24 – 28 November 2009 The leatherback conservation efforts in Kei is implemented by WWF-Indonesia through a local, community-based NGO (SIRaN) since 2003. In July this year, a one-man all around staff from WWF, Marthen Leuna aka Ateng, started his full time work here. There is much conservation work to do in Kei. We got […]

21 November 2009 – Saturday Today we were extremely happy in the morning and extremely sad by the afternoon.  We had a slow start leaving the house at 7am. For 2 long hours, we saw nothing. Eki was in fact close to cursing mode when we saw our first leatherback turtle at 9am. For the […]

20 November 2009 Second day we were asked to wake up at 5:30am! By after breakfast and 6:15am we were off. The seas were glass flat and calm as. The early morning sun made really brilliant reflections on the water but after 2 hours of searching, we still didn’t see any leatherback turtles. Yogi spotted […]

19 – 26 November 2009 After zooming around the many islands in Wakatobi, it was a relief to finally stay put in one community and concentrate in one thing and one thing only – leatherback marine turtles. Kei is the only location in Indonesia we can hope to photograph leatherbacks underwater. It is also the […]

3 November 2009 We had a very enlightening afternoon with the Bupati (Mayor) of Wakatobi, Pak Hugua. He was very aware of the Coral Triangle and the efforts of WWF, TNC & CI to help in the conservation efforts of this all important region. His special interest of course lies in Wakatobi. He said very […]

2 – 12 November 2009 S5 19.868 E123 32.143 Wangi Wangi S5 29.700 E123 45.276 Kaledupa S5 43.145 E123 54.238 Tomia S6 00.667 E124 03.054 Binongko S6 07.930 E124 35.984 Moromaho S5 20.972 E124 21.073 Runduma S5 17.737 E124 17.605 Anano The hour we arrived in Wanci, we immediately had a meeting with WWF Indonesia […]

2 – 12 November 2009 We noticed from early on how different the sea gypsies from Wakatobi lived compared to their Bajau relatives from Sabah, Malaysia and the Philippines. The Bajo from Wakatobi reclaimed land and had sturdy houses on top of their new land. We heard from Sugi how complex the situation is because […]

2 – 12 November I cannot write enough about the people we met along the way. Their faces have left an indelible mark on us. Here is a gallery of the look of Wakatobi. For several days in Anano Island, this man fished, salted and stored his catch before heading back to Runduma where his […]

2 – 12 November 2009 You cannot mistake the religion  of this area. Five times a day, we would hear the Imam sing from loudspeakers of nearby mosques. I loved it. Our WWF companion Sugiyanta or Mas Sugi as everyone called him, brought Yogi to an old Mosque in Binongko. After getting permission from the […]

2 – 12 November 2009 To many divers around the world, Wakatobi South Sulawesi is an underwater destination. Wakatobi, which is short for its many islands, stands for Wangi-Wangi, Kaledupa, Tomia & Binongko. We went to all these islands and beyond with WWF Indonesia and its partner agency TNC. We didn’t do much diving here. […]