Tom and Dan spent a couple of hours this morning in the mangroves off the Passe Houareau channel between the islands of Malabar and Grande Terre photographing and filming the abundant marine life. There wasn’t enough room in the unstable and leaking tiny tin boat for the whole team to get to the mangroves, so I waded with a bright yellow pelican case full of camera equipment balanced on my head towards the circling frigate birds. Not far down across the lagoon the boat came into view and I abandoned my plan of photographing the circling frigate birds ahead in the harsh light and squeezed in a quick snorkel in the channel in the last half hour before we had to escape from the out-going tide. It is the healthiest mangrove system I have ever seen, with countless fish species and numerous hawksbill and green turtles. All levels of the ecosystem were present, from the fish that graze algae and nibble on sea grass to predators such as barracuda and the black tip reef shark, who has accompanied us on almost every single dive on Aldabra. Lined with knotted roots where black spotted snappers mingled and studded in large coral…

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I can't believe that it's Friday, when I woke up yesterday morning I was really sure that it was Tuesday!!Things are moving into a higher gear at the SOSSC, work that has had the appearance of a pile of rubble for about two weeks, appeared as an actual bathroom this morning (without running water yet), but it does definitely look like a bathroom!This is actually the boardroom serving as the temporary workshop for the second floor.The Technical Area for the SOS Dive Team's equipment storage and maintenance is due for completion tomorrow morning with the final installation of the lighting and power plugs. The two specially designed fold down workbenches will allow the maximum utilisation of the area and there is now dedicated shelf and racking space for all of the team's filming and diving equipment.Our Video Editing Suite is very close to having it's fixtures, fittings and final electrical reticulation installed to await the installation of the actual video editing system.Dr Compagno's office is taking shape very well and the entrance hall area is about to be "FINALLY" painted!My team at the centre is truly amazing (including our designers, artists, builders, painters and all round…

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I mentioned before that a group of school kids were on the island... Each year Seychellois school children around the ages of 10-16 compete with one another to win a visit to Aldabra courtesy of the Seychelles Island Foundation. From first setting foot in the Seychelles on the SOSF expedition I realized that for most Seychellois Aldabra is a destination all have heard off but most will never reach. As the immigrations officer who proudly stamped my passport with the Seychelles’ coco da mer shaped entry stamp put it when he discovered my final destination was Aldabra… “Ah Aldabra, yes well that might as well be in Europe.” It is another world even for the Seychellois and only the cream of the environment/biology crop are invited to experience 10 days here. Last night Tom, Dan and myself provided their entertainment. I gave them an introduction on shark conservation and the Save Our Seas Foundation’s mission: to document the role that sharks and rays play in maintaining healthy marine ecosystems and the consequences of removing them from the world’s oceans. They learnt that sharks and rays are elasmobranches and were amazed that they are made of the substance in our ears,…

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The last few days have bounced between episodes of patient waiting (for our boat) and frantic gulps for air…Our accommodation has moved around, meaning we have carried crate after crate after pelican box after camera - in fact most of our 1,515kgs of luggage back and forth up the beach more than once. Working from one base yesterday and today we had time again to focus on looking for sharks and getting the shots.Yesterday we went to the outer reef to refill bait station 2 and see what shark species we would find. Sharks = 0 : Massive Net = 1. The net, a big green monstrosity hanging from a platform of floating bamboo poles and attached to a fish-attracting device (FAD) is put to sea by fishermen who return, with the help of its satellite/ GPS beacon, weeks or months later to pole the fish. The fishermen mainly catch tuna that are attracted to the smaller fish species using the net as cover, a scarce resource in the blue ocean. While Rainer was busy cutting the net free from the reef and our bait station Dan hovered over the reef’s bottom filming the coral and a friendly grouper.This morning…

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After the exciting experience of releasing another shark the new week brought with it a set of different challenges: builders and interior designers moving slower than I would like, plumbers being fired, painters painting the house the wrong colour, and much more.The highlight was a visit to the Centre by Chris Clarke, Executive Director of the Save Our Seas Foundation. I was initially apprehensive to show Chris the house, the decisions I've made to break down walls, re-arrange rooms, move this, get rid of that, etc. - after all he last saw the building in pristine condition and now it looks like a building site! Much relieved, Chris took it all with aplomb and seemed well pleased with our progress. But the days are ticking at a pace that leaves me having sleepless nights - we only have about 8 weeks left before we have our grand opening and first international shark conference and I'm still sitting behind a hired desk and deciding whether the chairs of the boardroom table have wheels or not!To escape the pressure Chris took Dr Leonard Compagno, Chief Scientist of SOSSC, Alison Kock, Marine Biologist and field researcher of SOSSC, and myself to lunch.…

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Happy Easter!I woke to a tropical downpour and silence in the little wooden house we are all sharing – grabbed my camera, pulled its raincoat on and tip toed out the door. Half way down the beach the rain stopped and I sat waiting for the shore birds to do something – catch a fish, fly over a shark fin, go for a swim – anything. That’s the game, and in the early morning with the light still soft and the air cool it is beautiful.Our planned dive in the mangrove channel this evening was washed away as we arrived and discovered that the clean water that flows on an incoming tide had not yet made it into the channels and visibility was down to 1 metre. Plan B moved forward and we snorkeled in the lagoon, which was pumping with a current of clean water. The lagoon is full of limestone islands that have been carved by the sea over the years into gigantic mushrooms and nicknamed champignon, mushroom.Dan finally got the opportunity to try out the latest technology in HD video and introduced to Aldabra the lilo technique. Cracking the silver floater out of the box he blew…

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Last night was our first night off and instead of catching up on some much needed sleep we stayed up watching the classic film Blue Water White Death, a documentary made in the 1970s about the first expedition to find great white sharks. It is interesting to step back in time and see how easy it was to drop in on an ocean full of sharks, when our expedition is spending hours upon end searching for them to no avail. Also what we know now about shark behaviour has changed dramatically in the last 30 years, most of the last ten.Today, the island was invaded by Seychellois children. While our boat went to Assumption early this morning to pick them up Rainer, Tom, Dan and myself went to sea in a little tin boat. Perfect timing, as we needed a small boat to get into the mangrove channels early this morning and again later this evening with the high tide. Both times we had exactly two hours to work, Dan filming and Tom and I photographing non-stop to capture the magic of a healthy mangrove system. Where we go so does the bait, but the black tips only came in…

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