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One chanad was caught. We passed the "Steel Seafarer" a reefer freighter from New York (arrived Apr. 25 left N.Y. about Apr. 3rd). I saw my museum boxes on barge C-34. All my efforts even going out to the freighter, and talking to the hands on west pier did not prevent the damn stuff from going to Al Khobar. It is supposed to return tonight, but I will be lucky if I ever see it again, what between Aramco & customs. Complete frustration and delay is the by-word of this place in all matters. It was calm and sultry tonight with cloudy skies and light southerly winds.
   Apr. 30 - Calm around 6:00 A.M. with a sudden shamal springing up around 7 A.M. and continuing strong all morning. U-48-29 The crew collected 1 siganus, 11 filefish etc. in the big fish trap for me. The fish, however, did not preserve well internally, so I cut out their guts. 
[[insertion]] 'Had al Lowh' [[/insertion]] 
   We headed for a sandy point about 2 miles north of Ras Tanura in Tarut Bay where we anchored very close to shore and spent the day. I set the eel pots and got my first 2 small [[underline]] Nemipterus [[/underline]] which were a beautiful pale pink in color with silver below. The shamal continued strong all day with clearing skies in the afternoon. This evening we headed back to Ras Tanura to pick up Jim and Ed.
   May 1 - Strong Shamal continued all day today with dust flying off the dock. We had some rewiring done on the boat by Mr. Evans and helpers. It was another frustrating day partly due to weather and partly due to general conditions. In the evening, we all headed to the same Sandy Pt. and even the crew was happy. I set 2 eel pots and 1 large trap baited with 2 mole lobsters, and a couple of crabs and herring caught the evening before. We fished with the light over the stern this evening and had the most bait fish around that I have seen any night yet including a large bunch of larval fish. Atherinids, dussumierids, and sardines were most common including several half beaks, mole lobsters, gub gubs, and numerous sea snakes
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up to 3 feet long. They would slowly swim to the top and apparently gulp air and then swim down rapidly out of sight. I saw one all tied up in knots; may be he was catching a fish. They all appeared to be the same species as I have already caught sand colored with black bands on the little ones, and pale grey bands on the bigger ones. We must have seen at least 3 dozen snakes or more in the two or three hours we were fishing off the stern. The bottom appeared to be sand. It was about 3 fathoms of water and about 50 yds. from shore. I think part of the abundance of fish etc. was because we were on the lee side of a sand spit, and there was almost no tidal current. Hence catching fish was a lot easier. I saw one grey fish about a foot long, but did not get a good look at it. Ed Gurley caught a sooty tern roosting at night on the deck roof, I took a picture of both of them the next morning. 
   May 2nd - I got a hold of most of my stuff this afternoon which is all at the Ras-Tanura 
storehouse. Mr. Sanders helped me locate the stuff and we talked fish. It continued fair with strong shamal winds till late afternoon. I discovered a small [[underline]] toadfish [[/underline]] in the eel pot but he was rotted, I had failed to see him among the oyster shells. I brought six boxes of my stuff abroad after Jim waged a successful talk with customs. 
   This evening, we returned to the sandy point and had boiled mole lobster "Um al Rubyān" and 
fried sardines for supper. The 2 inch dussumierids had [[underline]] ripe eggs [[/underline]] like the large atherinids of last night. The tide was faster and the crabs fewer, and the bait harder to get, but it was thick as last night, tho we were farther off shore. The wind quieted at sunset, coming up again after 10 p.m.
   May 3- We got going about 7:30 with light to fair shamal winds and went to Rahaima and talked with 3 fishermen in a boat