By : Nara Wisesa

We did our first set of surveys!! Unfortunately I haven’t had the chance to dive myself, since we have a surplus of rollmasters on board so we had to rotate. Thus I find myself in charge of getting some of the GPS coordinates and coordinating with the Menami captain in picking up team A, from their dive. Maneuvering the Menami during the pick-ups turned out to be quite a challenge, but this is still our first day, and we’re continuously learning to make the process more effective. Fortunately the dinghy that are dropping and picking up team B is much more maneuverable.

We only did two dives today since our crew is still tired from preparing and loading our equipment yesterday, and by the end of the day, we finally had our first set of data! The diving team here said the visibility was amazing, to them it felt like diving in an aquarium! Both dive sites, which are located in the tourism use zone, are in pretty good condition as well.Although team A’s 10 meter transect in the first site was mostly rubble, which may indicate that there used to be blast fishing activity in this area in the past, since the 3 meter transect was already showing good condition.

In addition to the data collected, the teams also made interesting observations. In the first diving site, team A encountered a pack of black-tip reef sharks! While in the second diving site, team B saw two hawksbill turtles. At the end of the day, we passed SikkaIsland on our way to a bay where Menami would be able to shelter for the night. This island is known to the local as the lair of Dugongs, unfortunately we weren’t lucky enough to see one today. Although I did glanced a low blow some distancestarboard of the boat, but it was too far away to make a positive ID of what it was, and whether it was a dugong or another marine mammal.

At night, we entered the data collected today into the database developed by our colleagues from WWF-US. We also made photographic backups of the data sheets, in case something happens to our database. Since this was our first time entering real data, the team was still getting used to the database interface, so the process was a bit slow and I was still needed to guide them through some of the functions. Hopefully as the team gets the grip on how to use it, the data entering process would be much faster in the coming days.
Another aspect that I’m loving so far in this expedition is the food! Our chef, who is a staff of WWF’s Wakatobi office, is amazing! I would never have expected to be able to eat such freshly and properly cooked food on board of an expedition vessel. Though I would need to watch for my intake, since I promised my wife that I will not gain weight by the time I come home... Oh dear, tough times ahead!