These Indonesian corals reefs are considered sacred-here's why

This article was produced by National Geographic Traveller (UK).

“Can you hear that sound like pouring milk on Rice Krispies? It’s the snapping shrimp — they have one massive claw and one small one. They’re really tiny and live inside the coral.” Having shared this nugget of information, my snorkelling guide Lisa D’Silva abruptly dips her head back underwater like a duck. I follow suit, the sound of wheeling birds overhead becoming muffled, my eyes scanning the seabed.

While the shrimp remain hidden, what I can see very clearly is the carpet of corals beneath the jetty of Yenbuba village. The deep-green lips of a giant clam the size of a crouching man quiver and shut as we float past, causing gentle tremors in the shallow waters. There are forests of twiggy staghorn coral and fields of beautifully scrolled cabbage corals. And dancing around them are colonies of finned friends: batfish, unicornfish, rabbitfish. I spot skinny needlefish with sharp protruding noses, and bloated, spiky porcupinefish and pufferfish. Then there are the hawksbill turtles — one is tearing up hard coral with his hooked beak to reveal the soft sponges inside, determined to get at his dinner despite repeatedly being flipped almost vertical by rhythmic sea swells.

Underwater scenes like this play out on repeat in Raja Ampat, a remote region of Southwest Papua in far eastern Indonesia. Comprising around 1,500 islands over 15,000sq miles, it sits at the heart of an area known as the Coral Triangle. Raja’s marine stats are mind-boggling: some 75% of the planet’s corals are found here — 10 times the number of species in the Caribbean and more than is found at the Great Barrier Reef — and these forests of the ocean support more than 1,500 fish species. Some areas of Raja Ampat have 100% coral cover on the seabed. More than half the region is ring-fenced via a network of marine protected areas (MPAs). And if Raja is the heart of the Coral Triangle, the Dampier Strait, where I am now, is the very heart of that heart.

“It’s the most marine biodiverse place in the world — that we know of,” said Lynn Lawrance when she’d introduced our group to Raja’s uniqueness at our first trip briefing the previous night, explaining the importance of the coral reefs for fish populations and even pharmaceutical development. Australia-born Lynn and her French husband Arnaud Brival are co-founders of a grassroots NGO called The Sea People (Orang Laut, in Indonesian), which specialises in Raja Ampat reef restoration. Her uniform is either a baggy Orang Laut-branded vest, cargo shorts and flip-flops, or a dive suit. We’re both here for the launch of a new coral conservation voyage run by Rascal, a liveaboard boat tour operator that’s also passionate about preserving these waters.

With our five-cabin ship called Rebel as a base, our small group will spend five days at sea exploring Raja Ampat below and above the water. Along the way, we’ll also learn about The Sea People’s important coral gardening work ­— the process of restoring degraded reefs by transplanting coral fragments taken from healthy sites. Which is why we’re here at Yenbuba, a village reef that Lynn’s team restored in 2021.

As we snorkel onwards, Lisa — Rebel’s onboard marine biologist — points out corals that have been grafted onto wire mesh as part of the restoration work, now barely visible due to successful regrowth. She also motions thumbs up or thumbs down to indicate normal corals compared with those that are stressed. Among the healthy browns and yellows, we find pockets of bright white and neon blues. The latter represent beautiful disasters: signs of coral bleaching. As in other parts of the world, these reefs are being affected by rising sea temperatures. So far, though, The Sea People’s data suggests Raja’s corals are surprisingly resilient — so much so that transplants from this area may in future be able to help save reefs in other parts of the world. And despite any stresses, the life of this seabed feels like poetry in motion; a world so surprisingly vivid and beautiful that I’m reluctant to leave the water and consider its vulnerability.

Bleaching is just one of the challenges for the corals. “Yenbuba is a site that gets quite a lot of human pressure,” Lynn explains, as we bounce across the sea in a small tender boat on our way back to Rebel. The further we travel out from Yenbuba, the easier it is to marvel at how tightly the village is wedged between reef and rock. Sheer karst cliffs rise abruptly behind the huddle of metal-roofed houses. The villagers live their lives right over the water and, as idyllic as it looks, there’s an impact. Fishing habits, coral mining and human pollution can contribute to degradation of the underwater ecosystems.

“The restoration project happened during Covid and it was the first one that was done by a completely local team — but that’s normal now,” says Lynn. Giving Raja’s communities agency to manage reef conservation work themselves is one of The Sea People’s key missions; Lynn has spent years teaching locals from these villages how to plant the corals successfully and working with communities to protect the reef habitats. “One of my and Arnaud’s dreams is for reef restoration to be the highest-paying job in the area,” she explains. “At the moment, the rock star job in Raja is being a dive instructor, but coral gardeners are beginning to be looked up to.”

