Rock Island Barbecue

On Saturday, the court staff organized a barbecue in the Rock Islands as part of Justice Miller's farewell. We met at M dock and loaded the supplies into two boats. They decided to have the men on one boat and women on the other and the men's boat headed off first to get the fire started. We headed down the east side and afer a short boat ride of about twenty minutes we arrived at Ngerkiil beach. It was a beach I had not been to before and was very pretty with a long beach and shade under the trees. There was a shelter with a barbecue and the guys got the fire going as the women arrived.

The men worked the barbecue while some of the women sat out on a bench preparing potato salad. The kids were off swimming and I sat in the shelter talking with the judges. We talked about current events like how the fishing companies have been in the Court and all over the news lately for illegal fishing, unrenewed permits, and unpaid taxes. Lunch was soon ready and we ate some of the barbecued chicken and beef.

When Palauans go out to Rock Islands and have a barbecue, the adults do not spend much time in the water. They will occasionally wade out a bit to cool off, but usually they spend their time in the shelter or on the beach talking, eating, or playing the occasional game. On the other hand, the kids love playing in the water and spend all their time in the water except to emerge to eat.

It was a beautiful and sunny day and I was eager to go snorkeling. I entered the water on one side of the island and slowly made my way around the island. Initially, it was shallow and filled with seagrass. As I made my around to where we had parked the boats I reached a nice area of coral. I hung around for a long time enjoying the water and watching the fish and coral. As I swam on the water became shallower and sandy. I made it all the way around and back to the beach.

While I had been swimming our Chief Marshal had arrived with freshly caught fish. They grilled it up and I ate a whole snapper by myself. I'm trying to eat fish as often as I can in my waning time in Palau. It took me a while to pick the snapper clean, but I was in no hurry and it was very tasty. For the rest of the afternoon, I sat back and relaxed and chatted more with my coworkers.

As the afternoon drew late it was time to depart. We piled back into the boats and sped off heading west. The water was extremely calm the tide very high which allowed us to travel just about anywhere through the islands without worrying about reefs. We zig-zagged through the islands over to the west side and began heading north.

On our way back we stopped at Cemetery Reef to have a quick swim. I had my snorkel gear so it was great fun to watch the fish congregate where the boats had parked. I saw three napoleon wrasses swimming along and a multitude of small yellow fish. The kids had fun jumping off the boats. It was a nice way too cool off and enjoy the water.

In the fading light we still had time for one more quick stop at the soft coral arch. It is basically a hole in a rock island that forms an arch above the water and extends under the water. I had stopped there before, but had not gone swimming. I swam out and then through the arch. Underwater the terrain is ever more spectacular with a few colorful coral along the bottom as you swim through the hole. I swam back and forth through the arch until our short time was up and we had to return to the boats. As we headed back we had to stop momentarily to switch gas tanks. During that time, we got to see a wonderful sunset next to Ulong. It was the perfect setting to end a great day in the Rock Islands.