The Seychelles Adventure...

It began on Wednesday evening (January 12th, 2011) as Russ packed his luggage for his trip to Desroches Island, in the Seychelles. Where are the Seychelles?- some of you might ask. The Seychelles are a little island chain about 900 miles off the eastern coast of Africa, in the Indian Ocean. If you find Somalia on a map, look just south east of there... you know- where the Somali Pirates probably hang out and wait for unsuspecting fly-fishermen to cross their paths. That is where Russ was headed. He had been packing and preparing for this trip for months. He had spent TOO MANY hours tying flies, preparing reels, winding lines, tying more flies, talking on the phone, e-mailing, tying more flies, ordering needed products, preparing camera equipment, designing clothing products (mostly hats and t-shirts) and having them made, and tying more flies. It is always a HUGE ordeal!

He was leaving Thurday morning from the Las Vegas airport, so on Wednesday evening he began to put ALL of his goods in his luggage. Then he proceeded to take it all out and start again. Once it was all in- for the second time- he went and stood on my bathroom scale... 74 pounds of luggage... 24 pounds over his weight limit. So he emptied out his bags again and started overThe pictures are of his bags as he packed. Notice the small green Able bag (the picture makes it look way bigger than it really is), this was his clothes bag for 16 days. He only packed 3 days worth of clothes so he could take ALL of his fishing gear! What in the NASTY?! He claimed there would be laundry accomodations. We will see.

He met Ryan in Las Vegas, rearranged luggage again, and finally began the adventure. They flew from Vegas to Dallas, then from Dallas to Paris, France. They had a bit of a layover in Paris. Here are parts of an e-mail from Russ describing this part of the trip:

We landed at 1:30 am Utah time, 9:30 am Paris time. I think the date might be yesterday or lasternight (this is how Gracie used to say last night... we still use laster-night in our house), not sure. Wait by looking at my itinerary we leave on the 14th, so we are probably just eight hours ahead of you. Well judging by how the euros are dressed Ryan and I probably stand out like euros do in the US. We are way too colorful, our pants are too baggy and our shoes aren't pointy enough. Coming into the airport all you could see was farmland. Grant got here and we found a place to pay to store our bags. The subway connects with the airport so we took it to downtown Paris and ran around like crazy trying to see some of the sights. Well I am impressed with Paris its neat. It's old and those building are way bigger than I thought they would be. The Louvre, we didn't go in, is flipping huge- at least three stories. And the courtyard... you could put at least 5 football fields in it. We could see the Eiffel tower way off in the distance pretty cool. We actually went into Notre Dame because it was free. Incredible!! It's old there and streets going everywhere in all different directions and the streets are as tiny as the cars. (I left out the I miss you's and I love you's for your sake).

After spending the day in France, they boarded another plane and flew 16 hours to the Seychelles. Here is part of another e-mail:

Well we made it to the seychelles after all that time. We boarded the plane in Paris and made the flight to Mahe. It was longer than the flight to paris, it was 16 hours!! Mahe was pretty, imagine an island and the beaches and then it turns into mountains not far off of the coast. Its cool looking even though they are small islands. We then flew the 45 minutes out to Desroches after a couple of hour layover. Wow if there is any place that I have been that you would love this is hands down the place. The island is beautiful!!!!!!!!!! The landing strip is cleared out of the jungle and it is just grass every where. They took us to our rooms at the lodge by golf cart and oh my gosh, it is like a five star resort. It is really unbelievable. This is a place where you would send me off fishing for the day and forget I was gone. If I can send some pictures tomorrow I will. The room has a huge bed with this curtain around it to keep out any possible bugs. It has two bathrooms, one with the stall and a bidet the other is where you would primp but the shower and tub are just outside that door and outside but private. You also have sliding glass doors that lead to a deck with a private bed outside with the netting so you could nap or lounge outside. The pool is beautiful and right on the beach. We had a five course dinner tonight. Backing up, we had a quick lunch and then got on our mountain bike to ride to where the boat was, just a few hundred yards. All the little villas are spread out and everyone has a schwinn mountain bike with a basket on it. We drove in a boat 45 minutes to Poivre island and fished. I got one really good shot at a permit and caught some small jacks. Grant had the same experience. When I met back up with Ryan that little bugger had caught a 12 pound permit and got tons of shots! I'm telling you it just isn't fair!!!!

Yep, I am having the same thought... poor you! We arranged through e-mail to meet on the computer Sunday morning at 10 am our time... 9 pm his time. We were able to use Skype and video chat on-line. It was amazing. We could see him as he talked and see part of the hotel he was staying at. Isn't technology incredible?! He is on the very opposite side of the world and we could see him as he talked to us. All was well... until Monday rolled around. The heating element went out on my dryer, all of the schedule conflicts began (orthodontist appointments conflicting with basketball, gymnastics conflicting with baseball, hair appointment conflicting with carpool, etc., etc., etc.) and we didn't hear from Russ all week- no email, no Skype, no IM's, no nothing! I was going to file a missing persons report with our buddy who is an FBI agent. I told him that

1. if he did find Russ and everything was fine and he was just having a good time fishing and just forgot about us for 8 days... to tell him not to bother coming home!

2. if he had been captured by the Somali Pirates and they were seeking ransom... I was willing to pay, if they could teach him how to do dishes and scrub toilets.

3. if he was injured or hurt- get him the aid he needed and then bring that medical help home with him... because he may need more assistance once he got home.

Needless to say, everything was just fine. They had traveled to another island with no ammenities, not even hot water. Therefore, no internet connection, no skype, no google phone calls, etc. I really was happy he was fine and safe when we did finally hear from him. Here are just a few pictures of his adventure...