Prologue
To my personal experience, that diving trip had lots of thing to note into my mind, such as, I made decision to join that trip only 3 days before the D day; I was not familiar with the gears I brought; The longest time consumed to reach the destination; The most unreliable local people in the sites, and so many others… L. However, I got good experience and achievement at the end… J.
Few weeks before, I decided to buy new pocket camera since the old pocket camera was obsolete and did not fit with family needs. Canon G9 was my choice since I already have DSLR Nikon with powerful lens. Should I not have DSLR one, then my choice would be Olympus SP570UZ, since it had powerful lens.
Since then, I bought other accessories for that camera to take underwater pictures. Some of them I bought during Deep Indonesia 2008 exhibition, while others I bought from Singapore via my friend who lived there. Later, I found that the accessories I bought and paid in the exhibition was not complete, while I needed that soon. So I had to make the accessories myself. I was not lucky or I was reckless, I dropped the hand drill over my foot while I was making the accessories. It was really hurt, but the accessories were finally done. And the foot problem was the big reason why I was so doubtful to participate in that trip. Moreover, I got flu, even though it was getting better and better. Further reason was that I was totally unfamiliar with the new photo gear at all, not to say I got the wet lens only 4 days before the D day and had no chance to try it. I was thinking that if the flu was still bad, or my foot was still swollen and hurt, I would be only sightseeing in Tobelo and its surrounding area. I would not take risk to dive with flu or my foot could not fin.
With the new photo gear, my previous packing case was not fit at all, so that I need to make the new one too within couple days before the D day. So I did not have enough time to get to know with my new gear. I had to count on my basic and common knowledge to operate my new limited gear (I did not get any additional strobe for wide angle shot).
Day 1
Saturday, April 12th, I woke up before one o’clock in the morning because taxi operator ringed me up (Actually, I ordered the taxi to pick me at 1 am, not before). My plan was to wake up at 1 am, get dress, and catch the taxi around 1.15 or a bit later, but since I already woke up earlier, then I was ready at 1 am sharp. Since I had realized that the traffic would be pretty empty and I got plenty of time, then I asked the taxi driver to use ordinary road instead of toll way. Even so, I was still able to reach airport terminal 1A less then one hour, so that before 2 am I was already in the airport. Several minutes before I reached the airport, the committee leader sent me SMS asking me where I was; and I said I would reach airport within five minutes, but later I found no other participant neither the committee in the airport, even the lobby door was still closed. Only very few persons and one or two security guards were sitting there having chitchat. I was about to take rest when the committee leader arrived and downloaded lots of baggage.
I was a little surprised when she asked me about my foot condition and flu. How did she know my unfit condition? She told me that one of the other participant named Mrs. S who knew my condition advised her. She was then starting to distribute three t-shirts that had to be used by participants; every of them had to be used for different occasions during the trip. I needed to go to a little dark corner and changed my t-shirt with the new one as she told me so. Not so long, one by one participant was coming. One of the reasons why I liked diving was that I could make new friends as always. The same thing happened in that morning. We introduced each other and had chitchat. Later, I knew that actually there were few participants coming before me, but they were taking rest in the other separate parts of airport instead of terminal 1A.
We lined up as soon as the airport door opened. It was clearly seen that our group had extremely lots of baggage compared to other passengers. I myself who was trying to simplify my baggage to become only two big baggage and one small rucksack was asked to bring one more shoulder bag of the committee since she was extremely busy coordinating the transportation.
I was glad that there was no delay of the flight, but since the time of door opened, check in and departure of flight were pretty tight due to the abundance baggage we had then we did not have time to have breakfast. The Lion LCC also provided no meals in the flight. That was the first time for me to fly with Boeing 737-900 ER series. The plane was new and sound, I liked it much. We reached Sam Ratulangi airport at Manado on time and changed the connecting flight to Ternate. All participants used the spare time to have late breakfast in Manado airport. I myself had my Mc D burger brought from Jakarta. The connecting flight was Wings LCC using propeller engine. That was the second time for me to fly to Ternate. That time the plane was full, quite different with the plane I used the first time I went there on 2005 (or 2006?). The plane landed on Ternate pretty roughly; perhaps it was caused of the wet runway due to the heavy rain previously.
