Coron's Bay of Plenty

The first time I saw a human skull I was 34 metres under water. The darkness devoured the light attempting to emit itself from my puny torch, relinquishing me of the power to look anywhere else. I moved towards to bones.

The water, despite the darkness, was crystal clear. A juvenile moray eel, disturbed by my light’s rude intrusion emerged from the eye socket. I stared. Unperturbed by my presence he opened and closed his lower jaw to the rhythm of my ascending bubbles. Was he warning me? Or just telling me to keep going? The treasure of this bay lay elsewhere. My own bones shivered at the thought.

Slowly, so as not to kick up too much silt, I moved from cabin to cabin. Just one ship, I thought. So much life had grown where so many lives had been lost.

A bicycle hung from the wall, completely intact. It seemed the only evidence that in fact humans had occupied, no more than that – had lived in this vessel. But hang on, on closer observation I notice an undeployed bullet. The size of my own breathing tank. A big sigh. Definitely humans.

Then it was clear. Light shone, not through the portholes, but through bullet holes. Fish danced in it, their bodies illuminated by the sun for a few seconds at a time and then gone again. Out of sight, out of mind?

A bay of approximately forty ships had sunk. All in one day. Not one soul survived. Coron bay has a well-hidden secret and even on close observation of the surface there is nothing visible to suggest that over three thousand Japanese lives were lost here, just beneath your feet.

The dive ended and we surfaced. Thirty-nine more ships to go.

Perchance, the treasure I was seeking wasn’t a physical treasure at all. Perhaps, it never is. Perhaps, just being where others had once been and had suddenly perished was riches enough. Perhaps, it is enough that their stories, now the secrets of the bay, had met my story to give them a voice.