Wet Blue Diary

KOH TAO ADASINDAKİ BALİNA KÖPEKBALIĞI

I was desperate to see one of these amazing animals and photograph it. I missed it badly when I was in Mombasa-Kenya  March 2009. We even had a plane for checking out the shark from the sky, 2 videographers, 3 phootgraphers was on board. I had only one day, but unfortunately there was no sharks around these days. (Please click on the thumbnails for the larger image)

I was waiting to see one of those lovely animals in Koh Tao but also knew that you need to be lucky. Last day last dive we heard from the radio that everybody was at White Rock Diving site and there is one shark swimming around. We were at least 1 hour away from it at the South Pinnacle. Immediately started the engine and cruised to White Rock which is close to north tip of the Island. I was more than ready when we get there jumped into the water before the engine stopped and as soon as I opened my eyes and saw that gorgeous creature 5 meters away coming directly to me. The largest but if you ask me the most beautiful fish on the planet avaraging 9 meters long!

She was swimming with an army of remoras and other symbiotic fish that is benefiting from the parasites on her body. The firt thing I thought is what a mouth! so large, so little eyes. She swam above me so close to my body just a few cms above. I was so happy, but then tried to catch up with it. She looks she swims slowly, so gently movements of her fin but she is very fast actually. I hanged around her around 30 minutes took lots of pictures but I was sweating and breathing so badly trying to catch up with it. I thought I am going to get exhausted.

Rhincodon typus whale shark (Balina köpekbalığı)

She was a baby  4 meters long but not easy to handle even with that sight. What a beautiful and gentle creature, she is  adorable. With a size like that how can you be this sweet natured. I feel in love with this creature and understood the reason behind efforts of people trying to protect it. Her body is gray and ful of dots on top and all white below.  Scientist can recognize the animal from looking at shoulder. So it would be nice to take pictures from just a little above from the sharks eye level left side.

İt was amazing to see big group of people, the chaos of divers and snorkellers around her. She looked like didn’t bothered from it but  I was. She went undernath Big Blue’s boat and took this picture of her, the hitchhiker fish around her and the divers surronding her.

I spent 9 days in Koh Tao loved the Island and it was some of the best days of my 40 days Thailand-Cambodia trip. Thanks to crew and manager of BigBlue for inviting me over. Go dive with them, they are good fellows!
Needlefish school in South Pinnacle of Koh Tao

http://www.bigbluediving.com/

I have spent around 40 days in Thailand and was able to do around 20 dives with scuba and 10 free dives. I had a chance to get quite a good amount of UW pictures and different species from there. There are pictures that I am really satisfied with an there are some places where the visibility was poor. But overally, I could say this was a succesful trip for me!

I am going to shoh here the grouper species that I was able to photograph. Groupers are among the family of Serranidae and I guess I had 7-8 different species of them in this trip.

Please click on the figure in order to enlarge them

The first one is the Blacktip Grouper 

They are a small type of grouper. Blacktip gropers grow up to 40 cm and 2 kg.

Epinephelus fasciatus (Forsskål, 1775)

The second one is Malabar grouper,

They are huge in size, one of the biggest ones. They can get around 150 kg and 1.5 m long

Epinephelus malabaricus Forsskål, 1775

This one known as Coral Rock Cod or Coral grouper. It has beautiful bright red color all over its body. It can grow to a size of 45 cm.

Cephalopholis miniata   (Forsskål, 1775)

Another one with blue line over his body. know as Bluelined Grouper or Blue line rock cod.  

It can grow to a size of 35 cm. 

Cephalopholis formosa (Shaw, 1812)

I would like to give my special thanks to BIGBLUE in Koh Tao and …. inSimilland Islands for supporting me for these dives. Thank you! Go and visit them they are both very professional and nicely operated dive centers

I would like to share some of the macro pictures from my trip to Thailand. I will try to share them and give information about the species as much as I could.

Please click on the figure in order to enlarge them

We have spent 40 days in Thailand and Cambodia and I had a chance to dive in different locations in Thailand. The first one was Beautiful Simillan Islands. These pictures were from East of Eden dive sight (night dive).

Simillan Islands is northwest of Phuket. You can either go there from Phuket with daily tours (which I don’t recommend as it takes long time to get there) or you can go up north to the town where they take you to the Islands. Spending some time there, is a better way to experience the place.

I wish I had some more chances for night diving as I have encountered many nocturnal animals (night time lovers).Night diving gives great opportunities for photography and better light.

We spent one night and 2 days of diving in Simillan Islands (5 dives), great place and rich marine life.

The only dissapontment for me was not seeing any sharks or other big guys except for turtles but the richness of the marine life is stunning indeed.