My dad came for a visit last week. He's not much of a water guy so we didn't do any stand up paddling or snorkeling, but we did do stuff. Here are just some of the highlights.

First we got a boat ride  from Koror, through the Rock Islands to Peleliu. Godwin, of Dophin Bay, is a great driver, guide, and all around good guy. We dropped us off at Giant Clam Beach while he took the rest of the folks on board over to Jelly Fish Lake for a swim.

While we were sitting under the shade shelters on the beach, we heard noises coming from the jungle that covers the rest of this limestone island. The source of the noises were some pretty massive lizards. I think they were monitor lizards. Shauna trekked off into the jungle in an attempt to get a great photo. We saw quite a few come down to the edge of the jungle. The biggest one was about 6 feet long and the smaller ones were at least 4 feet long. When they are approaching you can hear their footsteps which sound heavy, as though a person were walking through the dense foliage. We'd camped on this beach before and never seen or even thought that these big guys were here. Pretty awesome!

We spent the night on the island of Peleliu at Dolphin Bay Resort. Godwin and Mayumi are fantastic hosts and always take such good care of their guests. They set us up with a WWII land tour led by Tangie, the curator of the WWII museum on Peleliu. He's really knowledgeable and a good guide. We wound our way through the arteries of dirt roads that cut through the jungle.

We saw WWII caves, tanks, planes, tunnels, bombed out buildings and monuments. We even got to go into the museum, which would have normally been closed.

At the south end of Peleliu, we sat and watched the Pacific Ocean and Philippine Sea come together. It's the first place in Palau we've seen real waves crashing on shore. It was quite dramatic and beautiful. The blowholes were like icing on the cake. I could sit and stare at those for hours.

After returning to Koror, we grabbed our buddy Fuanes and took my dad on a tour of Babeldaob. We visited 2 of the four standing traditional bais. This is the one in Melekeok. You can hike up an ancient stone pathway to get to it, or you can drive a muddy, bumpy, dirt track road through the jungle. We did the drive this time and had a couple moments of excitement - the "will we get stuck" and "will we slide into that gigantic hole" kind.

Up at the northern end of Babeldaob, in Ngarchelong  State we went to Badrulchau and saw the stone monoliths and came up with all sorts of ideas about their origin.

The ocean view from there is just plain jaw-dropping. All the shades of blue, the waves breaking at the offshore reef, and the jungle are just amazing.

A bit further north we found the Tet El Bad Stone Coffin.

There's something about having someone come to visit that makes you go out and see and do stuff you haven't gotten around to. Shauna and I got to see some new things and make some new discoveries this last week - what fun!