Got back from Samoa a little over a week ago. Had a great trip. Three days of work, one day off.
My day off in Samoa
The weather had cleared from the stormy past few days, 32 degrees and the sun was shining. I headed down to the local dive shop in search of a fellow spearo, they only knew of 2 people on the island who spearfished. So I got a number and gave it a call. Got in touch with Jerome, one off the local Samoans, who gladly called in sick so he could take me out for the day. He told me to meet him at the first house past the wharf, not knowing there was more than one wharf I went to the wrong house, about 50kms away on the other side of the island, which is pretty far considering the speed limit over there is only 40kms because of the shitty roads. Got in touch with Jerome again and got him to give the taxi driver directions. One hour late I was there.
Rocked up at his house and met the family, everyone is pretty friendly over there. Had a quick tea and went to go find the boat. The boat wasn't really a boat, it was a hand carved canoe that his brother made. I got in one side, and fell straight back out the other, the outrigger did stuff all and it was more like riding a bike. I learnt my lesson after losing my sunnies and didn't fall out again. We paddled out to the reef edge geared up and jumped in. I realised I left my dive camera back out the house, I was pretty disappointed with the fish life anyway so it didn't matter that much. Lots and lots of small pretty fish, but only one big and tasty one seen, some black coral trout looking thing. Vis was close to 50 meters so he got away from me long before I had any chance to stalk him. Jerome had a handmade Hawaiian sling and was going nuts on all the small fish, he took close to a hundred getting a few on each breath zooming around with baby sized reject shop quality fins. I was pretty impressed with he’s diving abilities for what he had to use. I felt bad shooting something so small so I only took a few fish for dinner. A storm started coming in so we headed back in.
Jerome asked me if I was hungry, I nervously said yes. His family served up whole raw fish that we’d caught, and month old bananas fermented in coconut milk. I ate a few fish, not bad actually, the little black ones as they call them were the best. Got a little ill from the banana but managed to keep it down. Then met the muwati, the tribe leader who literally has a licence to kill. Had a kava session with the boys and felt a whole lot better.
The vessel
The catch
All in all a great day. I’ve got a bit more knowledge on the good dive spots now and some local contacts, so next time should be a ripper.
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