This week in Lembongan, The North Coast of Nusa Penida offers a lot of great dive sites and our dive at Mangrove this week was completely stunning!! The visibility was amazing and the fun divers pointed some big moray eels, scorpion fish and crocodile fish. Guy and Emily who were doing their Underwater Naturalist Adventure Dive found a lot of species that they didn’t know and enjoyed learning more about plants and corals.
This dive site is called so due to its location, right by the mangrove area to the north east of Nusa Lembongan. The Mangrove dive site offers a gently sloping coral reef, with small bommies and table corals that wait to be explored for the small creatures. Often marble rays and other larger species are swimming past in deeper water.
The mangrove forests are really important for the environment conservation as they provide critical filters to manage all the land-based run-off that damage the reef. They also provide a protective habitat for a lot of species (birds, fishes etc.). Its total area covers around 230 hectares with 13 different mangrove trees species and 7 associated plants. The mangrove forest functions as fishery resources, ecotourism, beach natural protection and carbon dioxide absorption. Nusa Penida Sub-District has 108 hectares of sea grass mostly found in Nusa Lembongan and Nusa Ceningan. All these areas are included in the MPA (Marine Protected Area).
Molas Molas were popping all over the place in Crystal Bay and helped the divers to forget the cold temperature. All of them had the chance to see up to 6 molas in one dive and a lot of manta rays during our trips to Crystal Bay, Manta Point or on the north coast.
Ohh, I have lost my wide angle there. But it´s a nice place.