Diving Triton Bay (Fakfak)

Pioneering The Southern Birds Head Seascape

Southern Birds Head Seascape by Graham Abbott
> View a gallery from this area
> Read Yung Yip’s trip report
> Read Peter Rowland’s hilarious trip report
> Press release 18th September from the BBC
> Press release 18th September from The Independent
View David Doubilet’s Irian Jaya, Birds Head Peninsula photo gallery and article which includes the new Hemiscyllium sp., walking shark species from the Fakfak area at: http://www7.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0709/indonesia/indonesia.html. David was with Diving 4 Images in the Fakfak region!
View Alex Mustards Walking Shark story at: http://www.finsonline.com/blog/fins/20070111/on-the-trail-of-the-walking-shark.html
IMPORTANT NOTE: This may not be a dive destination for every diver. At times visibility can be very low, we have seen this area as low as 5-10m, if you want clear water diving and to see big fish on all dives this may not the place for you. In fact the Raja Ampat does not always have crystal clear water. Yes there are giant groupers, Napoleon wrasse, eagle rays, a few sharks, schooling baracuda & jacks, fish biomass like no where in Asia, we have even found the most outstanding critters. Though all this does not happen on every trip, this area changes and every trip so far has been very different, water clarity changes, critters are not always there, the giant groupers are not seen by every diver and the weather can be very changeable.
Fakfak & Beyond with Conservation International
This trip was always going to a special one… I mean it’s not everyday you get to go out diving with a boat full of marine experts. Dr. Mark Erdmann was the trip organiser for Conservation International, Dr. Gerry Allen was the fish expert, Gerry’s son Mark Allen was to study the fish bio-mass, Dr. Emre Turak and Lyndon Devantier were studying hard corals, there were also a group of others to go on land making surveys with the local fishing communities around the Birds Head Peninsula.

Mark and I had discussed this area and along with the others joining we were very excited about the southern area of the Birds Head Peninsula which includes Fakfak, Kaimana and Triton Bay. The main reason being topographically it looked fantastic. From the sea charts we noticed the range of environments looked like it should be very complete. Most exciting of all was that no other surveys or even serious recreational divers had been through this region and fully surveyed the diving potential. In essence we were pioneering this area. We had our baseline itinerary laid out of key areas we wanted to visit, though this was totally dependant on conditions and most importantly if we would hit any marine life hot spots.
Our first day was the usual slow start though we did manage to make one dive. Unlucky for Gerry, he flooded his camera on the very first dive, even worse… no back up camera either. Gerry didn’t seem to mind this hick up and carried on with his diving as if this had never happened. Our first dive turned out to be very productive with a new species of flasher wrasse, fish life was fairly good considering the reef must have been impacted quite a long time ago.
We came across a big waterfall that dropped from the gorgeous tropical rainforest directly into the ocean, we couldn’t help ourselves, we had to go and check it out close up ahhh! Another topside place a giant cave we could take the tender boat into, then a deep bay with ancient skulls lining the walls on the entrance and more skulls deep inside the bay on a small island. Searching we came across a few uncharted hidden lagoons in amongst the tropical growth. We even came across an area where we saw a small species of wild Kangaroo. The island scenery all round is just fantastic.
Hitting the spot – I would head out each morning often before everyone had woke up to search for the most appropriate site. This for me was the most exciting part of the trip. This really was dive site exploration at its best, most days I managed to check out many different locations! Many of the spots we came across blew us away, a few in particular were truly amazing, the fish life here was so intense. Mark Allen doing his bio-mass study didn’t know where or how to start, though he had to! He had been to Raja Ampat, Thailand, PNG and other areas to study the fish bio-mass there, though he said this really was something else! Another area we hit had Gerry Allen going crazy, he came up with a fish count of 330, earlier records had produced 301 on a site in Halmahera, then 284 on Kri island in Raja Ampat. Emra Turak and Lyndon Devantier went nutty when we hit an area very rich for coral species. During the two survey trips Gerry Allen managed to identify two new species of Epaulette “walking” sharks, a whole range of different wrasses, including the most amazing flasher and fairy wrasses and a very unusual dottyback which was seen to be mimicking the colour patterns of a very common damsel fish, a new species of tilefish, gobies and others!
Of the sites we came across those that stood out most and have been named are:
Disneyland – on one side of this island lies a few very large boulders covered in giant white coloured black coral bushes, a few great areas with soft corals and a deeper sandy slope great for critters and garden eels. A few bigger animals like manta rays, eagle rays, baracuda and spanish makerel can be seen here at times. In all a dive with a bit of joy for everyone!
