Misool, first stop in Raja Ampat

The area of Raja Ampat boasts the highest level of marine biodiversity on the planet. Our first stop as we headed out from Sorong was to the south, the area of Misool. Here we spent several days diving the following spectacular dive sites:

Kalig Wall, Nudi Rock, Boo East, Boo Windows, Barracuda Rock, Wedding Cake, Wayil Island, Yilliet Kecil, Magic Mountain, Boo West, Baby Rock.
Here we saw many amazing critters from Skeleton Shrimp and Pygmy Sea horses, to sea snakes, to sea fans that grow bigger than a person.

This tiny pygmy squid we saw on a night dive was particularly adorable!

Each morning and evening we were treated to beautiful skies. I tried to capture them with my iPhone in panorama mode:

At the Boo Windows dive site there was a school of very friendly Batfish. I happened to have a macro lens on so I took this portrait

The camouflage of the critters is amazing sometimes, see if you can spot the pygmy seahorse in the photo below:

I hope you’ve enjoyed this post. There will be more to come from Raja Ampat in the following days…

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11 thoughts on “Misool, first stop in Raja Ampat”

Beautiful pictures but the first one in particular is amazing!

Wonderful photos Suzy :-D
I think my favorites are either the pygmy squid or the yellow pygmy seahorse ;-)

Very beautiful collection, Suzy.

Lovely photos. I couldn’t spot the sea horse on my phone, will look at it from home. That yellow fish was captured when it had its mouth open. Were it to see it’s own pictures, it would probably be terribly embarrassed. My empathies to the fish.
The batfish, wonder why is it called as such. At least to my naive eyes, nothing even remotely similar to the bats….brings a question, did you use flash? I am told it causes disorientation to the fish.
More later….looking for more too.