As I had mentioned before, Clown Valley is a must go if you ever dived in Alor, before the world ends or whatever civilization takes a tool on its pristine corals. Alor has fantastic and best coral reef I’ve ever seen and this Clown Valley is the class on its own.
It was published by Helmut Debelius in one of his underwater books and he described it as Anemone City. We only went there only once, two days before end of the trip. Previously Thomas tried to bring us there, but he changed location due to the current prediction when we were on the spot. According to Oliver, they dived their once when the current was so strong it lifted the fish trap until it stood vertically.
To be fair, for the whole time we dived there, we didn’t experienced too crazy currents. We had few dives with current, but it didn’t last the whole dive and we only followed and did drift dive. Of course I didn’t count the time we didn’t even make it down. Two occasions down there when the current was stronger was first, when we stationed and waited for big fish to pass by (I call it pelagic style of diving) but it was also not that strong because when I let go my hand I could stay put without much effort. Second, it was strong current. When we hit the current, few of us decide to go with it. Then the current changed direction, we followed again. Then changed direction again, this time blew us strongly to the blue, we decided to hang on. It was me, hubby, Oliver and Carlyn, and Piers. Three of them buddy together. The rest had got separated when we decided not to fight the current. When we hung on, the current was very strong that I think I could feel the sensation of my cheek flapping like those in the movie. My only concern was to hang on and make sure my camera and mask were safe. Carlyn couldn’t hang on, she got carried but caught by her husband, Oliver. Both of them finally blew away because the huge rock they were holding on was lifted! Luckily it didn’t damage the reef. Upon seeing this, three of us let go too and decided to go with them. It’s like underwater silent communication that we were taking care of each other after five of us were together. We were fine after drifted to another part of the reef and the current subsided.
Luckily that was the most current action we had there, nothing compared to Komodo. I was thinking maybe I thought so because when we went Komodo, we basically rookie, not really exposed to many current scenario, so we feel that it was the worst. After thinking, nah, I don’t think so, nothing compared to the feeling when you were brought up near to surface from twenty over meter by up current, and brought down to seventeen meter by down current the second you jumped, to the surrounding darkness in the middle of big-eyed trevally tornado. I guess nothing. Komodo is a very respectable dive site.
Anyway, as unpredictable as ever, Clown Valley that day we visited it was very calm with visibility up to probably thirty meters or more.
Clown Valley, had wall drops to thirty meter and another drops to dunno what depth, if I remember correctly. According to Thomas in that thirty meter, under rock outcropping etc, wobbegong sharks can be found. Although we were not lucky to see them, we believe him. He never lied, he never bluffed.
Anyway we met this gorgeous naughty nudibranch, Spikey dendronotus, who was swimming! It was actually a good swimmer, at first we thought it was carried by the current. It was also picky in choosing place to land. Once it landed on a sponge, walked a bit, didn't like it and propelled itself again to swim to another location.
After that we would graze to a field, miles of them full of anemone, all kind of anemone, bubble tip, magnificent, stinging, swaying, red, orange, white, blue, purple, yellow, big, small. It’s not Anemone Paradise in Tulamben, not gorgeous shallow water in Bunaken or Amed or colorful Komodo, there is nothing quite like this in term of size and diversity. It’s miles and miles, I don’t know how many football field, I think with this scenery. With fantastic visibility and depth I think not exceed twenty meter there, the color was breathtaking. I was moving very slowly and happily, enjoying every second of it and thinking, imho, Alor is worth it for the dive site alone. When I looked back to check on my buddy, I was even more mesmerized, everywhere, I mean everywhere above the anemone, we saw anemonefish hovering. Thousands, ten of thousands, I have never seen this quantity of anemonefish staying on the same area before. Not even close! Not even a fifth or a tenth. It’s gorgeous. Too bad this can never be recorded to justice; it could never be explained in words, pictures or videos.
On this and other wall or slope dive sites, we could see the most colorful reefs, even the overhang in the deep were rich in colors.
Or when the current picked up when we could just let it drifted us like fast paced movie going through miles and miles of gorgeous coral reefs. Silent, no mosquitoes, no noisy and nosy people, no trouble, beautiful sights, and thousands of friends. Why do we have to live on land??
I also miss the boat, the golden sunset, looking at the sea full of plankton, and there were days when we saw miles and miles of water full of transparent jellyfish. I can't imagine how many skin cream I need should I fall down. The visitors on the horison, jumping dolphins, the loud whale, the mola2, the breeze, the blue sky, the peace..
Well, the journal is missing something, which is the journey back, but I decide not to include it. Let's pretend I'm still there.
