Sumbawa, the unexplored Sunda Island - Snorkeling with whalesharks
This year we were on Sumbawa for the first time, one of the rather unknown Lesser Sunda Islands and - as we think after our trip - unfairly in the shadow of its much better-known sister islands Lombok in the west and Komodo in the east.
We don't know anyone who has ever been there, on the Indonesian Island of Sumbawa. But I (Kathrin) had read that this remote island is said to be quite scenic, with the absolute highlight being the presence of whale sharks. As it happens, a lot of the information you find on the internet is outdated, vaguely described or simply wrong. A lot of research was required to find out exactly what there was to see there and how to connect the individual places with each other. As always, our time frame is rather tight and leaves little time buffer. We know that. This is how we typically travel - caused by the professional life we have. In order not to unknowingly take unnecessary detours due to a lack of local knowledge and to make interesting places even more lively through local knowledge, we always travel with a local tour guide. Same with this trip.
Welcome to whaleshark village
Our Sumbawa trip took a total of 8 days including arrival and departure. The various stops on this tour are reflected in our West Sumbawa adventure trip. The crowning conclusion of our program, however, was the visit to the whale sharks, which gave me (Kathrin) reason to write this separate article.
With lots of interesting experiences in our luggage, we headed south from Sumbawa Besar in the afternoon of our penultimate day of travel. After about 2 ½ hour's drive, we reached a small coastal town, which, due to its inconspicuousness, gave no reason to suspect that it would serve as a base camp for maritime excursions. Well then. It was now late afternoon. And we had moved into our room in a small homestay near the port, which was at least as small. Since we had to get up at 3 a.m. the next morning in order to get to the scene by boat in time at sunrise, an early dinner was called for. So a quick walk before dark to get an idea of where we actually were. And then it was time for dinner. Actually…
However, dinner was not possible now. The power had just gone out, so had cooking and everything was dark, really dark. And of course it was not clear how long this circumstance had to be part of any consideration. Our cell phones, however, helped with lights and our car with tour guide and driver helped with a remote location for dinner. Lucky :-)
Off to the whale sharks or how to practice patience
Today was finally TOMORROW. It was 3 a.m. and with excitement the alarm clock was turned off and the light -voila- turned on again. Quickly got dressed,equipped with a hot instant coffee and heading to the harbor... and then sitting and waiting... and waiting...
A strong wind had picked up and caused considerable waves, which made it simply impossible to even get into one of the small wooden boats unscathed. Oh, s..t!.
Our guide had explained to us the day before that the probability of encountering whale sharks was 99%. The missing 1% are simply attributed to 'Nature'. Judging by the look on his face this morning, we seemed to have caught a rare 1% day. It was now 4:30 a.m. and we were still waiting. However - and as is often the case in life - persistence actually pays off. The wind gradually died down and the first fishing boats arrived at the harbor with their catch from the previous night. And finally our boat was ready to take us out to sea. Lucky :-)
The needle in the haystack - Or: How do you actually find whale sharks?
Out to sea – wonderful! And then...?
Our boat carried us out to sea for about 1 ½ hours, on a sea that we wouldn't exactly describe as 'flat'. But luckily we are not that sensitive and everything went well. And at some point a larger fishing boat appeared on the horizon in front of us and our crew was heading towards it. As we now know, our guide had a good relationship with the captain of this very boat far out in the bay and was in contact. From there he was informed that there were whale sharks to be seen again today. When we arrived at the fishing boat we met 4 of these sea giants. Oh, it was impressive to see these large animals so close to the surface of the water and even more so when we noticed that they were actually quite a bit longer than our boat. They were really huge, and they always swam with their mouths open, which - by the way - you can fit in as a human being in lengthwise format.
We first had to look at it from the outside for a while before we were ready enough to actually jump into the water with our snorkeling equipment. I quickly set up the iPhone in its underwater box and the first giant fish came swimming towards me, slowly and leisurely with its mouth wide open. I could see that he had no teeth, but I quickly positioned myself at a 90° angle. Whale sharks may have very small eyes, they are not blind and can ultimately find their way around the water a lot better than us. So it was thanks to the fish that there was no collision between the two of us. Meanwhile, the video recording showed a certain stretch of gray with white dots.. That was the other whale shark that swam past me and that I had obviously pointed my iPhone at as I wanted to avoid the first one when I saw its open mouth.
Well, I certainly needed some time to get used to it to get into the 'right waters' with these big fish. Not last caused by my observation, that sometimes there is a problem with the whale shark's 'distance sensor', as I recorded on my iPhone. On one occasion, Alan couldn't snorkel out of the way so quickly and the whale shark misjudged his distance measurement somewhat. The two had a collision. The dorsal fins are probably as hard as thick, tough leather. Also lucky again :-)
Let us know if this trip to Indonesia east of the Wallace Line interests you. We also know of more whale shark locations in the region.
Would you also like to snorkel with whale sharks?
