Papua, dive into another world in Raja Ampat

Dear English-speaking readers, this page is an automatic Google translation from a post originally written in French. My apologies for the weird sentences and the funny mistakes that could have been generated during the process. If you can read French, the original and correct version can be found here:

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Indonesia: Raja Ampat + Bali - March 2012

Papua, Papua in Indonesian. A name full of jungles and beaches, exuberant coral and giant fish. Another world ... which amazed me.

Head to Raja Ampat

March 2012. The archipelago of Raja Ampat, the "Four Kings" is a dream I had for a long time. A wild paradise. Unique, still preserved.

How to get to Raja Ampat? I explain everything and I compiled all the useful information in the article of which I put you the link below. I have updated and enriched over the years and my various trips to Raja Ampat (it's official, it's now my favorite dive spot in the Indo-Pacific area):
→ Raja Ampat: practical information to organize your trip

Raja Ampat is an archipelago strewn with verdant islands, unexplored for some. I spent about ten days there. Half on one boat, the other half on the ground.

The place overwhelmed me. As I said in my previous postI think it's one of my best trips. I have only one desire, an idea in mind, since I returned: go back!

The karst islets dot the turquoise water. (Raja Ampat, West Papua, Indonesia, March 2012.)

UPDATE : this first trip to Raja Ampat date of March 2012 and since then I have returned ... many times! ! ! 🤗 I put you links to my other trips below:
→ 2012 - July: Alor + Raja Ampat
→ 2015 - January: Raja Ampat - stay on Kri Island
→ 2015 - October: Banda cruise - Raja Ampat aboard the Waow
→ 2016 - July: Komodo + Raja Ampat

Sorong

But it is far, Papua. Very far. It's deep in Indonesia, all the way east of the archipelago. And we must investigate several flights, to join Sorong, the "capital" ...

Upon arrival at the tiny Sorong Airport [UPDATE: there is now a new, larger and more modern airport]it's already hot. It's only 7am, but it's the hustle and bustle. I think the air is milder than Sulawesi, sweatier than Bali. It is very tropical, very humid, Papua. We are almost on the equator.

Carriers in blue and red shirts rush over the baggage as they are dropped. Men with very dark skin, frizzy hair. The "natives" do not really have anything Asian. Their physical appearance makes me think more of the aborigines of Australia, the peoples of the Pacific islands ... Yes! Here we are in West Papua: it is Melanesia, Oceania. The region may have passed under the authority of Indonesia in the 1960s, it is not at all Asia ...

A brief historical-political reminder: the western half of the island of New Guinea, once colonized by the Dutch, was annexed by Indonesia in 1963. The Indonesians acted as invaders and the army committed massacres. A Papuan separatist movement continues to take action and the Indonesian authorities do not hesitate to brutally repress any demonstration, even peaceful. Just recently, in 2017, almost twenty years later the Biak massacre (1998), the Indonesian military and police have carried out mass arrests in Nabire and Sentani, whilea petition for West Papua tries to make the voice of the Papuans heard on the international scene. I close the parenthesis, but when we go there as a tourist, we must be aware that the region is unstable and not quite a "paradise" for everyone ...

When the plane of Sriwijaya Air begins its descent, after passing the clouds, we see some islands surrounded by turquoise water.

Then comes the coast and the stilted huts of Sorong. Seen from above, a pile of roofs of rusted sheets. In the harbor, many freighters, some abandoned, that rust too.

I did not see much of Sorong, which I only went through on the way back and forth, like most tourists who come here.

A formless city, crossed by more or less vague roads, alternating miserable huts and rather ugly concrete buildings. Nothing very attractive, except the smiles of kids playing and passers-by watching you go to the sea. It is an industrial and mining port in full development. And the front door for Raja Ampat.

Wonder

The wonder comes a little later ...

First on the bridge of Black Manta, the divers boat where I was transferred, with other pale faces disembarked from the plane.

Then under the sea, where we will make bubbles with the fish in water at 29 ° C.

Then, a few days later, from the pontoon of the magnificent Sorido Bay Resort, where I will have the chance to extend my stay ...

Operation "I am a princess"

Eh yes ! When I travel to Indonesia, I transform myself into a princess. You remember the time I had a boat for myself, the Pascha, in Komodo? Again, for this trip to Raja Ampat, I had a huge stroke of luck ...

I booked a bungalow at Kri Eco Resort, to extend the stay after the cruise. And it's on the Black Mantabetween two dives, that I learn the good news: the Kri Eco is in maintenance, I will be "upgraded", without expenses, to much more chic Sorido Bay Resort neighbor, who has the same owner.

A princess, I tell you! ☺️ But I'll tell you more about this in a future post ...

He is online ! Read here → Live my life as a princess in Raja Ampat

Raja Ampat on a cruise

Let's go back on the boat, for the first part of this trip to Raja Ampat ...

On the Black Mantawe are 16 divers. A group of 14 Americans, who already know each other. And then my new friend, Miyo, a Japanese woman who lives in Bangkok, a stewardess by profession, and who is like me a dive lover.

I'm glad to hear that I share my cabin with her. We met at Makassar airport at 4am. Our boarding passes in hand, we were looking for the right door for our flight, a little troubled by the number of the table, the number on the boarding-pass and the number of the sound announcement that were not the same ... We started the conversation and quickly sympathized, discovering that we both went diving, and on the same boat!

The cruise-leader Black Manta is a Frenchman, Cédric Lesenéchal. Adorable, calm and patient, all smiles, he makes sure to put everyone at ease. At the time of diving briefings, we forget the traditional whiteboard. His thing is to make 3D models of sites!

On the table, he lays bottles of Ketchup and soy, has a jar, spreads a towel on it to compose a relief, embellishes the landscape with some accessories: felts, toothpick, salt shaker ... And here, work!

His greatest success: the briefing for dives at "Manta Spa", the site where the mantas, by tens, come spinning in the bubbles of the divers.

See the video and photos here → Manta Spa

Cedric makes mini-mantas in triangle-folded paper towels, with a toothpick piqued in it. Americans love it. Me too.

We will love it even more when we see the real mantas ... Not at all "paper towel" format, even they do not fit in the frame of the photos! ! !

In short, the atmosphere is good. The palanquées are small groups of four. Miyo is shooting underwater like me. We drink at the Bintang, the Indonesian beer, in the evening. The staff of the boat is very caring. Everything is perfect.

And most importantly, the dives are great. Raja Ampat now ranks number 1 in my top 3 Asian sites, ahead of Komodo and Sipadan ...

Photos !

The proof in pictures ... I had already posted a first series of photos sub, here:

→ Rajat Ampat, the wild archipelago

Here's another sample, drawn from the 2383 photos and videos I brought back from Raja Ampat. As usual, a click on the image can display it in large and you can then navigate from one to another with the arrow keys.

I knew, for having read, that the underwater "biodiversity" was exceptional in Raja Ampat. To see it with one's own eyes is something else. Another world, really ...