This week in Bunaken… Judith from the UK and dive guide Opel got a very pleasant surprise when they came across a mama dugong and her baby during a dive at Ron’s Point! Judith and Opel had been to Fukui, where the rest of the divers on the boat were diving, the day before so they chose to go to Ron’s Point instead which is right next to Fukui.

Right in the beginning of the dive, at around 10 m, Opel stuck his head around a large boulder and quickly waved Judith over. On the other side a big mama dugong was hanging around with her little calf! The encounter was quite brief as the dugongs were moving and Opel and Judith didn’t wan’t to startle them by swimming after them. Of course all the other divers (including the staff members not diving that day!) were very jealous. The photo is from an encounter by another guest a few years ago as Judith ‘forgot’ to take a photo. As we all know – no photo means it didn’t happen, right? 😉

Dugongs are listed as vulnerable on IUCN’s Red list and we are very lucky to have some of them around Bunaken. It is estimated that they give birth as rarely as every 5-7 years so to see a mother and a calf in our waters is super exciting!

PADI Advanced Open Water student Albert from Spain and instructor Ina got another kind of adrenaline rush this week. During the safety stop on Lekuan II they had the normal hundreds of red fang triggerfish hanging in the blue just a few meters off the reef. Suddenly five large giant trevallies came in from the blue, did one swim by and then with high speed charged in to the school of triggerfish. All the reef fish bolted in towards the reef with a big ‘WOOSH’ and the divers even got slapped by a couple of fish rushing to safety. Exciting times!

We were very sad to wave goodbye to our PADI Divemaster trainee Jacqueline this week. She has moved to Two Fish Lembeh to finish her Divemaster course. Keep an eye out for her blog about what she thinks of the ‘dark side’!