Crocodile Rock – a great dive with a few different cool features, the first can seen on entry with a rock that just about surfaces, the rock is covered with small yellow sea cucumbers and lots of them, then we swim across a meadow of soft corals till we hit the Crocodile Rock, a rock formation here literally looks like a giant crocodile mouth, with soft corals hanging and rising up from the bottom, schools of snappers and sweetlips can be approached closely, angelfishes and yellow Bargibants pigmy seahorses can be seen around this area, moving on we start to see more and more yellow sea cucumbers till the amount gets out of control, literally thousands of them, just here we enter a crack in the reef and come put of a perfect archway that takes us round to another soft coral meadow on a mild slope – ooh lah lah!
One area I had yet to check out turns out to be yet another new site, this time for critters. This was probably the last site that our dive legend Larry Smith ever named, on Larry’s first trip to this region with his friends Donna and John, Donna always wanted to go back to one particular site and would say let’s go back to the one palm tree island, Larry named this site “Donna’s One Palm Tree Island” – here we have a slope down to 12-14m from here a very mild incline has lots of algae, scattered sea pens, the odd soft coral, black corals and small outcrops, within this area it is great to go hunting for those wish list critters.
Another new site we came across with the help of some news of a possible new species of velvet fish from Ned and Anna DeLoach. We dived this spot in search of this critter and didn’t find it on our one night dive here. Though this didn’t disappoint us as what we did find was even more great critters including bobtail squids, crabs and shrimps in sea pens, solar powered slugs, armina slugs, skeleton shrimps, planty of decorator crabs and then a “BIG WOW” as we hit a pair of Ambon scorpionfish, then as I swam over to bring Tim over to photograph the Ambon’s I passed a critter so great I yelled out with joy to call in the others – I’d found a small FLAMBOUYANT CUTTELFISH — a real ooh lah lah night dive!
I will find out as soon as I can what this was named!
Gado Gado – a great critter dive with a a variety of habitats from wall, reef slope to sand and algae patches with a few very cool nudibranchs – including regular solar powered slugs, ceratosoma (T bar nudi’s), along with other critters like the bumpy plucked chicken pigmy seahorse (H. denise), cowry shells and other cool critters…
Little Komodo – named by Dr. Gerry Allen… My first dive on this site was one of the most adrenalin powered dives I’ve ever had. Diving this site alone and probably being the very first scuba diver to visit these fish was an incredible experience. I was making this dive in a very strong current and on my own, then to have the added excitement of being surrounded by a whole assortment of fish and some rather big fish too, I really felt the fish here had never experienced sharing their environment with a scuba diver before. Here I was surrounded several times surrounded by vast amounts of fish, then came the jacks, some of which came in so fast and were so big my heart was really pumping with excitement, it may have been fear, though I was more excited about getting back to the main boat to tell the about this place and bring them over. The most exciting moment came when I looked up and was face to face with a few giant groupers, not your average groupers either, these were 2-3m monster groupers that seemed to stop me in the high flow of water and hold me there in my position for a moment so I could in their presence which at this moment almost felt surreal, kind of like running into Rutger Haeur on a dark evening and he does nothing but stands in front of you, staring down on you! Gerry obviously saw what I saw an came up from his first dive saying we had to name this place “Little Komodo”. This came from the Gerry’s first experiences of diving the pristine Komodo islands many years ago. At times this is the most intense fish site with fantastic soft coral cover, the shallows are just amazing, the are deeper areas with the most unique fields of orange and deep yellow tubastraea cup corals. Yes not quite the best survey site for corals and fish species but biomass, poor Mark had his job set aside, he said it was the most intense dive he had ever had to try and estimate biomass on.
The Fresh Water Vents – very unique fresh water upwellings rise up from reef, there are also a few of the largest sea fans I have ever seen, even those in the Banda Sea don’t get this large.
7th Heaven – another amazing fishy dive with gorgeous coral reef scenery and at times wild currents, my first decent here was yet another highly memorable one. After finding where the current split I descended and swam briskly into the current till I reached the reef crest, here I was surrounded by tons of fusiliers, larger fish lurked off reef like big Napoleon wrasse, I finally let go allowing the strong to take me where it wanted me to go, I drifted past some gorgeous coral bommies, some of which covered with orange and yellow cupped tubastraea corals atop these colourful coral rocks were thousands of small colourful anthias, then above these thousands of fusiliers, I held my hands out in front of me as if I had a camera, I took the memory snap to stay with me forever! The current swept me out along a spur out onto the crest of a deep drop off with endless soft corals, here the reef disappeared and I made my ascent! As I was surfacing, making my safety stop the name 7th Heaven came to mind, it just seemed all so appropriate!
White Rock Falls – good for critters, many different species, types and variations of pigmy sea horses and chances of biggies and at times schooling biggies cruising by off reef. Interesting topographical features on the rock fall itself, with good current flow fish life is very good!
The Batcave – on another check out dive I came across an area that looked great for critters with plenty of fire urchins, though we weren’t really looking for critter dives, just as I was about to end the search I though hey just swim into this current and see where it ends, I swam over a corner and kept swimming like crazy (usual for my exploratory dive experiences, often very exciting), I came to an area strewn with giant boulders as I went in between these boulders I was amazed by the amount of groupers I saw here, I also saw a few mobula rays and eagle rays, the topography alone here is just awesome with giant black coral covered boulders and passages between these giant boulders which makes for such dramatic scenery. It’s not bad for critters either!