We reached Ternate afternoon and we found out that not all baggage were carried by the plane (how come?) without prior notice to the baggage owner. The flight officer said that was because the baggage were way too much and heavy. I could understand that the plane should not overweight for the sake of safety, but I could not understand that the baggage weight planning was too little for the whole passengers; or might be they preferred to bring people instead of baggage for the sake of profit by reducing the passenger’s convenience. The committee took prompt action by complaining to the officers in charge and asking them to bring the baggage right away using any following flight. Looking at the condition of the Sultan Baabullah Airport of Ternate, I felt as if I opened my memory when I was going there. I did not see any major progress, if I might not say stagnation. In the parking lot, I saw big billboard promoting new and seemed nice hotel in Ternate, which was not exist while I was in Ternate few years ago.
While we were waiting the baggage, we had late lunch in Padang restaurant called Sari Bundo in the center of Ternate. I did not know exactly whether the food was indeed great or because I was too hungry, however I tasted it good. And the tomato and mango juices were really excellent. Until we had finished our lunch, our baggage did not arrive completely in Ternate, so that participants killed the time in many ways; some of them were having chitchat, browsing internet, sleeping on the chairs, etc. Right after we heard that our all baggage had arrived at Ternate, the committee sent them directly to the harbor (goz, I can not remember the harbor name). We then rushed to the harbor as well, some on foot while others used truck (that had been used to bring the baggage). The harbor was not far from the restaurant, however it was almost twilight; and I saw lots of kid playing and swimming in the harbor.
Our boats reached Sidang Oli harbor at Halmahera in the night. That harbor was chosen (instead of Sofifi harbor) due to the closer distance to Tobelo, our final destination. But then the committee and participants were really disappointed due to ‘premanisme’ of the local Sidang Oli porters even though many of participants were hand in hand to bring the baggage. The harbor itself got no light at all. So that we used our own flashlight to light up our baggage while downloading from the boats and uploading to the bus. I heard by myself that the porter leader asked for IDR 2 mio for around 45 baggage that were brought together by the participants. Gee, that was crazy. Lucky us, that Mr. D, the DKP officer, who went together with us could solve the problem by giving the good advises to the porters that we were there in the spirit of compassionate to nourish the community from the tourism sector; and bargaining for the decent payment for sure. We were also disappointed to see the boatmen asked for extra big payment with the reason that they had to wait for several hours due to late arrival of our group.
The participants and committee used rental cars and bus to go to Tobelo in the night. I wished I could see the beauty of Halmahera jungle that was well-known as place for bird watching. But since it was in the night, so I could see nothing but road and few name planks, such as the plank of mining company that guarded by the troops. I was thinking that the jungle would be easily destroyed due to the mining and the bird habitat would be also devastated. The road was narrow but with good asphalt condition, only few parts were damage. In the discussion with the driver, I knew that majority of Tobelo residents were Christians; so much different with majority of Ternate residents who were Moslems. The land journey took almost 4 hours, so that we bought snack on the way. As soon as we reached Tobelo, we took very late dinner first in Kakara Café before we checked into the small hotel near the café. The food was so and so, but the coconut ice was excellent. The uniqueness of that café was the owner, who had nine kids, all are female.
All participants and committee would then be separated into two groups since we would stay into two different small hotels. The O group and several committee members stayed in Regina hotel, while other participants (including me) and other committee members stayed in Mulia hotel. Both hotels located about a hundred meters in the left and right side of Kakara Café. We were then ready to sleep about midnight after we set up our photo gear quickly on the bed. So to me, it was almost a full day and night traveling (not to say other participants coming from Bandung who left before midnight the day before). The bed room was humble with air con and TV, but much better than the room used during Wakatobi Festival December last year. My roommate, Mr. MK, said sorry that he might be snoring while sleeping, and he advised me to wake him up if it came to annoy me.
Day 2
I believed that all were sleeping very tightly since all were really tired. However, I was still able to hear my roommate snoring, but it was not so annoying. I let him know that he was only snoring when he slept straight up, and the snore reduced when he was sleeping in the side position. We woke up in the morning and rushed to Kakara Café for breakfast. Even though I felt that I did not have enough sleep but I felt much better that morning. One thing that I was really afraid was the flu which was not a hundred percent recovered, but that morning I felt lots better, so that I decided to join the dive. To minimize the risk, I also used spray medicine to liquefy mucus in my nose.
