Administrator’s note: Eric Eckes, is a professional photographer from Southern California.  He recently visited the Bird’s Head’s Triton Bay for the first time.  Eric has kindly shared some of his whale shark images with us. They are magical!  Stay tuned for part 2, when Eric shares images from his Triton Bay reef dives.

In Eric’s words:

Whale shark with reflection
©Eric Eckes

“Margi and I visited Triton Bay Divers (TBD) in March 2024. Their motto, “Remote…and Worth It!”, could not be more accurate. We spent five nights there, the sole dive resort in Triton Bay. TBD is a 1.5 hour boat ride from the town of Kaimana and the airport. TBD has eight comfortable cabins, several dive boats, and a nice camera room with fresh water and compressed air to rinse and dry your camera gear. Food was aplenty consisting of delicious local cuisine.

Whale shark under a bagan
©Eric Eckes

Nurul Yazid, one of the principals, hosted us and was full of photographic information.

Whale shark with remoras
©Eric Eckes

We completed a total of fifteen dives during our five day stay. Diving with the bagans and their resident whale sharks were our favorite dives. The bagans are large fishing platforms that operate at night with lights trained into the water to attract baitfish. Before sunrise they raise their nets full of baitfish, which attracts the whale sharks.

Whale shark and fisherman
©Eric Eckes

We did a total of four dives on the bagans (two with TBD and two more afterwards with the Damai 1 liveaboard) and were greeted by multiple whale sharks on every dive. Most dives were conducted near the surface where we could observe and photograph the whale sharks feeding. On one dive to sixty feet, we were surrounded by five whale sharks swimming over, under, and around us. This was truly a memorable trip!”

To learn more about Eric and to see more of his images visit his website, ericeckes.com/. You can contact him at eeckes@cox.net.