411 Dive Log Australasia April 2025

GETTING THE BLUES IN TIMOR LESTE

Text and photos by Nigel Marsh

between the Indian and Pacific Oceans, is one of the great est hotpots for cetaceans in the world. They have recorded 24 species of whales and dolphins in the strait. Some like the Pygmy Blue Whales migrate these waters, while many others live here permanent, feasting on the rich waters that reach 3km deep in the Ombai-Wetar Strait. Hoping to see Pygmy Blue Whales and some of the other cetaceans that gather here, like Sperm Whales and Short finned Pilot Whales, I organised to take a special photogra phy group to Timor Leste in November 2024. For our week-long trip, diving with Dive Timor Lorosae and staying in their comfortable guest house, we organised four days of diving and two days of whale watching. Timor Leste is one of the smallest and newest nations, hav ing gained independence from Indonesia in 2002, after a long and bloody struggle. The nation is one of the closest to Australia, with the flight from Darwin to Dili taking just over one hour. Located in the coral triangle, the nation also has lovely coral reefs, numerous muck sites and a wonderful col lection of fishes and invertebrates. Our first day of diving saw us loading into a van, as most of Timor Leste’s best dive sites are accessible from the shore. We drove east from Dili, passing through small villages and seeing cows, goats, dogs and even monkeys. Ninety min utes later we arrived at Lone Tree. We quickly geared up, walked across the rocky beach and slipped into the water to find 30m visibility and 30 degree water. Following our guides Bella and Will, we drifted down a grey sandy slope and onto a lovely coral wall covered in healthy hard corals, soft corals, sponges and gorgonians. While we didn’t see any pelagic fish, there were plenty of small reef fishes to marvel at including a wonderful variety of angelfish, A Pygmy Blue Whale in the clear waters off Timor Leste.

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Jumping off the side of the boat I quickly finned in what I hoped was the right direction. I looked down, then left, then right, hoping to get a glimpse of the animal I had come all this way to see. A frustrating minute passed, and I was sure I had missed it. I kept scanning below when suddenly I saw it, the largest animal to have ever lived – a Blue Whale. I quickly freedived down to 8m to get a better look at this 20m long whale. I watched in awe as the whale, another 15m below me, glide gracefully by. I got a good look at its distinctive V-shaped head, its elongated body, its small pec toral fins and finally its wide tail as it disappeared into the gloom. Returning to the surface I had the biggest grin on my face and was incredibly happy to have finally seen this im mense marine mammal. This whale was actually a Pygmy Blue Whale, a subspecies of the Blue Whale that still reaches an impressive 24m in length. Mainly found in the southern hemisphere, one of the biggest populations of Pygmy Blue Whales feeds off the southern waters of Australia over summer and autumn. They then venture north, up the Western Australian coastline on their annual migration to spend winter birthing, breeding and feeding in the waters of the Banda Sea in Indonesia. On this migration a population of over 600 swims through the Ombai-Wetar Strait, off Timor Leste, heading north between June and August and heading south between October and December. On this return journey the local dive operators based in Dili, the capital of Timor Leste, offer special whale watching trips and swims with these enormous cetaceans. The Pygmy Blue Whales are not the only cetaceans seen in the Ombai-Wetar Strait, as scientists studying the whales discovered that this body of water, which is an important link

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DIVE LOG Australasia #411 - April ‘25

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