Right now we are approaching the end of Wallacea’s Spice Islands season and heading towards the start of the Raja Ampat season. With this, we’d like to take you back into the few trips we had in the Banda Sea and share with you the magical encounters that we witnessed. Are you ready for another tale from the sea?
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It is a well-known fact that a lot of people often visit the Banda Sea at the end of the year to witness the migration of the hammerhead sharks. Facing life in the wild with its unpredictability, some of them go home empty-handed. But this time, we were quite lucky with the encounter.
During a dive near Koon Island, at a depth of 30 - 43 meters, we managed to document a giant school of hammerhead sharks gliding in the water. It started with only a few of them, but then the large group followed not too far behind. While we observed from a safe distance, some of them didn’t shy away and swam closer to us.
Hammerhead Sharks often swim the Banda Sea between September and November. Their migration is moving towards Banda due to the abundant food supply that the rich Banda waters offer. The Southeast monsoon also brings in rich water up from the deep ocean during this time of the year. With the Banda Sea being located along the Ring of Fire, it becomes the perfect aggregation point for them. While encountering these sharks does not happen on every dive, they can be totally observable with correct conditions.
This one encounter came as a lovely surprise.
Sailing in the vast Indonesian waters means that you can encounter dolphins every once in a while, whether they ride along the boat’s bow, or as you dive into the blue waters seeing them play and chatter with one another.
But this time, we encountered a megapod of melon-headed whales.
The crew and guests were riding the tender when a lot of movement was spotted to the northeast of Ambon Island. Approaching the spot, we saw a lot of what seemed to be dolphins jumping out of the water. But after a closer look, they were melon-headed whales having fun in the water and mating. Some of them swam really close to our tender, adding some more giggles and amazement to our day.
Melon-headed whales are actually still in the same family as regular dolphins, only minus the beak. They are also super social, often traveling in massive pods ranging from 100 to over 1000 individuals, which explains why we were able to see 100 of them.
We might be approaching the end of the Spice Island season right now, but we sure are leaving with so many stories. As we continue our journey to Raja Ampat, there are still so many stories and encounters to look forward to.
Until the next tide,
Banda Sea, October 2026
Wallacea Dive Cruise Team
