole lot
of water between me and air, if this air stops flowing …”. But like all other
things, your confidence grows the more experienced you become.
As I mentioned earlier the crew on the boat is mostly Thai so for the two days we are treated to an amazing array of delectable Asian dishes, a good portion of them Thai.
Lunch yesterday
included a Tom Yum soup which we make quite frequently at home. Andrew makes
a fabulous rendition that he learnt to cook on one of his trips to Thailand. Breakfast
on the final day is always my favourite: Thai chicken curry with roti prata.
Roti prata is
not typically Thai, acknowledged, and to be honest I couldn’t do curry for
breakfast in any other circumstance! But I tell you, what a feeling, coming up
from an early Sunday morning dive cold and hungry only to delve into a big
plate of warm, spicy chicken goodness with the sun dancing off the water around you.
Washed down
with an espresso of course …
I can’t wait
for the next trip in August!
Tom (too) Yum Goong Soup
a creation by Andrew
21/2 cups of prawn stock (see method below for how
to make this, it's very easy)
2 stalks lemongrass, (hard outside layers removed
and cut into 3cm pieces then pounded with the butt of a knife handle)
1 thumb sized piece each of galangal and ginger,
peeled and sliced into thumbnail sized slices
6 kaffir lime leaves, stems removed, roughly ripped
and bruised with the butt of a knife handle
4-10 birds eye chillies, chopped
and seeds removed (4 of these with seeds removed will give a nice mild-medium
warmth. 10 will set your pants on fire!)
2 tomatoes, cut into eighths
8 mushrooms, quartered (or a can of button
mushrooms)
12 prawns, peeled and deveined with heads kept for
the stock
4 tablespoons of nam pla (fish sauce)
4 teaspoons of lime juice
First, make the prawn stock by bringing 3 cups of water to the boil. Cut or break off the heads of the prawns and add them to the boiling water. Let them gently boil for 5 to 7 minutes all the while pressing down on the heads to extract all the juicy, prawny goodness from them. It should turn red and frothy, careful it doesn't boil over or it will leave your cooktop incredibly fragrant (stinky). Give the prawn heads one last press and discard them, the stock should have reduced to 2.5 cups by now.
First, make the prawn stock by bringing 3 cups of water to the boil. Cut or break off the heads of the prawns and add them to the boiling water. Let them gently boil for 5 to 7 minutes all the while pressing down on the heads to extract all the juicy, prawny goodness from them. It should turn red and frothy, careful it doesn't boil over or it will leave your cooktop incredibly fragrant (stinky). Give the prawn heads one last press and discard them, the stock should have reduced to 2.5 cups by now.
Add lemongrass, galangal, ginger, kaffir lime
leaves and chillies to the simmering stock. Cook for 3 to 4 minutes stirring
occasionally.
Add tomatoes and mushrooms and stir until
cooked.
Add the nam pla and prawn meat. The prawns won't
take long to cook and will continue to cook in the hot liquid as you're serving
up the dish.
Put a teaspoon of fresh lime juice in everyone's
bowl then divide up the soup. Make sure you divide the prawns evenly, this
causes fights in our house!
Eat!
Yield: 6-8 serves depending the serving size
