Chek Jawa Boardwalk during high tide

We're back at Chek Jawa for our November guided walk! And this time during a high spring tide!

One of the best ways to orientate yourself at Chek Jawa will be to climb up the Jejawi Tower to have a bird's eye view of the whole surrounding. And of course it is the perfect spot to have a group photo! :)

We were fortunate to spot a couple of the white bellied sea eagles perching on the branches. This was soon followed an excellent view of them soaring in the sky. We were awe-struck!

At the back mangroves, we witnessed how the water slowly seeped in as the tide continues to turn higher. Nevertheless, we still managed to spot some of these colourful tiny fiddler crabs before the water came in.

During the high tide, many of the Gold spotted mudskippers can be found "anchored" on the surface of the mangrove roots. Both of them were raising their colourful dorsal fins at the same time in this photo!

The kids totally enjoyed spotting the mudskippers in all sorts of positions and places, such as this pair that looks like they are queuing up for something haha.

Here is another pair found high and dry up on the surface of a rock boulder.

How apt it is to spot several hermit crabs during the Naked Hermit Crabs walk. Thankfully, they are not exactly naked as they each have a shell as their home and are clinging onto the mangrove roots as well.

As we were walking along the mangrove boardwalk towards the coastal boardwalk, we had another look at the eagle.

Here is a closer look! :-)

What's there to see during high tide at Chek Jawa Boardwalk?

With the high tide, we had more opportunities to spot fishes swimming happily in the water such as this huge garfish that thrilled our group when we saw it!

And of course many other schools of fishes swimming together in security.

And woohoo, we had a special find discovered by one of our sharp-eye visitor!

This long and slender snake is the Oriental whip snake (Ahaetulla prasina). Don't you think it is such a beauty?

The oriental whi is mildly venomous but shy and will prefer to slide away into the undergrowth. If you want to take a closer look at it, avoid disturbing it.

Another lovely surprise would be the family of wild boars that greeted us when we arrived at Chek Jawa!

The mum was actually sniffing the young ones, probably to check on them. It was many of our first time witnessing this special act of love. :)

On this trip, we also had four student councillors from Dunman High School with us as part of their environmental exposure programme. Please feel free to read their reflections and more about what this programme is about on the EXCEL Exposure blog.

Special thanks to Ley Kun, Ria, Daniel, Pei Yan and Kok Sheng for guiding on this trip. We look forward to seeing you all during our December trip!

Read Ria's Wildshores blog post on this trip: http://wildshores.blogspot.com/2011/11/chek-jawa-with-naked-hermit-crabs.html