Fernando’s Pearl Farm tour was a bit different to our expectations, first he took us to the pearl farm which consists of a grid of rope

lines between buoys in the water.

Off these lines are tied hundreds of short pieces of rope about 12 inches apart with the oysters growing on them in big clumps.

 

Fernando announced that if we wanted pearls we had to dive down and untie one of these clumps and bring it to his boat, the lines

were at a depth of around 10 metres !

 

Mark and Amy retrieved a line each – bravo.

Although I reached the lines I couldn’t equalise (big earache) and despite a couple of attempts I had to swim back up.

 

Photos -    

      

 

 Above

Me diving with Fernando, I resorted to stealing his clump of oysters.

Who invited the chipendales.

Mark proudly shows off the line he retrieved.

 

 

 

Fernando explains how the oysters are farmed.

 

These oysters have been growing for 18 months

and they are ready for harvesting the first pearls.

 

We now set off for the hut where the shells are opened

To see if there are any pearls inside.

 

The hut is also where Fernando impregnates baby

Oysters with a shell nucleus ready to place back

in the sea for 18 months whilst the pearl is cultivated

 

If the pearl produced is perfect then the process can be

repeated, grafting a shell into the same oyster.

 

 

The hut – on it’s own island and inside you can see the air conditioned laboratory !

       

 

We each cut open one of the oyster shells and find the pearl within it’s slimy sack. We had one perfect grey pearl and one

slightly misshapen pearl, hence Fernando calling it his ‘lucky dip’.

 

    

 

The pearl farming is not Fernando’s main job and it seems to be just a bit of a hobby now, they enjoy diving

and harvesting the pearls with the children during the summer holidays.

 

We persuaded Fernando to take us back to his house so that we could buy some more pearls.

It was a lengthy process as the girls sorted through bags and bags of pearls to find

the perfect size, shape and colour, Paul & Mark especially enjoyed this bit !