Truk Lagoon Day 1 Island Tour

Divertrek
February 8, 2014
Museums & Aquariums / Pacific Diving / Shipwrecks

July, 2014

Etten Island in Truk Lagoon (Chuuk) — Preparing to land on Weno at Chuuk Lagoon (formerly called Truk Lagoon). Note that Etten Island in the foreground was shaped by the Imperial Japanese (using forced labor) to replicate an unsinkable aircraft carrier. Tonoas (formerly called Dublon) is in the immediate background.

Truk’s (Chuuk’s) historical treasures aren’t just hidden beneath the waves. They’re everywhere. And a WWII buff’s dream. The Blue Lagoon Dive shop/Resort is located on Weno (formerly Moen), the main island of Chuuk, and occupies the prior site of an Imperial Japanese fighter & Seaplane Base. On this beautiful property you will find old bunkers, machine guns, propellers and other artifacts.
The dive shop was founded and run by the late Kimiou Aisek, who witnessed the US Navy’s devastating attack on Truk (Operation Hailstone) in February 1944. His son Gradvin now operates the dive shop. Here are some pictures of the dive resort grounds:

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The Resort can also arrange a private tour for you to the “caves” (Tonotan Gun and caves), a massive gun emplacement that guarded the main harbour below. It’s on a private property, about 115 m above sea level, and the owner charges a modest fee to visit.

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The Blue Lagoon Dive shop (located on the grounds) can also arrange an Island Tour/lunch for you. On this tour we visited Tonoas Island (formerly Dublon), which was the Command Post during the War. There we visited the ruins of a Seaplane base, communications center (now a school), and a former Japanese Naval hospital.

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On this tour we also visited nearby Eten Island, which was a former fighter-plane base. The most conspicuous thing about Eten Island is that it looks like an (unsinkable) aircraft carrier from the air. This was not an accident. Before the war, the Japanese forced the locals to remove part of the mountain-top on the island and extend it outwards for a runway.

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The tour concluded with a beach lunch and snorkel on a beautiful, isolated tropical paradise called Fonomu Island, privately managed by Blue Lagoon. The coral reef preserve there was stunning to snorkel- pristine Staghorn coral, anemones, clownfish and other colourful fish. When lunch was over, we fed spare rib scraps to some small black-tip reef sharks.