The plan was we should depart from new Tobelo harbor to Tagalaya Island at 8 am. But we got lots of obstacle. The local people, who were given several responsibilities, did not do their jobs accordingly. The problems were coming one after another. I started to feel sorry for the committee, especially Mrs. NH, who seemed so tire but always tried to smile and made jokes. Mr. H, one of the participants from C group who said that the problems would not have ended the day before, then became reality. The tanks were not ready. And when the tank problem solved, the boat were not ready, either the boat were not in the harbor or there were no fuel in the boat. While we were waiting in the harbor, I noticed that it seemed diving under the harbor would be worth to try. We also made jokes on the harbor under sunshine, phew. We finally departed to Tobelo Dive Resort in Tagalaya Island few hours later. I started to realize that even though central government in Jakarta had promoted Visit Indonesia 2008, the local government and local people were not automatically ready for it, so ironic. However, my compassion to this country especially to the beauty of nature pushed me to help the local people to develop (if they were willing to)
Tagalaya was a small island close to Tobelo, about thirty minutes away by regular boat from Tobelo harbor. In that island, the government planned to build Tobelo Dive Resort. In the moment, there was only one building with several humble gazebos. We brought some of our stuff under gazebos. We then set up our dive gear real fast in order to catch up the schedule (I was a little slow due to my foot was not completely okay). Again we got another problem, the weights were not enough for the whole participants. So the dive leader could not dive properly, and the dive guide candidate could not dive at all but snorkeled only. Lucky me, that my group was pretty small, only five of us, me, Mr. MK, Mr. A, Mr. AD (dive leader), and Mr. I (dive guide candidate). The committee advised me that one of the goals of that festival was to develop local tourism industry; since the participants already had lots of diving experience and local community did not have proper dive guides, then we, the participants, were hoped to help dive guide candidates to be a professional dive guides. That was okay to the participants.
We dived into three different dive spots using three very humble traditional boats. My boat was the smallest and slowest one, but lucky it was completed with ladder, while one of the bigger two boats got none. In fact, according to all divers’ observation, all boats were not adapted yet for diving activity, not to say the boatmen. My boat headed to Pawole Island and my group dived right away. None of us had ever dived there, so we were not sure whether we entered in the right spot or not. It was kind of exploration dive, but in the same time we had to take pictures. To my opinion, that dive spot was not good; I saw many devastated coral and very few small fishes, nothing special. However, that was the first time for me to dive in north Halmahera and also the first time using new photo gear, except the strobe, so I was still glad. After we finished our first dive, we went back to Tagalaya. Tobelo Dive Resort did not have yet facility for divers to rinse the dive gear and photo gear, so we used Mrs. S’s plastic drum and my plastic container to rinse all diver photo gears. My gear accessories in the plastic container were moved to the committee’s bag.
We had late lunch of ‘Nasi Padang Bungkus’ in Tagalaya, and as usual, I could not finish my lunch completely during surface interval. During lunch, we had lots of joke over others. We were laughing so loud to see Mr. SW forgot to connect the strobe wire inside the camera housing, so that how hard he checked and rechecked, the strobe would never be working well. Lucky him, that even though we made jokes, we were also analyzing his problem, so finally he found and fixed the problem.
After then, my boat headed to Toputopu Island for the second dive, but one of my group members moved to the other boat to join his common group. Just like before, none of us had ever dived over there, so that again in Toputopu Island we were not sure where we had to enter. But I found that the corals down there were better than the ones in the Pawole Island. The same things were nothing special and not many fishes.
Sun was near to horizon when we got back to Tagalaya, so we had no chance to execute the third dive that day (and we did not plan for the night dive either). The committee separated the participants into two big groups for tomorrow since we only had one big and fast boat to reach Morotai. One group (including me) would go and dive to Morotai tomorrow, while the other group would still dive near Tagalaya using smaller and slower boats. My group would then have to pack up our gear and bring back to Tobelo, while the other group could leave their gear in Tagalaya.
