Dive destination: Cocos (Keeling) Islands

Pulu Keeling National Park is about as remote as you can get and visitors rare. It’s a closed atoll with a brackish lagoon, home to millions of sea birds including the endemic Cocos buff-banded rail.

Dieter Gerhard, owner of Cocos Dive, greeted us with the news that at first light we would be leaving for Pulu Keeling, 36km to the north. He hoped no camera gear was in a suitcase of ours still languishing in Kuala Lumpur. Fortunately that contained only non-essentials for the tropics like clothes.

Pulu Keeling National Park is a closed atoll with a brackish lagoon, home to millions of sea birds including the endemic Cocos buff-banded rail. The passage between Cocos (Keeling) and Pulu Keeling is open ocean, where swells are driven by trade winds for much of the year. Very few boats make the trip and it is even rarer to get a chance to dive there. Dieter used his 8.5m aluminium dive boat, Putri Laut (which translates as something about a princess, not a festering hoodlum) for the trip north over the lazy swell.

War History

On board was a descendant of one of the crew of the SMS Emden, a German light cruiser that had a spectacular career in the Indian Ocean, capturing or sinking 31 vessels during World War I. Captain von Muller was highly regarded for his gracious treatment of prisoners. On 9th November 1914 Emden had sent a small contingent ashore at Direction Island to destroy the Eastern Telegraph Company wireless telegraph and cable station and while they were ashore Emden was engaged by the light cruiser HMAS Sydney which had been escorting a troop convoy nearby. Sydney had heavier guns of longer range. After a crippling bombardment SMS Emden beached at Pulu Keeling. After further shelling she was persuaded to surrender. This was Australia’s first naval victory.

Meanwhile the German shore party at Cocos (Keeling) commandeered a local schooner, Ayesha, which they sailed to Sumatra, eventually returning to Germany seven months later. Surviving crew from the Emden were allowed the rare honour of adding the suffix Emden to their names. It was one of only two vessels ever awarded the Iron Cross by Kaiser Wilhelm II.

Remnants & Geography

On a good day the Emden site is an easy dive only a few metres deep. The boat can’t anchor there so we dived in relays; the visiting film crew first, the hoi polloi and us later. The props and drive shafts are prominent, as are 105mm guns concreted into the reef. There’s a no-touch policy from Parks Australia which might have been better applied to the Japanese salvors who, in 1950 ripped the ship apart with explosives and shipped much of it off to Japan, or to the swells that thunder in emphatically much of the year.
In the lee of Pulu Keeling where we anchored for lunch green turtles were clambering over one another to get their genes represented in the next generation. Or playing piggy back.

Cocos (Keeling), an atoll, belongs to Australia though it lies closer to Sri Lanka than to Perth in Western Australia, way off the beaten track, in the middle of nowhere. Flights are expensive and not entirely reliable which is why only about 30 visitors a week got there. It’s flatter than a nit, with 26 islands necklaced around a shallow lagoon.

On the windward side lies Home Island, home for around 400 Cocos Malay people. The Cocos Malays were originally brought in by John Clunies-Ross in the nineteenth century to work the copra (dried coconut flesh) plantations. They are Muslim and they have a fascinating culture mix of Malay and Scottish. Even though Queen Victoria gave the islands to George Clunies-Ross and his descendents in 1886 in perpetuity, the islands became an Australian Territory on 23 November 1955. John Cecil Clunies-Ross sold Home Island to Australia in 1978 for $A6.25 million.

West Island, 8.5 km to leeward across the lagoon, has the airstrip, one restaurant, a couple of cafes, a bar and 120 primarily expat Australians. The road end to end is 11km. Traffic hazards include goats, crabs, erosion and high tides.

Top Experience

Parts of the atoll are beautiful. The surfing, kite-surfing and diving are excellent. If you want a palm-covered island with crystal clear water all to yourself for the day, it is easy to arrange.
One of the best things in Cocos (Keeling) is not a dive at all, but a snorkel called The Rip, a narrow channel to the east of Direction Island where clear ocean water floods continuously into the lagoon. The strength of the current depends on the tide, the swell and the phase of the moon, anything up to about four knots. You throw yourself into the water towards the seaward end and get blasted through towards the lagoon. There’s a safety rope if you can’t swim back, but swimming cross-current brings you into calm lagoon water.

The Rip is about 7m deep, the southern wall covered with live coral, riddled with caves and teeming with fish. Some of the fish are regulars, like a barracuda about one and a half metres long and a blacktip reef shark with its dorsal missing. There are humphead parrotfish, napoleon wrasse, reef sharks, morays and groupers.Perhaps because every visitor comes here the fish are oblivious to people.

Lots of variety

One of the things I love about Cocos (Keeling) diving is the variety. There are steep coral walls dropping off into the abyss. There are shallow coral gardens, the wreck of a Catalina flying boat strewn through the sea grass beds, a fishing boat wreck and areas of old junk from the dismantled telegraph station on Direction Island.

There’s a resident dugong, Kat, who likes to scratch himself on the anchor line, spinner and bottlenose dolphins, mantas, reef sharks and an area with several encrusted cannons. Last year they saw humpbacks, whale sharks and tiger sharks too. It’s remote and an oasis for anything passing, so you can expect the unexpected.

Catalina JX 435

Catalina JX 435 was on a flight from Red Hills Lake airbase in Madras via Colombo when it crashed into the lagoon at Cocos (Keeling). It attempted a downwind landing on a choppy lagoon. Bouncing once, it flipped over and caught fire before sinking.

Rescuers from Direction Island managed to pull out seven men but two died later from their injuries. Seven more were lost with the plane and never recovered. The two Pratt and Whitney engines now lie close to one another but the debris field extends 600m to the south-west and most of the fuselage is missing. It is only a few metres deep to the sea grass beds so you can explore the whole area in a couple of dives

Last Notes

Accommodation on the island is catered to by several fantastic guest houses. The most basic is $180 a night and a buffet-style meal at the Tropika Restaurant is $33 a head. It may seem expensive but the costs of doing anything, especially running a business are daunting. It’s just so far away from the mainland, but high speed internet is available on Prison Island, an idyllic location.

Cocos (Keeling) Island information snippet

Getting there: Virgin Australia fly to the Cocos Keeling Islands from Perth twice a week. Diving: There’s only one operator, Cocos Dive. www.cocosdive.com Booking ahead is essential.
Air Temperature: 27ºC or more
Water temperature: tends to stay in the 20s
When to go: The diving is great all year round. Winds are lighter during cyclone season, November to April.
Currency: Australian Dollar. Eftpos facilities are available but bring some cash. A Commonwealth Bank agency is open limited hours.
Accommodation:

• Castaway is mid-range and nice. www.cocoscastaway.com
  
• Cocos Beachcombers is one of the best guest houses. www.cocosbeachcombers.com.au/
  

Travel insurance: This is one destination where travel insurance is highly recommended as flight cancellations could leave you an accommodation bill not budgeted for.
www.cocoskeelingislands.com.au