One of these coral gardeners is Cornelia Junfaly Patty — Cori — who works with Lynn and is also on board with us. When she emerges from her dive, droplets of water linger like trapped diamonds in her thick plaited hair. She’s one of Raja Ampat’s first homegrown marine biologists and was raised in the village of Yenbekwan, our next stop. At the rainbow-coloured wooden jetty, half-dressed kids jump about in the water like a shoal of flying fish. “I grew up here on the reef and we all snorkelled, but I didn’t know how to identify what I was seeing,” Cori tells me as we disembark to take a stroll through the village, the freckles across her cheeks emerging in the strong sunlight. “That’s why I wanted to study marine biology.”

The reef at Yenbekwan is another of The Sea People’s projects, and Lynn and Arnaud’s houseboat is moored here around nine months of the year. The site is named Yaf Keru, which means ‘coral garden’ in the local Biak language.

The village gardens of Yenbekwan end abruptly at a sheer jungle wall and porches dangle over the reef. At the centre, we come to a huge church with twin steeples painted the colour of the cloudless sky, as well as a small chapel. The latter marks the landing point where Indonesian missionaries brought Christianity to the island in 1936, part of the en masse conversions that occurred in Papua during the 19th and 20th centuries. “Before that, the stones and the trees were our deities,” says Cori, describing the animistic beliefs that once tied Raja Ampat’s communities to the land.

Back in the water, we get a closer look at Lynn and Cori’s low-tech coral gardening work. Divers able to confidently control their buoyancy can try it for themselves, as can snorkellers able to duck-dive and hold their breath. More than 80,000 fragments have been planted at Yaf Keru this way over almost a decade, and the underwater landscape looks like a vast forest in various stages of regrowth. As a novice, I opt to watch from the surface with a snorkel and fins. Hovering like a bird in flight, I see Cori crouch on the seabed and deftly tie a coral fragment to a carpet of wire mesh that has stabilised the degraded substrate, like a thread in a giant tapestry.

Oceanic alchemy

Life at sea in Raja Ampat is like floating through a dream. My cabin is all polished woods, big picture windows and comfy palm-print cushions. I fall asleep each night to the gentle lolling of the boat and throaty growl of the engine as we journey onwards, waking each morning to a silken silence and different seascape. Rarely do we see another boat, and when we do, it has the eerie demeanour of an ancient pirate galleon, with a sword-like bow and tall sail mast. It’s the typical look of Indonesia’s traditional wooden pinisi boats, still handmade on the beaches of South Sulawesi — a skill listed on UNESCO’s Intangible Cultural Heritage list. Many are now used as liveaboard dive boats in Raja Ampat. Rebel is a customised version of one, with a covered wooden deck where we take our meals at a huge communal table; a small air-conditioned bar area where marine biology presentations are held; and a flat rooftop for sundowners with 360-degree views.

Despite the alluring comfort of our personal travelling island, the landscape inspires exploration. The day after our visit to Yenbekwan, we rise in the velvety cocoon of first light to go birdwatching in Waisilip Bay. Taking two tenders out, we skim over reefs so shallow and waters so clear I can see tiny yellow fish darting among a shelf of staghorn corals from the boat. Amid a deafening dawn chorus, our binoculars rake over palm cockatoos and a pair of white-bellied sea eagles in the towering canopy of jungle teak, then the russet face of a local possum-like marsupial called a cuscus. Somewhere, beyond a veil of palm fronds, there’s the ‘cah cah’ call of Raja’s endemic red bird of paradise, known for its magnificent plume of fiery feathers.

Suddenly, we become aware we’re being watched. A gnarled snout, a pair of beady yellow eyes — a saltwater crocodile has emerged directly in front of our boat. It’s rare to see them on the reefs, but Cori says every year locals get caught out and there are casualties. Their relationship with this marine predator is complex and intertwined with tradition. “A long time ago people believed the crocodiles were gods,” she whispers, as we quietly watch its movements. “They still believe they protect the area.

Marsupials and birds of paradise in the jungles and saltwater crocodiles on the reefs are just some of the wildlife quirks of Raja Ampat. The fauna here has been partially dictated by its location east of the Wallace Line. A curious biogeographical boundary first drawn in 1859 by a contemporary of Charles Darwin’s, it shows how wildlife distribution and evolution have been shaped by landmass movements millions of years ago. The line falls around Bali; where we are, the wildlife and even Indigenous human genetics have more in common with Australia than with Asia.

Enigmas come in all forms, I discover. I wake at dawn one day to find us drifting among an otherworldly landscape of dozens of tiny islands, our boat trailed by several blacktip reef sharks. We’ve reached Wayag, 60 miles north of the Dampier Strait — one of Raja Ampat’s most beautiful, and photographed, areas. The karst rock here is calcium carbonate — old coral reefs that erode easily in the sea. “That’s why you get these mushroom-shaped islands that are very iconic to this area,” explains Lisa, the pair of us breathless and sweaty as we scramble to the top of an island viewpoint called Pindito Point for a better look.

