Capturing the Moment

Our first stop on our Indonesia adventure was one of my favorite dive spots on the island of Bali, a place called Tulamben. It is a little sleep village at  the base of the towering Mt. Agung Volcano. If you walked the black rocky beach you would have no ideas the wonders that lie just beneath the calm water. If you put on a mask, and dip you face underwater you will find a world filled with beautiful and strange marine creatures and one massive shipwreck. Gliding above the wreck of the U.S. Liberty Covered in color The wreck of the US transport ship Liberty has been drawing scuba divers in for decades. There is not a bare spot of metal on the entire wreck thanks to the prolific coral and invertebrate life here in coral triangle. Indonesia, Philippines, and Papua New Guinea form the worlds best and most diverse area of underwater biodiversity. It is what keeps drawing me back here time and time again.  First nudibranch, joruna Giant Mantis Shrimp ...

This is a clam attached to the wreck  One of the most famous scuba dive sights on the island of Bali, Indonesia is a huge shipwreck called the USS Liberty. I remembered these WWII Liberty ships being built in several shipyards near where I grew up in Savannah and Brunswick, GA. So I looked more into this wreck to see if I possibly came from the same place halfway around the world and what I found was very interesting. In fact the USS part of the name is a common misconception. It should be USAT Liberty. This stands for U.S. Army Transport. She was built in Kearny, N.J. in 1918 for WWI and then survived until an ill fated day in 1942 during WWII when she was torpedoed by the Japanese submarine I-166 while transporting railway parts and rubber. Other boats tried to help tow the damaged Liberty back to shore but eventually had to be beached at Tulamben, Bali. Not finished moving yet, a 1963 volcanic eruptions moved the ship off the beach into the water about 25 meters offshore. ...