Raja Ampat 1 - Raja Ampat 2 - Bunaken - Lembeh

Lembeh

After the two morning dives I went on the boat to leave Bunaken. We went over to Manado...


At the harbour


And then we saw this bus...


On the road over to the other side of Sulawesi Island




A couple of pics from the resort on the Island of Lembeh (it is only a couple of minutes boat ride over to Sulawesi mainland). The resident baby lizard once I had a bungalow in that resort as well - same problem with mix up in booking of the room....


View from the bungalow over to Sulawesi mainland




The resort


And now underwater... Lembeh Strait is known for the strange creatures that you can find there. I have the impression that for all fish that exist they have a hairy and/or a pgymy version of it. It is pretty amazing what you can find there. Lots of the creatures are poisonous though and since a lot of them are very good in camouflage too it is a good idea to be careful...
Two pygmy seahorses


Liked how the fish took on the same colour as the sponge




Hairy ghostpipefish


Swarm of cathfish (and this shows why visibility was not good close to them ).


Not sure what exactly this is (fish, yes, bit don't know which one)


Fireworm


Orang Utan crab


mimic octopous


Baby coconut octopus


Pufferfish


Pregnant shrimp in bubble coral


Little fish on a whip coral


Colourful nudi


Pygmy lionfish


Eggs of a flamboyant cuttlefish - you can already see how it will look like


Adult flamboyant cuttlefish


Ambon scorpionfish


Upside down jellyfish


Dragonet


Babies everywhere...


Nudi


Mantis shrimp - I stay away from them because they can jump out of their wholes with 100km/h and they are VERY strong...


Looks like the are kissing, right?


I find them really cute...


And a yellow one...


Something interesting going on outside?


Lembeh seadragon - looks a little bit like pygmy seahorses but it is longer and has antennae on it's back


Love the texture...


nice starfish


White frogfish


This crab was very tiny...


Robust ghostpipefish


Two nice nudis...




And that pygmy cuttlefish was maybe 3 or 4 cm long...

Leaf fish/Schaukelfisch


Spider crab


Different spider crab


I think this is a white V octopus


Mototi octopus (one of the rarer species)


Little crab. In reality it was maybe 1 cm long


The mantis shrimp in the most common colours


Demon stinger


Have to look u pthe name of that one as well - forgot, sorry


Ambon scorpionfish - can you see how well this is hidden? I had to look several times before I saw it


Stargazer snake eel


Nudi


Kauri shell


Never saw a seahrose in this 'typical' position before.


Emperor shrimp


Frogfish


Murray eel


This cutie was about 2 cm long... really small.


Frogfish who.....


walked over to a banded shrimp. Idiot me didn't stay to see if there was a fight between them *argh*


Robust ghotspipefish (two)


This floudner seems to have a crab leg in it's mouth


Banga cardinal fish


I guess this is a snake eel too


This one is missing an eye


The finger is just so you have a comparison at how small the seahorse is


Pregnant shrimp on a whip coral


Hairy frogfish with a half open mouth. Let me tell you something at this point. Last year I saw a similar hairy frogfish at the same dive site. This year I heard that dive guides fed it because underwater photographers wanted to have a pic of it with the mouth open. There was a meeting of the Lembeh dive guides to talk about this because it was obvious that this was not good for the fish. It died anyway. So if you read this: PLEASE do respect the nature and don't mess with it just for a picture.


Polonaise


Trying out fishportraits again


Ugly seacucumber


Hairy orang utah crab


Coconut octopus


Ghostpipefish again


Another nice nudi


Teenage clown sweetlip


Mandarin fish girl


Pipefish duo


Mating mandarin fish


Hermkit crab


Since it was my last day I could decide where to go. I hadn't been too happy with the dives of the day before (especially the mandarin dive was not good since there were too many divers there - due to shops not sticking to the schedule that had been set up in order to avoid these crowds). So I asked if we could go back to the flamboyant cuttlefish eggs. Which is where we went for the first dive...


Why do the legs remind me of a beard?


Balloonfish


Another coconut octopus. This was a really funny one as it lowered the shell and in the end it looked like a turtle to me.


And this is the first hairy frogfish that I FOUND MYSELF!!! *yeehhaaawww* But only because I put my stick close to it and therefore it moved. At first I thought it was a scorpionfish but then I had a closer look and saw what it was. So it was 'ding, ding, ding' at my tank.


I need to add that the day before we had been looking invane for a couple of things. Like giant and hairy frogfish but we didn't find them. For the second dive we went back to the dive site that by now is probably famous for it's hairy frogfish. And we found this one...


And that one. We didn't find the big one again.


Snake eel


Mimic octopus trying to fake a lionfish...


And then the dives were over and I had to dry my equipment for the dive back home. Since that day I was diving for the last day I went in the water although my ears were hurting. Bad idea... The next morning I finished packing and at 10 AM after I had said my goodbyes to everyone I went on the the boat towards Bitung. Last glance at the resort.


Fisherman


Eiffel tower in Bitung


And a fountain (not sure there is water in it) in Bitung...


At the airport I checked in and it was business 'as usual'. Flight to Singapore was uneventful but I was in pain. So as soon as we arrived in Singapore I went to the clinic in the Transit Area and was given antibiotics and strong pain meds for my ears. That helped (no pain in my ears but a stomach in uproar for the rest of the trip... ). Arrived in Frankfurt, got my luggage, took the train and - was home again after 4 weeks.

As a final remark I would like to say that once again I had a wonderful time in Indonesia. I loved the Papua Paradise resort and loved the underwater world in Sulawesi. People in Indonesia are just sooo friendly and unspoiled by tourism (yet). And I met a lot of interesting and nice people who were my companions for part of my trip. I would like to thank all of them because they made my trip very special.

THE END...