From here, the ocean beneath us is marbled from the underlying reefs, the islands stretching for miles like ink dots blotted on its surface. It’s the same aerial perspective that marine biologists use to monitor manta ray activity, Lisa tells me. “They use drone shots to see the IDs of the mantas as they roll on their bellies, so they know it’s a pup nursery area because the same females come here each year for protection.”

Later that day, Lisa’s presentation on manta rays gives us the tools to identify the gentle giants we’re hoping to see on our afternoon dive. If it’s got a white mouth and a wingspan of around 11 feet, it’ll be a reef manta; if it’s got a black mouth, it’s likely to be an oceanic manta. The latter can grow as large as 23 feet across. “That’s the width of Rebel,” says Lisa, to audible gasps from our assembled group of diving novices. “They were only formally described in 2009. There are at least 700 that have been photo-identified in Raja Ampat. It’s one of the best places to see them.”

An hour later, as I stare into the gaping abyss of a manta’s mouth trying to identify it, the hairs stand up on the back of my neck. Is it white or black? It’s unexpectedly graceful for a creature so huge and it’s moving so slowly it almost looks like an eagle caught in a headwind. It’s my second scuba dive of the trip and my ears are popping as I struggle to tread water without being pulled away by the current along the reef shelf. With a wingspan of about 10 feet, this is a reef manta, I conclude. She loops around, disappearing into the murk and then returning moments later. I remember another fact from Lisa’s presentation; that mantas have the biggest brain-to-body ratio of any fish. “They’re inquisitive. You really can make eye contact with them,” she’d said with a smile. Though I can’t see this manta’s eyes, I’m convinced she’s looking straight at me.

Sacred waters

The natural world is so raw and unapologetically dominant in Raja Ampat that it’s easy to understand why it became intertwined with locals’ belief systems. The following day we visit Mayalibit Bay, an area wreathed in tribal legends, where the bones of ancient warriors rest in a mountain cave and nature is still worshipped at a sacred river. Over the past eight years, the community here has opened up to tourism, inviting visitors to dip into the waters.

“Our family name is Mentansan; ment means ‘people’ and ansan means ‘strong’ in Papuan,” says Pasai Ramar, the nephew of community elder Alfred Mentansan. When I meet him at his village’s small wooden jetty, he’s bare-chested and still dripping from a swim. Thousands of years ago, he says, before the concept of Indonesia, this bay was the home of the King of Waigeo and the Maya tribe, whose warriors would come to the river to connect with god before going into battle.

“We still come here every week for family gatherings. They say when you jump into the water, you think about challenges coming,” adds Utin Lisa, my village guide, as we hike into the jungle behind the settlement, the smell of petrichor replacing briny sea spray, the mountaintops smudged with rain clouds. She’s barefoot, dressed in a version of what the Maya tribe would have worn in ancient times: a headdress made from junglefowl feathers; cuffs of coconut palm bark fixed with tiny shells and bright-red berries; a skirt fashioned from dried sago palm leaves.

But none of her garb is as startling as the brilliant clarity of the Kali Biru river, which we reach after 10 minutes of sweaty hiking. Descending a slippery wooden staircase, I enter a world very different from the reef. It’s one of complete stillness, with trailing branches and moss-slickened boulders — all submerged yet visible as I become enveloped by the river’s sharp coolness and gentle current. We float beneath an arcade of jungle creepers, at eye level with giant banyan tree roots plunging deep into the sandy riverbanks. No wonder the village’s ancestors considered this place sacred.

I hold tight to this sense of wonder when I slip back into the bath-like sea for one final snorkel come nightfall, hoping to find one of Raja’s most curious creatures: the epaulette — a ‘walking shark’ that crawls over the reef using its pectoral and pelvic fins. Under a cloak of darkness, I feel like I’m cast adrift in space, the corals beneath me the surface of an unfamiliar planet. A pair of translucent squid pulsate in my peripheral vision as needlefish dart skittishly towards the light of the torch strapped to my wrist. The seabed reveals the swollen limbs of a crown of thorns starfish — one of the problem predators of Raja’s reefs — next to the skeletal remains of the coral it’s sucked the life out of.

Then we spot it: a small, patterned walking shark, directly below us, feeding among a reef forest, its long-finned tail intertwined with the slender fingers of branching coral. As I observe it intently, trying to work out if it’s crawling or swimming, I realise I’m also being watched again. Hundreds of tiny eyes are lighting up the sea. A galaxy of stars, accompanied by the sound of popping Rice Krispies, magnified in the void of night. The ocean has finally revealed its snapping shrimp — and the scene is ethereal, fantastical and, in the right light, verging close to heavenly.