Shallow waters around the island Arborek, Raja Ampat, West Papua, Indonesia
Wikipedia: Located off the northwest tip of Bird's Head Peninsula on the island of New Guinea, in Indonesia's West Papua province, Raja Ampat, or the Four Kings, is an archipelago comprising over 1,500 small islands, cays, and shoals surrounding the four main islands of Misool, Salawati, Batanta, and Waigeo, and the smaller island of Kofiau. The Raja Ampat archipelago straddles the Equator and forms part of Coral Triangle which contains the richest marine biodiversity on earth. Administratively, the archipelago is part of the province of West Papua (formerly known as Irian Jaya). Most of the islands constitute the Raja Ampat Regency, which was separated out from Sorong Regency in 2004. The regency encompasses around 70,000 square kilometres (27,000 sq mi) of land and sea, of which 7, km2 constitutes the land area and has a population of 47,885 (as of 2018). This excludes the southern half of Salawati Island, which is not part of this regency but instead constitutes the Salawati Selatan District of Sorong Regency. The name of Raja Ampat (Raja means king, and empat means four) comes from local mythology that tells of a woman who finds seven eggs. Four of the seven hatch and become kings who occupy four of Raja Ampat's biggest islands whilst the other three become a ghost, a woman, and a stone. History shows that Raja Ampat was once a part of the Sultanate of Tidore, an influential kingdom from Maluku. Yet, after the Dutch invaded Maluku, it was claimed by the Netherlands. The first recorded sighting and landing by Europeans of the Ampat Islands was by the Portuguese navigator Jorge de Menezes and his crew in 1526, en route from Biak, the Bird's Head Peninsula, and Waigeo, to Halmahera (Ternate). The English explorer William Dampier gave his name to Dampier Strait, which separates Batanta island from Waigeo island. To the east, there is a strait that separates Batanta from Salawati. In 1759 Captain William Wilson sailing in the East Indiaman Pitt navigated th
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Location: Arborek, Raja Ampat Islands, West Papus, Indonesia
Photo credit: © Bert de Ruiter / Alamy / Afripics
License: Royalty Free
Model Released: No
Keywords: ampat, arborek, bert, coral, de, horizontal, indonesia, indonesian, island, islands, landscape, papua, paradise, raja, reef, ruiter, sea, seascape, shallow, shoal, tourism, travel, view, water, west
