On this page
- What is this Saleh Bay whale shark guide?
- Who runs it, and what is the commercial interest?
- Is it connected to operators with similar names?
- How are sources chosen and ranked?
- How are conflicts and dates handled?
- What will you not find in this guide?
- How do you report a mistake?
- What do readers ask about this guide?
- Which sources support this page?
- How do I reach the desk?
By Saleh Bay Whale Shark Editorial Desk
This Saleh Bay whale shark guide is an English-language travel reference with a request desk, under Juara Holding Group. It does not run tours, boats, rooms or transfers, and it is not a government body or conservation organisation. Requests can lead to a paid booking, so we have a commercial interest. Each claim names its source, and we say so when a source is undated.
What is this Saleh Bay whale shark guide?
It is a reference for people deciding whether, when and how to see whale sharks at Saleh Bay on Sumbawa, an island of 15,448 square kilometres with a mid-2025 official population estimate of 1,673,700, according to Wikipedia. Information on the bay is scattered across scientific papers, government files, Indonesian press and sales pages from tour companies, and those sources often disagree. Our work is to put them side by side, say who said what and when, and tell you where nobody seems to know.
It is written by the Saleh Bay Whale Shark Editorial Desk. There is no named team and no individual byline. Nothing here is a first-hand travel report. When a page says what a morning on the water involves, it is relaying what operators, journalists and researchers have published, and it names them.
A good place to begin is our short sourced answers to common questions, which link onward to the longer pages.
Who runs it, and what is the commercial interest?
The guide sits under Juara Holding Group. It has one commercial purpose you should know about: people can send requests to a desk, and those requests can lead to a paid booking. That gives us an interest in you travelling, and you should read us with that in mind.
Here is how a request works. You ask a question or describe a trip. The desk answers. If a trip is possible, any fee, the price and the company that contracts with you are set out in writing in an offer, before you agree to anything. The site is not itself a contracting party. Nothing on these pages is an offer, and no page promises a boat, a room, a date or a sighting.
The commercial interest also shapes what we refuse to do. We do not rate or rank operators, because we have not verified their safety, licences or boats, and a ranking from a site with a desk would deserve suspicion. Where an operator's claim helps you plan, we quote it and name the operator, so you can weigh the source yourself.
Is it connected to operators with similar names?
No. The name describes the topic, which is Saleh Bay whale sharks and the bay they use. My Best Places to Visit, a travel blog, names a local tour operator called Saleh Bay Whale Shark. That firm has no connection with this guide. The no-connection statement is ours, not the blog's.
If someone uses this name to ask you for money, check the channel. This guide's only contacts are the WhatsApp number and email address at the foot of this page. A genuine offer from the desk arrives in writing and names the company that would contract with you.
How are sources chosen and ranked?
We rank by what a source is in a position to know, and the ranking changes with the question. A ministry database is the right authority on whether a decree is in force. It tells you nothing about what time a boat leaves. A tour company knows its own departure time, but its statement about how many sharks live in the bay is a sales line until a study supports it.
| Source type | Examples used on this site | What we trust it for | How we limit it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Government and treaty bodies | Decree 18/KEPMEN-KP/2013, listed as in force; CMS Appendix I and II listing; IUCN Red List Endangered assessment dated 18 March 2016; UNESCO's SAMOTA Biosphere Reserve, 724,631 hectares | Legal status and formal designations | We state a document's status and date, and name gaps such as a blank document number |
| Scientific papers and factsheets | A Frontiers paper of 30 April 2026 tracking 70 sharks tagged from 2015 to 2025; the IUCN shark specialist group factsheet on the bay's listing under Criterion A and Sub-criterion C2, which reports on 108 identified sharks | Biology, counts, movement | We carry over the authors' own hedges, and say when data are unpublished or small |
| Conservation organisations | Konservasi Indonesia's 2025 report of 174 identified individuals | Recent counts and field work | Such groups campaign as well as count, so we name them as the source |
| National press | Antara on Governor Decree 100.3.3.1-196 of 2026, which reserves part of the bay, quoting the provincial spokesperson | Events, officials' statements, and rules whose text we lack | We say we are citing the report and not the text |
| Operators and tour sellers | Departure times, inclusions, listed codes of conduct | What that company says it does | Always named, always treated as an interested party |
| Travel blogs and community guides | Accounts of a single trip, overland times | Colour and practical hints | One visit is one visit, and we say so |
Our page on whether Saleh Bay whale shark tourism is ethical shows this in practice: a contested subject, with the evidence separated from the claims of people who have something to gain from them.
