Charlie's Diving Blog: Excellent dives at Boo Window, Whale Rock, and Tank Rock January 29, 2023

Tuesday, March 28, 2023

Excellent dives at Boo Window, Whale Rock, and Tank Rock January 29, 2023

These are three great dive sites in the Misool managed area. Diving these sites means tightly controlled one hour windows for each dive because diving these sites are in such high demand. The first dive, at Boo Window, included more beautiful coral gardens, anemone fish, a Green Turtle, cleaning stations, and more. Below: Anemone Fish

Triggerfish with cleaner wrasse, below:

Below, Angelfish with very dark green coral.

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Below, Green Turtle. The Green Turtles in Raja Ampat seem exceptionally calm with divers, probably from frequent encounters.

Below, Bumphead Parrotfish. Always love seeing these though it is not easy to get close enough for a photo.

Our second dive of the day was at Whale Rock, named for a whale shaped rock you can see just to the right of center in the foreground of this picture (to the left of Whale Rock is Nudi Rock, smaller, with small trees giving the rock its nudibranch gills. This was a dive site on a future day for us.)

Here's the dive briefing drawing of Whale Rock:

I had multiple nice encounters with Napoleon Wrasse on this dive. Below, in the foreground, a juvenile Napoleon Wrasse has its mouth open for the cleaner wrasse (wish I'd caught the wrasse while it was in his mouth!), in the background you can see a larger darker mature Napoleon Wrasse. Below:

Anemone Fish peeking out from his anemone, below:

Below: Top of picture, Yellowtail Fusiliers, bottom, Banner Butterflyfish.

Below, Donna with huge, beautiful sea fans.

Beautiful Sea Fan and soft coral, below:

Below: Schooling Big Eye Trevalle Jacks.

Cornetfish, below:

Below, magnificent, but this time not aggressive, Titan Triggerfish on cleaner station with attentive cleaner wrasse:

Below, a pair of beautiful Angelfish on the right with a beautiful Triggerfish on the left. Second photo is a closeup of the Angelfish.

I was thrilled to be able to get the following sequence of shots of a Spadefish getting its gills cleaned by cleaner wrasse!

Obviously, I can't resist either cleaning stations or Anemonefish:

School of Fusiliers crossing a coral bommie:

Beautiful soft coral, below:

Fish lined up, in the characteristic position, head up, tail down, signalling they want cleaned by the two cleaner wrasse you can also see in the picture, below:

White Tipped Reef Sharks, below:

Last but not least, a curious Napoleon Wrasse comes by just as I've got to start up for my safety stop to end the dive.

Our third dive of the day was at Tank Rock. Another beautiful dive. I was thrilled to start the dive with an extended encounter with a usually shy fish, the polka dotted Barramundi. Below:

Below, Fusiliers and Yellow Tailed Fusiliers.

Groupers with Green Coral, below:

Donna videoing amall Banded Damselfish on Table Coral, below:

Below, Green Moray. Saw a number of these on the trip but didn't see any other kind of Moray.

We switched guides for our group for the last few days of diving. Gui, aka William, seen in the next two pictures, was harassed by a small 7 inch remora and I was amused by his antics as he tried to get it to leave. The remora is attached near his ankle. Below: