Aside from Puri Jati, another good muck dive site in Bali is at Secret Bay on the north West of the island. The journey is around 4 hours long from Padangbai on a bumpy road. The water there is much colder than the rest of the island. Yet there are a lot of interesting stuff to see and if you are a micro lover then it shouldn’t stop you coming here.

Day 4

This is the hot tub inside the resort. If you go for a more expensive villa, you can have your own hot spring tub inside your courtyard!.

We were having our breakfast by the Jetti.

In case you don’t know what’s inside?

This pool is the hot spring tub by the mangrove forest. All in all, it’s a nice resort. I have not been disappointed with any resort yet.

Our last day of diving. we chose to come to the ‘secret bay’. Being published on every guide book could hardly be categorised as a secret. Anyhow, we were told that the water can be very cold so we donned a thicker wetsuit our gears and waded in. This place supposes to be one the best sites for muck diving in Bali. So I’m here to prove it.

We turned left toward the mouth of the bay on our first dive and went to the opposite side on the following dive.

Longfin Spadefish (Platax teira)

There are a lot of Banggai cardinalfish (Pterapogon kauderni) Most of them take refuge in the artificial reef or among the spines of sea urchin.

 

Double ended Pipefish (Trachyrhamphus bicoarctatus)

Puffer and filefishes are one of the most common species on this site.

Striped Puffer (Arothron manilensis)

We came to the wooden boat wreck. The wreck itself is nothing special. I suspect it was deliberately sunk to make a refuge for the marine life in the bay. Under the wreck, there were about a hundred of striped Catfish (Plotosus lineatus).

Shrimpfish (Aeoliscus strigatus)

Fingered Dragonet (Dactylopus dactylopus)

Shrimp Goby (Vanderhorstia sp)

Marble snake eel (Callechelys marmorata)

My favourite macro subject, an imperial Partner Shrimp (Periclemenes Imperator) on a sea cucumber.

This one climbed down to the side and feed himself along the muck.

Bristle worms

Spotted Toby (Canthigaster solandri)

A frontal mug shot

A few years earlier, he would have looked like this

Robust Ghost Pipefish (Solenostomus cyanopterus)

Frostfin cardinalfish (Apogon hoevenii)

Cockatoo Waspfish (Ablabys tanianotus)

Juvenile Giant Frogfish (Antennarius commerson)

More and more stuffs keep coming out as we zigzag around the area. We were like kids walking into a toy shop and keep find a new toy every corner we turned.

Yellow Edged Moray (Gymnothorax)flavimarginatus

Yellow Shrimp Goby (Cryptocentrus cinctus)

Another Fingered Dragonet

We made 2 new records here at the Secret bay.  The longest dive we have done so far on the first dive which was 104 minutes and 2nd longest dive of 99 minutes. So our two dives took almost three and a half hours. Crazy! … and my jaw hurts from biting on the mouthpiece for so long.

After the dive, we had another long journey back to Ubud. Because diving took so long, we would arrive late at night. So we asked our driver to stop along the way for some photo ops. The sun was setting so taking the picture against the rice field would have been spectacular. However, when I asked him to find a rice field, I guess I should be a little more specific about the location. Anyway, we got our rive field and the sun is disappearing fast. so I took out a SB-800, a lumiquest softbox iii, some gels and started shooting away.

This shot was lit by a handheld SB-800 connected via a sync cord, zooming to the widest angle with diffuser, 1/4 CTO and sb-iii on

Arriving at Ulun Ubud hotel. This hotel is set on the cliff overlooking the valley. It is a very nice hotel with a lot of character but unfortunately is not well maintained. You can see paint and plaster peeling off, mould patches. I reckon this hotel has a lot of potential if they renovate it.

After cleaning the dive gears, it’s time to say good night.

Sunrising over the Ubud valley

If was completely dark when we got here last night. I could hear the sound of the river below but I couldn’t see it. so this is the first view of our balcony.

The reception is on the top of the cliff and you have to walk downstairs to each villa. Walking down is ok but going back up to the breakfast hall was a bit challenging. The stair was steep and we felt the air was quite thin making a good morning exercise. Well done, you have earned your breakfast.

 

Ubud is a very special place to us. There is an aura of sacred, energetic and yet relaxing atmosphere in the area which makes it different to the rest of Bali.

Here is our terrace. Right at the bottom of the steps.

with the most amazing view ever.

It is always sad to leave Bali especially when you are heading back to wet can cold Europe. This trip has again met and exceed our expectation.

On the flight over Denpasar.

It took us 4 hours yesterday to get from Secret bay to Denpasar. Only to fly back over it again taking 20 minutes.

So that’s it for our trip to Bali. We have dived all around the Island. We hope to come back again someday. For sure, this is one of the places that we enjoy the most. Thank you to our guide Janri and Aquamarine for arranging this wonderful and memorable trip. We surely will come back.

Back to Bangkok. A container city.