All of us went back to Tobelo at dawn. I rinsed my gear right away and then took shower. My photo gear was left on the bed to let it dry. We went to Kakara Café for dinner. During chitchat with the other group, I knew that diving in Tanjung Timur of Tagalaya would have chance to see sharks, while the corals were so and so; meaning that dive spot was better than two dive spots which my group had dived before. We were also discussing the dive plan for tomorrow since tomorrow dive in Morotai would be deep dive to see WWII wrecks. I had never been deep deco diving for around two years past and the others might have the same or even worse. I proposed to the committee to provide one safety tank to be hanged in the five meters depth just for precaution. The committee gave the tips for us to dive directly to main wrecks target at the depth of around 45 meters, and then slowly ascend to depth around 18-20 meters to see tank (or panzer?) wreck that was almost totally covered by corals, and at last spend the safety (deco) stop by watching lots of octopus hiding in the corals.
After we got back to the hotel, we started to check our photo gear, download the pictures, edit, and then submit to the committee. Before I slept, I consumed my flu medicine and also advised my roommate to sleep in the ‘correct position’ to reduce snoring.
Day 3
That morning after, I woke up really fresh, since I got enough time to sleep, my flu was almost recovered, and my foot was much better. However, I was still a little worry of possibility of reverse block due to the flu, moreover today dive would be deep (and likely deco) dive, so again I used my spray medicine. Local people prepared the whole things better than the day before, even though they were still far away from excellent. The committee agreed to provide one safety tank, however all participants were still reminded to dive cautiously and never counted on safety tank. The group for Morotai was ready to depart around 9 am, and it would take more than two hours to reach the dive spot.
The wrecks dive spot in Morotai, called Lapangan Pante, was so close with Wama Village. Our boat reached it almost noon. Since boat designation was not adapted for diving activity, so we got difficulties to don our gear. However all of us managed the problem really good. We finally descended right away after the safety tank was set up.
All participants went down through the reef directly to the wrecks in the depth around 45 – 50 meters, while the dive leader was hovering on top of them. That time we were accompanied by professional dive guide, who had dived in that dive spot, brought from Manado, so the dive guide candidate could directly learn from him. It was the first time for me to see many different wrecks in one location. I saw panzers (or trucks?) and four aero plane wrecks. I was so happy to see them. They were really great and stunning. But again, the fishes were so limited. One thing that made me astonished was the corals were not that much as I thought. Comparing to the Liberty shipwreck in Tulamben - Bali that was about in the same age, these corals were so limited. However with its clear visibility, that wrecks dive spot was really great and outstanding, and I did love it very much.
I was a bit nervous taking pictures there for many reasons, such as hard to concentrate due to nitrogen narcosis, due to my photo gear was new and I was not familiar with it, hard to find good angle since my strobe was not big enough to cover the objects, and I had to keep an eye over my deco time. Moreover, I would like to enjoy the beautiful sceneries deep down there. So my time to take pictures was so limited with limited photo gear for wide angle pictures, oh my God. Down there, I forgot the problem of my foot and flu, ha-ha, perhaps I was so absorbed by the beautiful scenery. The dive leader was really great in giving his services; he always reminded us about the deco time and kept calling us from above. I was starting to ascend when I saw my deco time was about 17 minutes at the ceiling of 8 meters. It seemed that all divers had real good calculation about their air consumption, proven with nobody used the safety tank provided. And I thought all of the divers missed the tank wreck that lied on the depth around 18 – 20 meters. I got headache that I believed coming from nitrogen narcosis.
We spent our surface interval at the harbor village (HMS Lastory harbor) in Morotai, located about 10 minutes away by boat from Lapangan Pante dive spot. Too bad, I did not bring other camera to take picture of this village. We were also having late lunch over there. The dive guide seemed had lots of friend in that island, since lots of local people had short chitchat with him. During lunch, the professional dive guide advised me that actually there was one big and intact bomber wreck lying on the depth around 90 meters, phew; I would not take the risk in this remote area to see this bomber wreck.
After short discussion, we agreed to .... (continued at http://richardkurni.multiply.com/journal/item/17/_North_Halmahera_Morotai_Underwater_Photo_Festival_are_to_wake_up_part_2_ )
Some more photos can be seen at http://richardkurni.multiply.com/photos/album/35 and http://richardkurni.multiply.com/photos/album/36 ; Happy watching... :-) (You might need to sign in and add contact to see the pictures)
wahh... kerennnn!!! 
