Diving in Palau

Palau is made up of many small islands and to get about we had to rely on the speed boat, leaving a stream of sea spray at our wake everywhere we went .

Palau is famous for its sharks, and the giant clams which were much sought after by the Taiwanese .

The Jelly Fish Lake is on the top of a small hill , and is filled with 2 types of jelly fishes which have lost their sting , so you can swim freely among them .

We did a night dive on a wreck , a sunken Japanese warship from the second world war which was discovered just 6 months previously. The ship sat at an angle , the deepest point was 120 feet and the shallowest at 60 feet .

The night dive was a huge mistake as the ship was covered in deep silt, being undisturbed for almost 50 years, and with 13 people kicking about in the dark, we could create a mud bath very easily.

That was exactly what happened .

I was pushed by my thoughtless buddy into a chamber which had only one small opening to the outside, just after the 2 divers in front of me left after kicking up a thick storm of mud, and I was literally blinded the moment I was inside .

There I was, 80 feet under water, alone in an iron chamber in the bowels of a huge warship , unable to see beyond my fingers held right in front of my eyes, totally disorientated, and my air was running out. I tried to swim out but kept bumping into the walls and creating more mud cloud .

I had about 5 minutes of air left and nobody could have helped me.

So I prayed.

Right after my prayer I found that I was already out of the boat, floating in mid water at 40 feet , unseen by my diving buddies who were all still waiting for me at the only entrance to the chamber.

To this day I've no idea what happened .

There's a folklore in Palau that on the island there are small birds which carry a light in their beaks, and whenever there're people lost on the islands, they'll go to them and use the lights to lead them home.

On that night these birds must be out in full force !