In the North Gili’s, Lombok this week we have started our move to our dive centre on Gili Air. Our equipment room is stocked, our second boat nearly ready which can seat 25-30 people. A extremely exciting time. The season is picking up now and we have had our Zoey boat everyday with courses as well as fun divers. The water up in the North is still extremely clear and the sea life abundant.
What we have spotted this week which we have not seen in some time is the ornate ghost pipe fish.
This beautiful creature was found hidden in a hole between two big rocks covered in feather stars.
A good spot from our guide as it really was camouflage amongst the colour of the stars. They are truly mesmerising to find as they hang vertically upside down in the water blending in to their surroundings. They are not big creatures and can be fairly shy so to get a good look at their head especially can be a mission as they bob around trying to hide.
Among this we have been seeing leaf scorpion fish, lobsters, squat lobsters, shrimps, crabs, barracuda, turtles and schools of bat fish. The odd blue spotted stingray appears on average once every 3 dives. In the north Gili’s we have a lot of rabbit fish, surgeon fish, snappers and fusiliers surrounding the reefs and on occasions we get some pretty special sightings of whale sharks, eagle rays, manta rays and so on passing by. The manta rays tend to stick around for longer.
