Over Chinese New Year (last week of January 2009), I spent a week diving on Christmas Island (Indian Ocean).

For those of you who are not familiar with the island, Christmas Island is a territory of Australia located 2600km northwest of Perth, Western Australia and 500km south of Jakarta, Indonesia. In other words, it’s only a 2.5 hour flight from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

It has a population of 1500 and 70% of the population are ethnic Chinese.

So why is this island so famous?

Every year from November to early January, around 100 million red crabs migrate from the forest to the ocean to mate and to spawn. This migration has been called one of the wonders of the natural world. The island is also a focal point for other land crabs (robber/coconut crab, blue crab) and sea birds (ie., red-footed boobie, frigates, etc.)

I would like to share the highlights of my trip with you at www.flickr.com/wudai. We missed the crab migration season but we ventured into the forest to see the red crabs.

Enjoy!

Thanks for posting! Am keen to go Christmas Island! Any whalesharks sighting??

I just saw a documentairy about Christmas island on discovery last week.. very nice holiday destination with amazing wildlife!

Somewhere I'm very keen to get to one day. Had a mate that was building the detention centre out there a few years ago, he raves about the diving.

It's a bit of a long (and expensive) flight from Aust though, right?

Ryan.

We didn't see any whalesharks during our trip but during our week there a kid who was snorkeling near the Settlement (beach/boat ramp/pier area) saw a whaleshark, it swam up towards him and freaked him out!

My understanding is whalesharks do live around the area and they usually appear when the baby crabs are born. (Whalesharks feed on baby sharks.)

As for the cost/flights, Christmas Island is a 2.5 hour filght from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia so actually it's not a long flight for those who live in Asia (ie., HK, Malaysia, Singapore, etc). The residents told us it would cost them less to fly from CI to Perth through KL rather than taking a direct flight. I think it's a longer flight from Perth to CI.

Finally, since the Aussie dollar has weakened against the US dollar, those of us who live in countries where we can capitalize on the weak AUD will have significant cost savings visiting places where they spend the AUD these days.

While those of us relying on the aussie $ can't afford to do much international travelling at the moment Oh well, we had a good run there for a while.

I hadn't actually thought of flying to CI via KL, especially if heading there from the east coast, might be something to look into in the furture.

Heehee, the weak aussie dollars is a majar plus! Is deciding between Timor Leste or Christmas Island but think Timor will have to wait until the USD weakens...
wudai, which dive operator & which resort did u go? would u recommend them? oh btw, u have nice photos on your flickr!

We went diving with Christmas Island Divers and stayed at the Sunset. We had an excellent time!

Thanks, Wudai!

Hi,

I lived on Christmas Island for nearly 4 years. It's a beautiful place to dive, and to explore the jungle and caves.

It is tricky to get there some times, the flights from Perth are expensive (or as of last week the airline has gone bust, so not at all available), the flights from Asia are intermittent... but it's definitely worth it!

When I lived there 2004-2008 there were two main dive operators:
CI Divers
Wet 'n' Wild Adventures

Both operators were very reliable and spoke a variety of languages. The accommodation available varies from year to year, with hotels opening/closing etc. The resort reopened in 2008, which is a lovely place to stay, however I'm not sure if it's still open.

Despite all the frustrations of getting there... you will definitely enjoy it when you are there! The people are very friendly and accommodating, the climate is beautiful... and the diving! Fantastic visibililty (often ~50m), lots of whaleshark sitings (Novemeber - February) and pristine reefs all around! A good place to start is the tourism association website [christmas-dot-net-dot-au].

I hope you get to experience this paradise at least once in your life!

Hannah

Hannah, wow, 4 years of X'mas everyday!
We might do Cocos Keeling too! Have contacted the travel agt, there are rumours of weekly flight(s) from S'pore. Yippee! But 1st they need to settle the Perth, CI, Cocos Keeling route...

Xaria
Austasia/Silk Air had chartered flights to Christmas Island until last year. I believe MAS has a direct flight from KUL... at least for now.
I personally prefer flying directly because PER is pretty tough on cabin luggage weight and I carry all my camera equipment.
I dived with Indian Ocean Dive Academy on X'mas island. Unless you want to go around Perth, I'd personally skip the Oz mainland portion. The National Airline stops at Learmonth on the way to/from the island and the scheduling is just funky. You lose a lot of time travelling plus your luggage capacity is more limited. Not worth it.

Thanks, Drew. Hoping for a direct flight from S'pore, if not, will make do with the KL route, definately not going to fly to Perth (so far away!)... I mean they are still sorting out the Perth route, then they will decide on the S'pore one...