It’s all going on in Komodo, soft lights, candles, romantic music, animals mating all over;o)))   2 beautiful eagle rays dancing around each other yesterday, so wonderful to watch, lots of Octopus around the reefs too. Nice juvenile Grey reef shark coming in very close, happy photographers.   no less than 9 ballet dancing Mantas today, all males, I peeked;o) think they were practicing the courting ritual, chasing around after each other in a conga line, then over and below each other, looping, twirling, what a show, simply amazing!! huge green turtle, white tip reef shark and a big black blotched ray. Batu bolong was 24c today, BRRRRRRR!!!!

Yeehaa was the cry as we whizzed along the Golden passage, started with wee pygmy’s with no current and turned into a decent rate on the Komodo scale of how scary can this current get;o)) We passed, Giant trevallys, motorways of fusiliers, white tip sharks, a hawksbil turtle and a lovely bunch of huge chevron barracudas, what a ride, ending in the shallow calm water the other side to spot crocodile fish, scorpion and a huge porcupine puffer, this was all after our first dive at Full moon with Grey sharks and the usual crowded fish streets, you just can’t get moved at that dive site;o)))))))

Just such a lovely time with the ‘Petite Poulet’ group;o) Elo, Cedric, Carol, Petra, Laurent, Bernard, Annie, Chantal, Jean Pierre, Lionel, Isabelle, Marie Francoise, Thank you to Helene & Xavier for keeping the staff laughing, and of course my weee chicken Ricardo Abrahao for spotting so much stuff, Last dive at Airstrip was just amazing, whilst watching a Manta getting cleaned an Eagle ray hovered above it, next trundles up a turtle to see what was going on then we had a swooping, diving fly by from 4 Devil rays, what a hectic 10 mins, don’t know why everyone was laughing when I pointed out the Nudibranch??? we’d also already seen a beautiful bamboo shark out swimming, pygmy’s at Tatawa kecil for the first dive and we all saw why it’s other name is Current city;o) a superb end to the holiday;o))

Very nice day diving today even with the wind, waves and currents! First dive we had a Manta, Oscar the spearer Mantis shrimp (shrimp and Oscar really don’t go), orangutan crabs, big barracuda getting cleaned, stingrays and more types of anemones and nemos than you could count, next dive whiz along the channel with 5 turtles, 13 huge milk fish, 3 chevron barracudas, schools of snappers and of course fusiliers, very happy Carolina, Bernhard and Kath;o))

2 dives yesterday just like hour long National Geographic documentaries, Crystal rock was so full of fish it was ridiculous, even on our safety stop we were surrounded by thousands of fusiliers with the sneaky Giant trevallies in amongst them and a shark mackerel hanging on the edges of the school and darting in to sca…tter them in all directions. 2nd dive in the channel not content with watching 3 sharks play in the current along came a Manta through the chute and flapped slowly above them, then in darted the huge 1+mt Giant trevally to see what all the fuss was about and to top it off everyone’s dream, 2 dolphins shot past behind the manta, I kid you not, it was unbelievable;o)) At the start of the dive we’d had a leaf fish, ribbon eel, morays, more giant trevallies circling us, Giant barracuda, every thing seemed to come in Size XXXL today;o) Trine, Moni, Oli and Peter very happy divers;o)))))))))))

Mantas everywhere with very curious ones stopping right in front of you to check you out then slowly moving off over our heads, all of us trying not to blow bubbles;o) Found a very strange snake eel swimming about before eventually spotting us and making a quick reverse into the sand and disapp…earing, can’t even remember what patterns he had now and nobody had a camera;o(

Wainilu the critter dive coming up trumps again with a Wonderpuss, you really can’t beat it for strange things popping up all over;o) 30 something Mantas just reported this morning at the airstrip with the guests requesting to do the dive a 2nd time straight after! Baby black manta up in the north with a white question mark as it’s markings on it’s belly;o) Weather is a lot better now, getting some rain in the night, hot during the day and the sea is a lot calmer, but strong currents with this full moon!

1st October we had a proposal from Ben to ask Angela underwater if she would marry him, awww it was so nice, happy to report she managed to say Yes in between the floods of tears filling her mask, Congratulations to you both, what a lovely couple.  We then went onto Wainilu for the 2nd dive and had a fantastic dive with frog fish, cow fish, pipe fish, feeding sea cucumbers, babies of every type of fish, a lovely day;o)

We had a family of 4 devil scorpion fish wandering around in the sand, the biggest green and very ugly had a smaller one jumping on top of it, then it would tuck in by the bigger ones tail and get scooped along, following on were 2 smaller ones trying to keep up, really was a family day out, very nice to watch and behaviour that we’ve never seen before;o) 2 Massive African Pompanos in the Channel today, this is the only place I’ve ever seen them before, so not sure why they turn up here once a year? Big grey shark show at full moon and 1 at Crystal Rock in the current along with the massive dogtooth Tuna, boy are they scary;o) Mantas are back in force.  New big black frog fish found at Wainilu and a gorgeous pair of robust ghost pipe fish and a Juv Zebra bat fish;o)))))

For the fans of Oscar the huge slasher Mantis shrimp at White sands, well just to let you know he is now bigger than ever after his burrow was covered for a couple of weeks, yes I think he officially is the biggest Mantis on the planet;o) and still as scary!! Getting lots of Mantas at the airstrip, lots of sharks at Full moon and Crystal.  Eagle rays seem to be congregating at Stingray City, beautiful to see them chasing each other.

Fine specimen of a Bamboo shark out swimming around at Orange Grove, divers got some nice photos, still getting Mantas even though this is not the season;o)  Pygmy seahorses to be found on various Fans and lots of Leaf fish at the moment.  New baby brown frog fish found at Stingray, hope he stays in the same place.  Black and white banded Sea Kraits popping up everywhere, a huge one on Batu bolong, Wainilu still coming up with new things everytime we dive there, a critter heaven;o)

Today Crystal Rock simply took my breath away. We had the eagle ray right up close, a bamboo shark hiding under a table coral, a couple of massive napoleons honking away, a white tip cruising through the middle of us divers…..and then…. I decided to go for a wander up to the current at the side of the rock to …see if there was any action to be had….and I saw these silver shapes materialize in the blue. As I got closer I realised they were dolphins! 8 of them! Frolicking right in front of me, just playing in the current with a couple of young ‘uns to boot. I got so excited I think I went more high pitched than them! Seriously – a dream come true. It was official – I was the most excited diver in Komodo today!
Batu Bolong stunning we had a massive bamboo shark hunting round the pinnacles & blue fin trevallies going mental on the fusiliers. Then a random school of bumphead parrotfish cropped up on Horsehoe Reef.
40 javanese cownose rays on Crystal Rock last week…that was very cool!!
Raging currents at Full Moon today! But what a dive it was! Sharks. Everywhere! Even saw some Grey Reefies in the crowd. And what about the enormous Giant Trevallys hanging smoothly in the current?! Or those poor little nemo’s that almost got blown off!
Nice drift at hanging gardens with the biggest Giant Trevally heckling us all the way, even when we were spotting mandarin fish in the shallows there he was dancing around and inbetween us!