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THAI DIVE
Encounters with a whale shark
By Denise Mattia
I lingered behind the small group of divers hoping to capture the antics of an adolescent clownfish, which ducked into the tentacles of an anemone faster than I could snap the shutter on my camera. Losing patience, I turned from the juvenile delinquent and looked toward the dive group. The image of what lay ahead will be engraved forever in my mind. The reef chain off the coast of Thailand was living up to its reputation as a premier dive destination.
This was the second dive trip I planned in Thailand. During the first visit, my week on a live-aboard boat had been cancelled due to a monsoon. I'd had fun in Phuket and several good dives in Chalong Bay, but I vowed to return to dive the sites I'd heard so much about. Covering a trade show in Bangkok gave me the opportunity. My only hope was that fair weather would prevail.
I spent a day covering the show and flew out the following morning to Phuket Island. I was met at the airport and was transferred by van to a dock. Rather than head south to Chalong Bay, where live-aboards usually set sail for the National Marine Parks of the Similan and Surin Archipelagos, I was driven north to the alternate port of Thap Lamu in Phang-Nga Province where my ship awaited my arrival. This point of embarkation shortens the distance to the archipelagos by at least 40 nautical miles.
The ship lay moored a fair distance out in the bay when I arrived, and it seemed like an interminably long wait in the steamy tropical sun while supplies, camera equipment, luggage and nine additional passengers were transferred to what was to be, for the next six nights, our floating home. We finally boarded and learned during orientation that the air-conditioning system had malfunctioned. Only two cabins could be cooled, and mine wasn't one of them. It didn't matter. With plans to be blanketed in the thickness of night air and lulled to sleep by the heady saline scent of an exotic sea, I readied my equipment and prepared for the early evening dive. The island we were heading for was Koh Bon, which lies about 12 miles northeast of the northernmost island in the Similan Archipelago.
The underwater topography of both archipelagos is comprised of granite – magma from deep within the earth's crust that rose, cooled and crystallized more than 30,000 years ago. I sank into an ancient world where fiery rock had once pulsed out of the heart of the earth and formed planes that stacked up until a Koh or island was formed. Over the eons these "steps" have become banquet tables where every manner of marine organism can attach itself, feed and grow. At the western section, clusters of pink and yellow soft coral coat craggy surfaces that range in depth from three-to 100 feet. I noticed a host of red and purple shrimp on one ridge. Nearby, a parrotfish remained motionless, having found its bed for the night. With wide eyes staring at nothing, it resembled a stuffed toy left behind by a child.
Dive, eat and sleep: on a live-aboard boat the routine seldom varies, and ours was no exception. The chef, with a remarkable ability to transform any staple into a gourmet's delight, had platters of Thai-style shrimp, chicken and fish, rice, fresh vegetables and fruit waiting for us after the dive. While we supped, the boat headed northward to our next island, where we weighed anchor for the night.
Sated with food and fatigued from the day's travel, we claimed space on deck for our beds. Forward filled up fast. I chose the aft with nine other mates. It started off well enough, but noxious diesel fumes that wafted up periodically from the engine room interrupted my sleep. So much for the romantic notion of sleeping under the stars at sea. At 3 a.m. I dragged my bedding down to the galley, found a cool spot on the floor and dozed off.
We were all a little bedraggled the following morning when we hit the water at Koh Tachai. Still, if the rich display of coral, fans and tropical fish found while diving one of the finest sites in Thailand, wasn't sufficient to make us forget all that went before, then the appearance of manta rays certainly was.
Mobulida – mantas. The pair appeared from beyond the scope of visibility as immense unmistakable shapes with dark backs and brilliant white undersides. They approached and sailed above us on the reef, then flew through the water and became blue silhouettes against the sunlight. They circled. I swam hard to position myself in what I hoped would be their expected path. My gut instinct proved right. They swam directly toward me, claspers curled, coming so close I could reach out and touch them. Rather than risk scaring them away, I kept my hands on my camera and swam with them. They didn't seem to mind and presented me with front, side and overhead views. Still, try as I might for that ultimate shot – both mantas in the frame, or one, mouth agape, feeding on plankton, or a diver swimming with them – it didn't happen. But I didn't complain. The experience of being alone with two fantastic creatures was sheer magic. It never occurred to me that this experience could be topped.
