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Tuesday 22.2 – Majuro – Kosrae, Micronesia
Leaving Majuro, Marshall Islands. 45 minutes flight to Kwajalain atoll – also in the Marshall Islands. It is an American military base, and most people got off here. Nobody else were allowed off the plane. After 45 minutes the Island hopper continued and an hour later we were in the easternmost island in Micronesia – Kosrae. A lush and green island with high ‘mountains’ in the middle of the island. Similar to places like Bora Bora. We were the only tourists getting off the plane today together with 12 local. Mark from our hotel, Pacific Treelodge was waiting for us. He was hot happy with the tourist business – you were the only tourists on the plane? And Continental just cut back from 6 flights a week to 4 flights (two from each direction), and there are no other airlines servicing the island. February uses to be a busy month, but there are no one now. We will be the only guests this week. The drive to the Treelodge was not long – kind of a small island. But the change in humidity was stunning. Had not thought so much about it in Majuro.
At the Treelodge we opted for a quiet afternoon with beach visit. It was low tide when we arrived, but high tide later. The Bully restaurant is a near perfect restaurant. Great food and a place to meet both for westerners on the island and tourists. Tuesday is Movie night where they showed Angels and Demons. You enter it through one of two pathways through a swamp and it has views over backwaters and the interior of the island. An idyllic place. The hotel room is also fine with a small kitchenette and a bedroom. We decided to make breakfast our selves though the prices are ok here. We visited a couple of stores and the selection is even smaller than in the Marshalls. I tried for a couple of hours to upload to travelblog, but it timed out or disconnected many times. Mark laughed and said this was as always on this island.

Wednesday 23.2 Kosrae, Micronesia
After breakfast and a slow morning, we took a taxi to the Lelu ruins. ‘Widely considered a wonder of the ancient world’. Big words. The ruins date back to 1400-1800 and is now walls (compared to the inca walls, though not, but well done). There are some small pyramids of stone where the kings were displayed and then left to rot inside. The bones were then later removed and put in the ‘blue hole’ in the water just off the course way to Lelu island. Lelu island was the place for kings and noble men and the commoners had to deliver food to here. It is interesting in the pacific content, but objectively speaking, the structures are not impressing. No entrance fee. There is a hill on the island where the Japanese dug in during the war, but the hill was too difficult for the children. Returning we wanted to see the clam farm (they cultivate big clams up to 3 meters and also corals and fish), but we first entered a wrong place which was a crab farm. Much of the big crabs on the island has been depleted – probably because of harvesting, so now they try to cultivate them. It was a Pilipino in charge and he said it was still government founded but would probably be sold if it had success.

Read the full story and see more pictures on my homepage version: http://www.futtrup.name/RTW/Kosrae.html

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