More diving in Munda

  Munda, Solomon Islands
Thursday, June 21, 2007

I took a nice, relaxing boat ride from Gizo to Munda and got to see some local villages along the way



The diving there was amazing. On one dive, when we go to depth there were three enormous eagle rays circling the area we were hanging out--amazing!!! I also did my first cave dive ever. We got off the boat and walked into this small island a bit to get to what looked like a small pool. Turns out the bottom of this "pool" doesn't really exist. We went down about 30m before it bottomed out and became a narrow passage way that popped out into the sea. The blue color of the water as I was coming out of the cave was stunning! Like nothing I have ever seen before, something to remember for sure!!

I had a day to visit some local sights. Started with skull island.



This is a tiny island that symbolizes what is left of the head hunting days as most of it was destroyed during bombings in WWII. There is an old dude, Eddie, who usually lives on this island to take care of it and protect the artifacts. Since the tsunami, he has been staying in his local village the next island over.



Our gide, Suna, was from the local area and the youngest skull in this shrine belonged to his great-great-grandfather!! Here he is in front of the shrine displaying some local jewelry



and then blowing on a sea shell, originally used to warn the women and children that heads were being brought to the area so they could all remain clear.



In the old days they used to barter with "shell money" which you can see me holding in this picture. It is carved from huge clam shells.



Of course there were skulls all over the island. The story goes that two tribes were meeting peacefully, but one tribe stole the queen of the other tribe which led to the agression between tribes and eventually head hunting. Typicall men, blame it all on a woman!!!



On my last day there, my flight out was moved 2 hours earlier (unhead of in "island time"). I didn't find out until about the time the plane was taking off without me (the airport was a 5 minute walk from where I was staying). I was hoping to get to Honiara in time to do a dive with a guy I met on the flight from Brisbane to Honiara, on the remains of a B-17. Didn't work out in the end. Fair enough, gives the massive blister on my heal from the climb a couple extra days to dry out! Later that day I finally got my flight out.