Each descent revealed another species, another niche, another personality. Splendid tall mounds are at the center of Koh Tachai. The southern side ends abruptly at the edge of a submerged plateau, while the northeast corner is narrow and jagged, with nooks and crannies that harbor redtooth triggerfish, moorish idols and bannerfish. During a dive to that site, I motioned to Bob, my dive buddy, and Mira, our dive instructor, to swim through a thick cloud of glassfish and fusiliers that hovered over a coral head. Extraordinary. Not only were the fish unafraid of divers but they also wouldn't spread out when divers moved in.
I hardly noticed when the current picked up. As we rounded the point the tentacles of the anemones stretched out in a single direction. Rope sponges became entwined in an intricate weave, and schools of scarlet, blotcheye and lattice soldierfish stared back with their huge eyes as we flew across the reef. We found the mooring line and began a lurch and wrench ascent while hanging onto the rope, the undertow yanking it and us in all directions. I followed Bob to the surface, submerged again just in time to miss ramming into the bow of the boat, and was swept past the stern, where I spotted a towline. I got it and was grateful to the crew who towed me back to the dive ladder.
Topside, there were periods of heavy rain, which reduced the ambient light underwater. Still, visibility at the plateau of Koh Tachai was sufficient to spot a zebra shark on the sandy floor from 50 feet above. I had to meet it. On the way down, I ignored the assembly of juvenile and adult lionfish in a niche to romance the six-foot shark, a bottom dweller, known familiarly as a leopard shark because of its spots. Unlike its northern cousin of the same name, this species has a broader nose and two ridges running down its back. My benign shark allowed a close look before pushing off. Turning back to the reef that's encrusted with purple, pink and red soft coral tipped with yellow polyps, I found the lionfish and a school of moorish idols gracefully swimming among the colorful branches. Blue-fin trevally added brilliant flashes as they descended upon morsels hidden in a gorgonian fan. Even the camouflaged scorpionfish here were tinted shades of yellow, orange, white and black.
One manta, two manta, three manta, four? Divers are almost guaranteed to see them at Richelieu Rock. The name of the site is a misnomer, as the area consists of a large central horseshoe-shaped seamound, surrounded by separate smaller mounds of granite on which hard and soft coral colonies have developed.
Eyes darting wildly, I watched the mantas overhead as they winged across the reef, silent and graceful, and was never certain how many there were. I came to within 30 feet of one during my second dive to the "Rock," but in comparison to my original encounter it felt like a mile. Yet luck of a different species was with me one morning when I swam from a coral head to rejoin my dive group.
I missed capturing the shot of the 20-foot whale shark that had suddenly appeared over my mates. I was about to give chase when the gentle giant turned and met me head on.
There are precious few natural highs in this world. Coming to within inches of a whale shark many times your size – a few tons heavier and close to four times your length – is definitely one. There was never a question of who was more powerful. I knew that with one flip of its huge tail it could send me reeling or, as it chose, disappear into the blue. Instead, it allowed me to accompany it. Perhaps I resembled one of the oversized remoras that preceded it. For 51 minutes I stuck with this awesome creature like a sharksucker. I didn't care where it took me. This was one of those special encounters intrepid divers live for.
The whale shark made no special movement to indicate it was finished swimming with me. There was no clue. It simply moved away and was gone as suddenly as it had arrived. I checked my air and computer. They confirmed what I suspected. I hadn't gone into a deco dive, and I had plenty of air to navigate back to the boat.
A veritable traffic jam of marine life materialized on the Koh Similan reefs. In addition to astonishing displays of hard and soft corals and gigantic gorgonian fans that decorate swimthroughs, overhangs and pinnacles are the invertebrates that inhabit them. The sheer number of each species boggles the mind and shocks the senses.
That the marine population flourishes despite illegal fishing is fortunate for the tourist industry. What's not so fortunate is that fields of brain coral and thickets of staghorn that have been turned into graveyards. Fishermen who dynamite the reefs after the diving season ends, I was told, cause this devastation. Although the National Marine Park of Thailand is aware of the problem, only their continuing best efforts can ensure the preservation of these archipelagos.
I flipped backwards into the water from the inflatable for my last dive at a site called Honeymoon Bay at Koh Miang, the number four island of the nine in the Similan Archipelago. It was painful to think that this could ever be destroyed. There was almost too much color, both static and moving, to absorb it all at once. I closed my eyes tight to make sure I could remember all I had seen. When I opened them again a turtle was staring at me. Astonishing.
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