News of a giant sea creature washed up on a beach in Indonesia.  Is it a whale? Is it a giant squid?  Is it a monster completely unknown to science?

Of course, the last possibility is the dream of all cryptozoologists.  The world’s oceans are continually revealing new species and it is not pure romance to hope that they may yet bring to light a creature that had supposedly died in prehistory or something of monstrous size, which had previously been unknown.

The carcass in Indonesia, which has been washed up on a remote beach on the island of Seram will, most likely, be identified as a baleen whale, although some have suggested that it looks more like a giant squid.  The chance of it being something else is remote, but it remains a chance.

For myself, I find the seas endlessly fascinating, and it is precisely because of that element of chance.  Whenever I take a journey by boat, I am forever scouring the waves, ever hopefully that something unexpected will break the surface.  At different times, and in different places, I have been fortunate enough to see humpback whales breaching; shark fins circling; a large sunfish surfacing; dolphins and porpoises playing; a school of flying fish leaping; but I have yet to see the snake-like neck and teeth-laden jaws of the sea monster of my imagination.

But that won’t stop me dreaming.

© Bradley Dunbar

Bradley Dunbar gets deep whilst still remaining within his depth.