smellzlikefish
Contributor
That's too bad. Where did you go in February in Indonesia?
I went to Misool, Raja Ampat, specifically in dive site called Magic Mountain, 3 times around late December, late January & mid March. Always had good luck to see the giant oceanic manta. They are huge. My guess they are about twice the size of the reef mantas that I have seen in any other places (Manta Sandy, Manta Ridge, Manta Alley, Taka Makassar & Manta Point). I have seen the oceanic manta in Blue Magic, central Raja Ampat too.
These giants have a trade mark of white collar and wing tips (not all black top as you usually see on the smaller cousin reef mantas) as shown below:
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We see mantas on basically every other dive here, and we have seen the oceanic ones both here and in the Galapagos, so we weren't all that disappointed at all. I mean, Indo is amazing! We stayed in a resort in Lembeh, then took the SMY Ondina through Raja Ampat. I struggled with photos for the first few days in Raja because there is literally something going on everywhere. And the visibility was a challenge at times. Once I was dialed in with decent conditions, though, it was like taking candy from a candy machine!