How are conflicts and dates handled?
We state a conflict and leave it standing. If one operator says a boat ride takes one hour and another says two, you will see both, attributed. We do not merge figures from different sources into a single range, because that would invent a claim nobody made, and we do not pick the figure that makes a trip look easier.
Dates get the same care. Shark counts rise as more animals are photographed, so a number without a year is close to useless. Prices and flight schedules go stale quickly, and every published figure carries the month it was checked. Where a process is still moving, such as the 2026 conservation reservation, we say what we last confirmed and when. Facts across the site were last checked in November 2026 unless a page says otherwise.
Spelling is a small example of the same habit. Sources write both Labuan Jambu and Labuhan Jambu for the same village, and we note that instead of quietly correcting anyone.
What will you not find in this guide?
Some gaps are deliberate, because the evidence does not support an answer:
- A sighting success rate. Only operators' own claims and a small research trip log are available.
- A government fee tariff. Fee figures we show come from operators and a listing, and they are labelled that way.
- Annual visitor numbers, an exact count of bagans, or a monthly weather table for the bay.
- Verified details on medical access, ATMs or mobile coverage in the village.
- Operator ratings, or any endorsement of a company's safety.
If you find a page that seems to answer one of these with confidence, tell us, because we would treat that as an error.
How do you report a mistake?
Give us the page address, quote the line in question and, if you can, add a source that shows why. Operators are welcome to correct a line that describes their own business, with a link to where the current information is published. Researchers and officials can correct us the same way. Trip requests are a different kind of message, and our contact page deals with those.
We check the correction against its source and change the page if the source holds up. We may keep both versions and describe the disagreement if the matter is unresolved.
What do readers ask about this guide?
Who is behind the Saleh Bay Whale Shark guide?
The guide is published under Juara Holding Group and written by the Saleh Bay Whale Shark Editorial Desk. It has a request desk, and requests can lead to a paid booking.
Does the Saleh Bay Whale Shark guide run tours?
No. It does not run boats, rooms, tours or transfers. The desk answers requests, and any arrangement is set out in a written offer that names the contracting company.
How does the Saleh Bay Whale Shark guide choose sources?
It ranks each source by what that source can know: official texts for legal status, papers for biology, press for events, and operators only for what they say they do themselves.
Is this guide linked to the Saleh Bay Whale Shark tour operator?
No. A travel blog names a local operator with that name, but it has no connection with this guide.
Which sources support this page?
- Wikipedia: Sumbawa
- My Best Places to Visit (travel blog)
- Marine ministry legal database: Decree 18/KEPMEN-KP/2013
- Convention on Migratory Species: whale shark
- IUCN Red List: whale shark
- UNESCO: Saleh-Moyo-Tambora Biosphere Reserve
- Frontiers in Marine Science, 2026: Indonesian whale shark tracking
- IUCN shark specialist group factsheet: Saleh Bay Important Shark and Ray Area
- Konservasi Indonesia: 2025 Saleh Bay whale shark report
- Antara: province reserves Saleh Bay as a conservation area
How do I reach the desk?
For questions, requests or source corrections, use WhatsApp +62 811-3941-4563 or bd@juaraholding.com. These are the only two channels for this guide. The desk answers what it can, and only a written offer binds. The disclaimer sets out the limits on what we can guarantee.
Send the desk your dates and starting point. The desk replies in writing.
Ask the desk on WhatsApp bd@juaraholding.com