Tiny island

Just behind Teop Island, there is a very small, uninhabited island. There’s not much there other than some trees and the rocky, coral ground.

The rough coral ground:

When the tide is low, it is possible to walk/wade there from Teop Island. Here are a series of photos showing the little island as we progressively got closer to it:

Finally, as we arrived at the island, we could look back and see Teop Island with the larger Bougainville island and mountains in the background. Nice view.

Tsikaut views

I often post photos of views on my blog, and usually they’re either taken at Buka or in the Teop area. But today we have some different views – ones that don’t normally feature on my blog, because I’m not at Tsikaut very often. Tsikaut is at the north of mainland Bougainville. I went there one Sunday for church when I was staying with some friends for a weekend at Sohano Island. Anyway, I hope you enjoy these views taken from Tsikaut.

Stormy tropical views

Here are some views from our village with dark clouds in the sky.

Looking towards Irue with canoe on the beach in the foreground:

Irue closer up. I like the canoe going past on the right.

And another canoe-on-the-beach photo with Teop Island in the background.

Unonovi views

It’s a long story, so I won’t go into it, but back in December, I stayed overnight at a village called Unonovi. It is about a 5-10 minute walk away from where we live.

I got up early in the morning when the sun was still low in the sky and took some photos, which I will share with you now.

Early morning light on the trees:

If you go to the beach and look to the right (or south-ish), this is what you see:

If you look to the left (or north-ish), you see Teop Island:

Here is a zoomed-in photo – half of Teop Island and also the smaller uninhabited island called Teovorana.

View from Buka

Sorry it’s been so long between blog posts! I’ve been in the village a lot and not had much time to write any. Hopefully they will be a bit more regular from now on.

Well, when I got back to Bougainville, I enjoyed the nice views from the Centre at Buka where we stay when we’re not in the village. This kind of view really does match the slow pace of life – you step out of the flat and just stand and gaze for a few minutes appreciating the beauty of God’s creation.

Daytime view:

The sun sets on the other side of the island, but we get some nice pink hues in the sky over the sea sometimes.

Moon above the sea with pink sunset clouds:

Moonrise with reflection over the sea:

Scenic photos

Here are some of my favourite scenic photos that I took in Scotland. I’ll let you enjoy them without further comment.

Sunny photos!

Scotland’s not been having a great summer this year, but I did manage to find some sunny moments when I was there. Here are some of them.

Loch Ness. Yes there are clouds too, but you can see the sun reflecting on the water.

An almost cloudless sky – at Orkney.

Also at Orkney.

Orkney.

Orkney again.

My ancestral ground – MacKay country in the far north of Scotland.

When this photo was taken it was so sunny that I have a shadow, and it was warm enough for me to have bare arms!

Blue sky at St Andrews.

Where I'm staying

While I’m here in Canada, I’m staying with Rebekah at her parents’ house. It’s out in the country and it has nice views.

Here is their house – the bedroom I’m in is upstairs, at the window by itself on the left.

Here’s my room:

Here is some of the bushland near the house:

Horses in the paddock with some farmland in the background:

This is Grace, one of the horses that they have rescued. She was very skinny and in poor condition when they got her and now she is doing very well.

Tropics on a rainy day

When we think of tropical islands, we usually think of warm sunny days and scenes like the one below:

The reality however is that it’s not ALWAYS like that. Sometimes the sky goes grey and the heavens open. The sea loses its beautiful bright blue colour too. The photo below is taken from roughly the same place as the one above.

Coconut palms and frangipani – a common perception of the tropics, but usually with a bright blue sky in the background too. Rainy day photos don’t make for quite as attractive tourism campaigns, but they are a reality, and it’s a nice relief from the hot sun, plus it fills up the tanks with drinking water.

Sunset

Not a lot to say, just some lovely sunset photos taken one afternoon. What a beautiful place to live!

Trip to Teabes

We visited a village area called Teabes during our last village stay. This is our village grandpa’s home village, so it was nice to see where he used to live and meet some more Teop people.

We travelled by motor boat and on the way we passed these tiny, uninhabited, rocky islands, which we can always see from Hiovabon. They looked quite photogenic as we passed.

There was lovely white sand beaches at Teabes.

When you go to Teabes by motor boat, you travel through some mangroves to get there. They had some cool reflections in the still water.

Heading out of the mangroves as we leave Teabes: