by Nara Wisesa

Hurray, we’re back in action! After the 3 days of unplanned stop in Kalabahi, it feels great to be back out in the open sea! On this seventh day we left Kalabahi at 4 in the morning, by 7 am we have reached our destination and the team was raring to go! We planned to dive at 4 locations today, and 2 of which were on the western coast of Pantar Island. The current at both locations were calm, and the coral cover were pretty good, at the 1st location team A had an encounter with a turtle, while on the 2nd location, it was team B’s turn to see one. I also managed to have my first dive during this expedition today! At the second location, I joined team A for a dive together with our dive master. Since it’s been ages since my last dive (which was back in 2011), I needed to regain my composure underwater, and re-familiarize myself with controlling my buoyancy, though by the end of the dive, our dive master said that after 2-3 more dives I should be fine. At that location I became buddy to Mumu as he collected his benthic data, the dive itself was a bit of a blur to me since I spent more time adjusting my buoyancy, thus I did not pay much attention towards my surrounding, but from what I remember, the current was not too strong, however the coral was a bit patchy, with signs of damage from blast fishing in the past.

As we finished both of our dives on the north-western shore of Pantar, we went north towards PulauBatang. The landscape of this island is very interesting. BatangIsalnd looks like an island out of the Teletubbies world, dominated by a grassy hill with several trees and a few goats can be seen grazing. The reefs here were composed mainly of coral rubbles, evidence that in the past, this area was also heavily bombed. However, young corals were seen here and there by the team, indicating that recruitment of new corals is taking place. Since this area has been declared as part of the MPA’s core zone, hopefully this will leave the area in peace, safe from further blast fishing, and in a few years’ time, hopefully the reef will recover to its former glory.

Our last location for the day is a sandflat/atoll called Lapang. The island of Lapang itself is actually small and very flat, unlike the hill island of Batang just next to it. However, the sandflats that extended north from that island continues for several kilometers, composed of sand and coral rubbles. The team had a hard time finding a good reef to sample, and in the end, only team A managed to find a reasonable sampling site, while team B failed to fine one. Thus team B (together with me who was acting as the GPS tracker man) waited until team A finished by visiting one of the coral mounds in the area, in the middle of which lies a beautiful small pool full of seagrass, anemones, and soft coral as well as numerous herbivorous fishes. This pool seems like a safe haven for this community. As night falls, we spent the night right next to the sandflats, the Menami dropping its anchors in the shallow waters, sheltered from waves. We were treated with a breathtaking view as the sun sets over the island of Lembata, further towards the west, the colors were simply amazing, as if the whole sky was on fire.