Day 8

Sunday, April 17, 2016
Raja Ampat, West Papua, Indonesia
It was Rons birthday yesterday so last night they made a cake and all the crew sang him a birthday song. It was a nice interlude from the sombre mood prevalent throughout the ship and it seemed to cheer everyone up a bit.

We spent the night near a large island that had a village with an elaborately painted mosque and a jetty jutting out from the beach . One of the dive tenders went out to meet the ferry that was bringing Lyn back to the boat.
There was quite a bit of activity around the island with dive tenders and fishing boats going in all directions and there was a tall tower on a hill near one end that had a lookout tower on it.

Our first dive this morning was at a site called 'Blue magic' and after Daniel scared us all with the promise of a strong current, it proved to have very little current and was an easy dive.
There were lots of large schools of reef fish all swirling about together and Pelagics swimming past in the blue water. The visibility wasn't particularly good and if it had of been, the dive would have been spectacular. There were Spanish mackerel, Dogtooth tuna and lots of Trevally and we even saw one little Black tip shark that was trying to hunt the Trevally.
There were various species of Batfish and big eyed Squirrel fish resting on the sand and massive schools of sardines on the surface.

A few Moray eels were hiding in holes and one particularly large one half out of its hole waving about with its mouth open .
Some of the fish were posing nicely for photos.

The second dive which was after breakfast was near an island at a site called Chicken reef and started with a sandy slope which was covered in Garden eels. As we continued along the reef we saw a few small Black tipped reef sharks and there was a manta prowling along out in the blue which unfortunately didn't come close enough to get a camera on it.
The water temp was cold again which was not good for my jaw, and I had to hang on to my regulator all the way.
There were a few little bommies covered in coral but on the whole there wasn't a great deal to look at as the visibility wasn't great either, but it was an ok dive.

After our lunch of spaghetti carbonara we set off for our last dive near another island called Frewinbonda. The water was a little bit warmer this time although the visibility seemed to be worse. It proved to be an interesting dive with no current and lots of unusual things to look at .
One of the dive guides found a tiny blue crayfish that was barely an inch long in a little cave, which was just stunning and then we swam around the bommies and admired the corals.

Out in the blue we spotted a black tip reef shark and then a little stingray scooted up from the sand. There was a turtle laying on top of the coral and many different species of reef fish swimming around the rocks.
It was an easy dive and, again, would have been spectacular if the vis had been better. Still, we made the best of it and enjoyed hovering around the bommies peering into the crevices and caves.
At the end of the dive one of the guides turned over a piece of coral and discovered a weird looking creature which turned out to be a 'Solar powered Nudibranch'.
I've never seen one before and didn't realise that Nudibranchs came in such large sizes.

Upon surfacing we discovered that it was still raining and was very cold in the wind so it was back to the boat for tea and banana fritters.

The boat rides out to the dive sites have been mercifully short which is nice as we don't have to endure the wind on our wetsuits for very long. It's ok when the sun is out but that hasn't happened a lot on this trip. Oh well, at least we are not getting cooked in the sun. The deck of the boat also gets very hot when the sun is on it and with bare feet that is not good!
They have to keep pouring water on it so we can walk on it.

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