Tanjung Anu (Wotchamackallit Point) – couldn’t quite think of a name for this and “anu” in bahasa Indonesia basically means, “erhm, what d’ya call it” a fantastic black coral forest drops off from 12-25m where it is packed with small silversides being fed upon by pelagic fishes this area is also a grouper aggregation point. We recently discovered a ledge where lots of groupers congregate at times with the odd giant Napoleon wrasse. We were also buzzed by a hueg school of jacks a few times here.
GT Rox – giant shallow swim through between two islands with great soft coral packed boulders, fantastic fish life and chances of seeing the odd big fish. The name comes once more from the first ever dive here where we all saw really big giant trevallies between these these rocks!
Batu Amir (Amirs Rok) – I’d been thinking of a name for this site, when our tender driver came to me and told me of another reef that came up close by, a robust hard coral garden packed with thousands of fusiliers and squadrons of lionfish feeding on the thousands of small sweepers. We recently explored this area more and found a great coral bowl like area which drops off and this is where we can see even more bigger fish and fantastic reef scenery!
Stumpy Rok -  a long reef spur juts away the island with excellent fish life, awesome soft corals and sea fans with a great chance of seeing large rays, on many dives here we have seen schooling rays. A great place to view tilefishes (5 different species), this is where the new species of tilefish can be seen at it’s shallowest depth recorded up to now of 42m, previously only recorded over 55m deep.
Terrace Number 3 – this is a top critter dive, so good we spent a whole day on this one site, with a few different species of ghost pipefish, pigmy sea horses and the most amazing soft coral area that is like it’s own unique eco system of soft coral critters, photographers and film makers could spend hours on end in this area and still be wanting more… This is probably one of the best night dives I ever had in Irian Jaya!
Kathy’s Rok – I had a name on my GPS for this site, though when we dived it I left out a name. I decided to name it after the trip had ended when we were in the area and as I looked over to the rock, I named this after the only diver who managed to stay down the whole dive and came up raving that it was her favourite fishy dive of her trip and we had some amazing fishy dives, so this was really saying something, of course great coral reef scenery! I’ve heard so many people saying sites should not be named after people, ah BS – if divers have such enthusiasm as this, they deserve to be remembered!
Headhunters Bay – an ancient human skull and some bones mark the entrance to this deep bay, I thought the name gave it an eerie vibe. Here we have a few different sites, with great shallow reef scenery and critters to areas with fire urchins, giant frogfish, twin spot gobies and plenty of colourful nembrotha nudibranchs, so many we would often see them feeding, mating and sitting atop alsorts of great places for hptoography.
Frantic Jack – my first dive here was another most exciting dive. I dropped down to a very fishy and colourful coral strewn boulder patch, I let the current take me down to a deep drop off, here there was very minimal coral life, I did see a giant grouper way down below me though I was not so impressed with this wall section so swimming on fast I came a to a great topographic gulley with interesting coral life and good small fish life above the corals, just as I was taking in the view I was buzzed for what seemed like minutes on end by a school of mixed species of jacks, from the giant GT’s to the smaller big eyes and many other species in amongst, this was really like I was being bombarded by these different fish, they were swimming frantically not knowing what was going on in their surroundings with this intruder to their environment! I had the feeling they were going a little nutty at the site of their first ever scuba diver. Photographically there a few gorgeous areas where giant baramundi cod and angelfish hang out!
Walkers Patch – I had one photo-pro’ / journalist who was thinking about a story on the epaulette “walking” shark, he kept asking when we would see them, as we weren’t really in the right environment I kept saying “maybe on this site”, though we should be able to see them on a site later in the trip. We hadn’t seen any and our last night dive we relocated the main boat to an area I thought was the ideal hiding place for the walking sharks. Not so confident in me he left his walking shark camera set up on back on the tender boat, though after less than 4 minutes of being underwater I signaled him to come over, these was a 4 footer right out in the open and with no concern what so ever about being surrounded by photographers and flashes going off. This photographer was shooting with his not so good walking shark camera set up and by the time he had turned to think about going up to the boat I had been up and came back handing him his walking shark camera set up, we saw about 6 of these walking sharks on our dive here! Later over dinner I put it about that I wanted a name for this special site, it was Peter Rowlands who came up with the best idea and we named it Walkers Patch! It is good for it’s shallow scenic soft covered bommies and has some interesting critters too!
There are many more not yet named!
In many recent press releases Mark Erdmann has dubbed this area a “species factory”. From the marine life perspective especially the coral reef biodiversity, it is unparalleled for an area this size.
Up to now the only way to dive this area is with dive live aboard vessel. Be one of the lucky first divers to join a trip with to this very hot new dive destination.
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