ASFA Partners and Input Centers–Field Trip
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9/18/2008 ASFA Partners and Input Centers
Once again, I rose early with Denise R. and we headed down to the beach for a bit of outrigger fun in the early morning light. After a bit of cleaning up, we were once more treated to a light breakfast, Fiji style. We finished closing the auctions and items were picked up and paid for by the happy winning bidders.
Richard Pepe moderated a session on ASFA partners and input centers to fill us in on new developments and what each center has accomplished in the last year.
After the morning tea, we began the 2nd business meeting for this year’s conference. Business accomplished, we moved on to the passing of the Presidency from Barb Butler to Elizabeth Winiarz. After some gleeful chortling by Barb, we had a presentation by Jan Haspeslagh (traitor that he is) on the 2009 IAMSLIC/Euraslic joint conference in Belgium: mussels, beer, chocolate & lace with a lot of great pictures of the rugged Belgian coast.
We were then handed a lunch and herded onto the bus for the afternoon field trip. Many escaped the net and didn’t join us. The countryside was gorgeous. Montfort Boys’ Town was the first stop on the trip with a visit to their aquaculture area. They raise ducks over the ponds.
The second stop was the Freshwater Prawn Farm which is a joint venture between a New Zealand company and the USP Marine Studies Department.
Finally we were dropped for a bit of shopping at the Pacific Harbour Arts Village. Afternoon tea was at Uprising Resort on the edge of the island facing Beqa (Benga) island. The buffet was set for 55 and we had a round dozen show up. Sigh. Excellent food and really excellent coffee (yeah, beat the tea). We returned to the Holiday Inn sated and satisfied with information, food and fun conversations on the bus.
