Our third week has seen us truly get stuck into life here, with teams Chelsea and Barcelona covering both land and sea. Goodbye to the fishing competition and hello to whales, sharks, turtles and devil rays!!
Although Saturday’s forecast of rough seas and rain sadly decided to be accurate for once, swimming teaching, diving and lounging in the sun were replaced with card games, dissertation research and a fabulous murder mystery night orchestrated by Ark, and accompanied by popcorn and mac and cheese. A visit to Tofo was greatly received on Sunday; we wandered around the town’s markets, purchasing postcards and beautiful wax paintings before our fab surf lessons (or delicious cappuccino for Sophie)! The day continued getting better as we visited the eagerly anticipated Mexican restaurant (‘Tacos n Frends’ should you ever want to visit which you must) and it certainly did not disappoint; our stomachs were filled with burritos, quesadillas, churros and tequila before we headed to a gorgeous little bar to watch the sunset. Ark’s birthday gave us the wonderful excuse to bake and eat cake, so the day ended with some pretty happy people with bellies full of chocolate cake!
Monday gave team Chelsea an opportunity to redeem themselves with the plastic machine after last week’s unfortunately timed power cut, and an evidently efficient production line of Joe and Sophie with Bento as the expert and muscle machine allowed them to churn out over 50 sets of moulds, leading them to storm ahead of team Barcelona. Chelsea’s further successes have certainly been seen this week in the water, spotting a white-tipped reef shark on a dive, riding the waves with dolphins and finessing their quadrat surveying technique, although having 18 sightings of whale behaviour from land and collecting beach clean and fisheries data of course can’t go unmentioned.
Whilst team Barcelona experienced a rather different week away from the ocean at Escola Básica de Paindane, plenty of fun was had. Mornings were spent painting a mural on a wall of the school with Julia and Bento, bringing people, a manta, breaching humpback and flamingo into one landscape as school children flocked. The afternoons were then filled with teaching the secondary school about sharks and rays, accompanied by Pascoal who we greatly appreciated in aiding us to lesson plan, translate and have a little control over each class!
Friday was a little different, starting the day at fisheries and Paindane school before heading off to Inhambane airport with the hopes of renewing our visas! With the help of lots of kind individuals we were successful in our main mission as well as learning how to play Mancala, eat the best chips possibly ever at the airport and visit a bakery that sold the most delicious pastries and made the whole trip worth it.
So, with exciting animal sightings, spending time in Paindane and witnessing yet more stunning sunrises, week 3 is looking pretty hard to beat!
