Surf's up!

So I just spent an awesome weekend at Alus Alus beach. This is an hour's drive east from here to a great little place known as "Jock's shack", which is right on the beach near a tiny little village. Currently it has no running water or electricity, because last week it was broken into. Everything was stolen, including the kitchen sink! The expats on the island have rented it for a few months from Jock, who has now moved to New York to take up a position with the UN. Works for us :)

The beach is beautiful, but swimming can be likened to throwing yourself into a washing machine. Rips, strong currents and big waves are the norm. I think any surfer would love it, but also find it frustrating - the waves are big and look surfable, but then they crash and burn pretty quickly! There are some good waves around each end of the bay, where the reef is (or was?!) though.

It's funny seeing the water buffalo come down to the beach each night... almost like the migration of the wildebeeste in the Serengeti!

So we spent a lovely couple of days swimming, boogie boarding, chilling out, reading books, testing out the local rocket fuel, eating and sleeping. Kyle, an Aussie visitor, and I tried our hand at cracking open a coconut... let's just say a machete would have been very handy! Smashing it on the concrete of the water tank stand, followed by some deft knife-work, did the trick.

My arms are dead from fighting the waves on my boogie board, and from the workout I got on the tennis court with Nam (an expat with CordAid) and the locals this morning at 6:30. Any exercise you do on land needs to be done in the cool of the morning or evening. It's just too hot and humid otherwise!

Life is tough. I'm not looking forward to going back to work next week!