Our Amateur Underwater Photography

The main reason for people to come to Manado, Sulawesi is to make the short boat ride to Bunaken Island. Bunaken is a very well-known diving island surrounded by coral reefs that drop straight down 90 degrees to form a coral reef wall. The snorkeling off the beach of the island is also great and you do not have to swim too out far to be surrounded by reefs and fish. A couple divers at our hotel even say that they actually prefer snorkeling here. The fish and coral seen are the same. One difference, however, is that snorkelers tend to scare away the fish while divers just sort of blend in with the aquatic life.

The currents at Bunaken tend to be quite strong, so we usually walk down the beach to find a good entry far enough away from our guesthouse, swim out to the reef and then glide back with the current. Bunaken has so many more types and schools of fish then we have seen thus far. It is like swimming in a tank. After snorkeling we usually check the book to try to get an idea of what we have just seen, but since I whiffed badly on the Togean blog (see comments), I will just post photos and state the obvious.

Apart from snorkeling there is really not much else for us to do on Bunaken, so I use this blog post to showcase our blossoming underwater photography from Bunaken and Togean Islands. Mika has a small fuji digital camera that we can take about 5M (15 ft.) down. It is quite difficult to maintain buoyancy underwater and get fish to sit still for a shot though, I must admit, our skills have improved some as we have traversed through islands in SE Asia. The images are definitely not professional grade underwater photography, but will hopefully give you a glimpse into the creatures and colors that we have been seeing every day while on islands in Sulawesi, Indonesia.

Fish holding their position by swimming against the current

A Ray

Visiting another world

Another Ray

A sea snake

Hide and Seek

I was one of the few people not to see a turtle. Look closely and you can see Mika's only shot of one.

I also made a few enemies in the ocean. This territorial anemone fish is staring me down,

while this very territorial damsel fish makes mad dashes at me until I swim away

Fox face butterfly fish

Something weird

Boxfish

Like swimming in an aquarium

and like floating in space