A Glorious Day

Yesterday our group took a short boat ride from Midway to Eastern Island where we spent our morning. We were told that Eastern had been badly damaged by the tsunami that hit it just a week prior to our arrival but I wasn't fully prepared for what we saw.

The first thing that I noticed was the outrageous amount of flies. No matter where you were on the island there was always a thousand flies near by. The smell also unveiled the death of the albatross caused by the tsunami, it smelled kind of like rotten milk and dirty gym socks. But the worst part of going to Eastern was seeing all the empty nests and dead albatross chicks and parents alike. The volunteers are in the process of cleaning the island but it will be very difficult.

(A fish washed ashore from the tsunami) 

I've come to realize that Midway is this massive paradox. It's so full of death yet there is so much amazing life being made there as well. While on Eastern Island, we had the privilege of seeing a Short-tailed Albatross chick. This bird is extremely endangered so we were so lucky to catch a glimpse of this little guy.  On our way back we saw a huge pod of dolphins! Our boat driver, Jason was so kind and he let us drive around with them for a while. It was so cool, I've never seen anything like them before!

After lunch we had the privilege of going snorkelling! The staff here are all so amazing and they happily accommodate us. They took us right out to the reef and we saw all sorts of amazing fish. I will post Kris Krug's pictures that he took underwater as soon as they're up. The coral was the most magnificent colour of purple that I have never seen before!

Later that night we all set out to watch the sunset from Rusty Bucket Beach. It was a wonderful sunset with some amazing colours. After the sun set we watched the stars and my goodness it was glorious!

As I was sitting there I wrote down some thoughts that were going through my mind:

- I am so amazed by the power of the sun. Here you can see from horizon to horizon, such a large distance yet this ball of gas 150 million kilometres away can give light to this huge expanse of land.

- Everyday I've noticed something different but equally beautiful about our planet. I see beauty in things that I never thought I would like rust and byproducts from a huge war.

-From Rusty Bucket you can see a full 180 degrees around you of plain ocean. You're nineteen hundred kilometres from the closest country and all that you can see is ocean. It appears that the water is just spilling off the edge of the earth!

It felt as though we were in a snow globe or something. The true beauty of this island cannot be captured, it must be experienced.