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Notes from July 1st Cherine We decided to relax this weekend, and went to the lowlands. Cherine went on a photo tour around the cargo dock area, and Eric went fishing. There is a native Papuan village at the cargo dock area, where the mangrove swamp empties into a bay that leads to ocean. The native people in this area live in huts built on stilts to allow for the high ranging tides to flow without disrupting their village. Their main mode of transportation is called a “longboat”, and they are hand carved from large trees from the surrounding rain forest. The company we work for supplies the village with fresh water, so while I was there, I got to see many people paddling their boats across the bay to the fresh water supply, and filling up buckets, jugs and whatever they could find. Most of the time, it was the kids who were sent to do this chore. I realized that kids are the same everywhere in every culture when they started a huge water fight. Luckily, they didn’t include me. I took a ferry boat down the bay to the port (about 10 minutes) where all of the company’s supplies come in and go out. Every bit of groceries, electronics, clothing, mining equipment, and even the things we packed to bring here, come to the island through this port. The company ships out all of its copper from this port, too. I’m going to go back there again sometime, and charter a ride in one of the longboats.
Exploring the coast and the mangrove swamps “Fishing” (Eric): I was invited by one of my co workers who owns a boat (there are a very few “western style” aluminum or fiberglass hull boats that have been imported to the island) to go fishing along the coast. We set out pretty early, got the boat, and drove to the sea port owned by
When talking about the “coast”, for most of the south part of the island, you are talking about mangrove swamps with sandbars and mud flats for a few miles off the coast. Mangrove swamps are pretty interesting in themselves. Created by sediment flowing off the mountains into the ocean, eventually enough sediment builds up to create a mud bog, and various plants start to grow in the mud. The mangrove swamps are perpetually wet. Freshwater rivers flow through them out to sea. The swamps are low enough that when the tide rolls in, the rivers back up, and the entire swamp floods until the tide goes back out. There are some main river channels, but generally, there is water almost everywhere. The swamp is a mix of channels (anywhere from 12’ to 90’) with shallower islandsAll of the plants and animals have evolved to adapt to the rising and falling water levels, the constantly changing mixture of freshwater and saltwater. The trees have long, exposed roots, that are underwater during high tide, and above water and above ground during low tide. There are many different fish, birds, reptiles (including crocodiles) that call the mangrove swamps home. The port where we put in is in the thick of the mangrove swamp. Basically, the closer you get to the ocean, the harder it is to build roads, yards, or anything else that requires dry, solid land. The combination of deep river channels and the ability to build a road to the site is why the port is located where it is. After putting in, we had about 3 miles of channel in the mangrove swamp to go down. The boat we were on had a depth gauge, and the depth in the channel was over 100’, which makes sense, as the channel is the access that all of the large ships need to take in order to get from open water to the loading docks. We hailed an old Papuan couple netting prawns in the tidal pool, bought some prawns for bait, and headed out to open water. Once we reached open water, we ran parallel to the coast, staying no more than a mile offshore. We ran over a bunch of sand bars/mud flats, and had as little depth as 2 feet, just barely enough to not run the prop into the mud. The shallower the depth, the larger the waves get, and coupling that with the inrushing tide, we had a pretty bouncy ride. After about 2 hours of bouncing around in We would occasionally see long boats full of Papuan tribesman, carrying supplies from port-site to their villages. There are two types of long boats, traditional and modern. The traditional long boats are around 15-20 feet long, about 2 feet wide, and about 2 feet tall, with a pointed end on both sides, much like the typical “Coleman Canoe”. The modern longboat has a 10-15HP outboard motor fitted to the back end, and is typically 20-25 feet long, 2 feet wide and 2 feet tall. We saw many of both kinds, obviously the further away from the port we were, the more motorized longboats we saw, mostly laden with supplies and/or tribesmen. Talk about living in a “Nat Geo” moment!
Motorized longboat
We only caught 4 fish the whole day, we attributed it to the extremely low and high tides that day. We put up with the tide rushing madly inland the whole time we were out, which actually ended up being a convenience, as we were able (with the help of GPS) to navigate our way back to the port through the deep channels in the mangrove swamps, avoiding getting ourselves tossed around in the open water. Were it not for the high tide, we probably wouldn’t have been able to make it through the swamp, due to submerged trees, logs and sandbars. I can’t even imagine how Jean Jaques Dozy (Dutch explorer who found the copper and gold deposits we are mining) navigated his way through the mangrove swamps, 50 miles inland, then went 20 miles and some 15,000’ in elevation to get to the ore deposits, all in the 1930’s, before GPS, maps and helicopter. After a day in the mangroves, I have a lot of respect for those intrepid explorers. Even today, the mangroves are very unforgiving, with the outcome of being stranded in them being very likely getting eaten by a reptile or getting bitten by a poisonous one. Hopefully the next time we go out, we will be able to get some more pictures of this very remote, beautiful yet unforgiving area.
July 5
Toilet help, if you need it. (Pria = man, Wanita = woman)
These signs are in several public bathrooms.
Late July 2007 As ironic as it seems, it is definitely winter here (as winter as it can get in the South Pacific). Even in the lowlands it is pretty mild, temps in the high 80’s to low 90’s. The activity has dropped off at the Sheraton Hotel, fresh seafood is hard to come by, and the produce seems a bit scarce too. The wet season is living up to it’s name, raining almost twice as much as normal, however there was an anomalous 4 days without any rain, it is amazing how quickly things dry out here. Everything depends on a daily rain, as the soil can dry out pretty quickly. Eric went up to the surface mine to look at some potential projects for the contractor he manages. Talk about being on the top of the world. Eric was at almost 13,000 feet at the side of the open pit mine, with a 15,600 foot peak in view, the highest point between the Himalayas and the The surface mine moves a lot of rock, with the help of giant shovels and haul trucks. See the
Still working on learning the mysteries of how to hit a tiny ball with a metal club (otherwise know as “Golf”). The ball is flying a bit further and a bit straighter than before, so we are making some progress. Hopefully we can get to where we can play a few holes without loosing 20 balls. It is actually fairly relaxing being out in the jungle surrounded by nature. We spent a few hours driving around the lowlands, spending some time with the native Papuans. They were very hospitable and were excited to have their pictures taken. Between us knowing a few Indonesian words, and them knowing a few English words, we were able to communicate a bit. Smiles from children warm the heart, no matter where you are.
Some tribesmen on the side of the road, gladly posing for us. Note the red beetle nut face paint.
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