Tai ta nic! Full Steam Ahead!

I love the sense of humour, No chance of an ice berg here!

Never a dull moment, these days! This is what passes for Staff Development here at the Juniper Tree....
Seriously, though; we travelled down south of Bangkok to the Dolphin Bay Juniper Tree, this week, to catch up with Caspar and Gill.
We had a number of special moments in just a 2 day visit. A lovely beach day, the view above is 50 yards from the front gate of the JTDB.
This visitor to the Juniper Tree had more than her fair share of charm, but we were soon out of sugar cane so off she went with a trumpity, trump etc.

The beach is amazing here, sea lovely and warm, a bit silty out from the shore, so the water is  not too clear, but loads of beach combing to do. Millions of hermit crabs from too small to be easily seen up to the size of an apple! In the picture of Joan below it was a huge hermit crab the provoked the reaction; so well known to her friends!
I've got pictures somewhere of Joan hanging out the back of a boat just off Lindisfarne, yelling, "Puffins" to a group of not so interested students from Croydon  from way back BC (before children!)
This reaction could be seen and heard about any sea urchin, anemone, fish or other critter in an Aberdaron rock-pool on a family holiday, or equally on a Field Course with "A" level Biology students.

I
The other picture of Joan is her "Safety Testing" the new water slide. Due to a bad job done at the installation, the tiles on the bottom and sides of the pool are coming off, and Caspar is frantically trying to schedule a major, re-grouting of the pool whilst the Juniper Tree is quieter. Joan spend a good hour diving down to the bottom of the pool with lumps of epoxy putty to make the broken edges of the tiles safe until a proper repair can be done, the sacrifices you have to make to do your job!


We are finding our time is very full, not just with the work of the juniper Tree, but with Church and all the other aspects of developing a social life. I found myself riding one of our Head Gardener's motor bikes up to the supermarket the other day, as time was short; a thing I would never even consider doing at home! The other evening we went to Elliot and Jemima's school production; "The Music Man". The performance was superb and it brought back many happy memories of school plays both at my schools and our children's schools. Both Elliot on lighting and Jemima in the chorus did very well.
We have continued to host a small group, from CMCC (our church here) we now have 10 regulars and we enjoy a meal, singing and a devotional as well as a lot of informal chatting. 
The JT managers went "en mass" to an open day meeting at "The Well" a counselling centre used by many of our guests. The aim is to enable agencies involved in "Member Care" to share expertise and to network. With over 4,000 people involved in cross-cultural work based in Chiang Mai, there are a lot of needs to be met. 

The next views are the islands off the coast down at Dolphin Bay, in the Gulf of Siam. The water is very warm and the beautifully painted wooden fishing boats look amazing in the setting sun as they set off for a night of squid fishing. They all seem to have eerie green lanterns that, I guess, attract the fish; whatever, they look romantic against the night-time seascape.
You can see were the fishermen draw up their nets on the sand as there are patches of tiny fish left on the beach. The picture shows a fish stuck in the opening of a sand crab's hidey hole. 
I waited in vain for the crab to re-emerge and pull the fish down further; but I'm sure as soon as I left the crab returned to the task!
Aside from many varieties of sea shells, there was a very odd slug-like creature, pinkish in colour that enlarged and shrunk from ball shaped to sausage shapes at will. We decided it was most like a leech but odd, it certainly was.
There were a number of small, mushroom shaped jelly fish in the water, but no one seems to have been stung, so that's good!
Plenty of sandpipers run around the beach and with a pair of binoculars you could have spent a few hours identifying many more.
It may  become boring for me to relate that a surprise visitor to the rope mooring one of the fishing boats was a King Fisher! It really does seem that I am seeing them monthly since spotting my first ever at the age of 54!
The drive down to dolphin bay was in the dark but driving back up to Bangkok airport during day light was much more interesting. We had another driver who would have been more at home at Brands Hatch,  but we got a good look at the more rural areas of Thailand and then the industrial areas as we approached the Capital. There is such a strong contrast between the areas untouched by the modern world in their stark simplicity and the modern trappings of a 21st century city that could be anywhere in the world with it's Multi-National brand names plastered all over the place.


 Just prior to heading down South, things were very busy at the Juniper Tree. Mother's Day came and went, Joan had lovely cards, gifts and Skype messages from the kids. Where would we be without Amazon/ Moon Pig etc?
The roses here were from the Carey's children as they thought Joan wouldn't get flowers this year!
The new houses are going on a pace. We had to pay early for the steel for the roof structures to avoid a 40% price rise that is imminent, but we negotiated strenuously, over the price of electrical cable and managed to reduce that price by at least 30%!
One side effect of building along the side of our plot is that at least the new buildings will mask the rather ugly buildings next door. I don't think there is any chance of those buildings ever looking better as they 

belong to an orphanage for Hill-Tribe children and they seem to exist on next to nothing. The work they do there, however, is amazing.
My final picture isn't too clear, but I had include it; we were watching the tiny baby gecko on the ceiling of our living room when the larger Gecko pounced! I told Joan it was it's mum coming to take it to safety, but we both suspect otherwise! 
The new inhabitants of our Marine Aquarium seem to have settled in well. One clown fish has taken to hiding in a hole in one of the
 rocks which looks cute. They certainly have
 attracted a lot of interest among the Staff
 here, as much as the guests. Every one of the gardeners, kitchen and laundry staff
 have called in to see them.