Note that live-aboard trips are linked below – Mergei Archipelago Myanmar, Palau, and the Raja Ampats Indonesia.
UTILA, THE BAY ISLANDS OF HONDURAS 02/2011
PADI OPEN WATER – This must be the cheapest – and one of the best places in the world – to get diving certificates. Utila is a dusty little town whose sole purpose is diving. There are 14 dive shops here all competing for business. My company was Utila Dive Center and for US$300, in addition to the open water course, I had 3 free nights of accommodation, free breakfasts, two free dives after and got a T-shirt. The instructors were all top-notch from Denmark, the US, England and Trinidad/Tobago. Unable to swim, it was a real test doing the necessary 200m swim.
TAGNAGA, COLUMBIA 21/11/2011
#7. Calichan.
#8. Latravisia Cpaso del Angel.
These two dives were disappointing – a sketchy guide and dead coral with few fish.
ANDAMAN ISLANDS, INDIA 17-18/12/2012
Scuba Schools International (SSI) Advanced – Andaman Bubbles Dive Center, Havelock Island. When I should have received my Advanced Diving certificate, After innumerable emails, SSI would not issue my card because the instructor was PADI and PADI would not issue my card because the head instructor was SSI!!!
#9. Bayview, Havelock.
#10. Pilot Reef, Havelock.
#11. Dixon Pinnacle. Wall dive with gorgeous pinnacle with good coral. Napoleon Wrasse.
#12. Dixon Pinnacle. Schools blue stripe snapper, Napoleon Wrasse, barracuda.
#13. Muck dive.
MALDIVES 05/04/2013
#14. Pinnacle, S Ari Atoll. Poor coral and few fish. Worst possible guide who was always 20m behind and paid no attention to me except on ascent.
PERHENTIAN ISLANDS, MALAYSIA 20-21/04/2013
#15. Sugar Wreck. Giant pufferfish, blue streaked angelfish, lionfish, boxfish, barracuda
#16. Temple. Long fin bannerfish, six barr wrasse, blue barred and red lipped parrotfish, garfish, white eye moray, window grouper, blue lined grouper, harlequin grouper, titan triggerfish
MERGUI ARCHIPELAGO, South MYANMAR 26-30/11/2013
APO ISLAND, PHILIPPINES 9/2/2014
#29. Cogon. Long drift dive. Huge school bigeye trevally (jacks), banded sea snake, gobi, regal angelfish.
#30. Lagahan. Flying gunnard, snake eels, squid, eastern clownfish, longnose hawkfish.
#31. Chapel. Leaf scorpion fish, banded sea snakes, white eyed eel.
SABAH, MALAYSIA 20-22/2/14
Day 1 – Mabul
#32. Pardise I,II – broad club cuttlefish, reef scorpion fish, flathead crocodile fish, octopus, yellow fin trevally, schooling batfish.
#33. Pana/Lobster Wall – crocodile fish, turtles, nudibranch, firedart gobies, spotted lionfish, morays, hairy hermit crab, blue spotted ray.
#34. Water Bungalow.
Day 2 – Sipadan Island – one of the top 5 places in the world to dive.
#35. Barracuda Point – large school barracuda, white-tipped reef sharks, Napoleon wrasse.
#36. South Point – coral +++, white-tipped reef sharks.
#37. Drop Off. Scariest dive of my life. Went at the end of the day with just me and two guides. At 16m I had a complete blockage of air (rust particles in the tank) when I was right next to the guide. Buddy breathed to the surface after the rest stop. Once horizontal the blockage cleared. Large school bumphead parrot fish
Day 3 – Mabul, Kapalai
#38. Stingray City, Mabul – peacock mantis shrimp, boxer shrimp, morays.
#39. Kapalai – juvenile frogfish, boxer shrimp, leaf fish, nudibranchs (nembrotha, flaggelinas, chromoderis)
#40. Paradise II Mabul.
PALAU 16-22/12/2014
FLORES and KOMODO ISLAND, INDONESIA 11,13,29/01/2015
The biggest island in the chain, it offers beaches, bay islands, exceptional diving and snorkeling near Labuan Bajo, an interior of perfectly shaped volcanoes, jungle, rice fields and the only access to Komodo National Park and its famous Komodo dragons. The Portuguese named it “Flowers” when they colonized it in the 16th century. Then name stuck as did Catholicism.
Labuan Bajo (pop 15,000)
This town has a particularly unattractive one-way main street separated from the harbour by shacks and a container port. The narrow strip of pavement is flanked by a strip of muddy dirt, an open sewer on one side, piles of dirt, ramshackle guesthouses, restaurants, shops and 32 dive shops.
Fees for visits to Komodo NP: 150,000Rp per visit, Dive permit 225,000Rp per visit, Rinca permit 50,000Rp per visit.
On our first day, we took a tour that involved two dives and a visit to Rinca (cost 1,150,000Rp or US$93), one of the two main islands that form Komodo National Park.
#69 Tempah
#70 Wainilu – a slope of coral debris leading down to dull brown soft corals was a mecca for “small things”: cuttlefish, a flying gunnard, tiny striped pipefish, lionfish, and the sweetest harlequin sweetlips (a tiny white fish with brown spots and lobed fins fluttering in a small coral patch).
Rinca is the best place to see Komodo dragons as about 20 animals congregate in the small national park headquarters. The rangers carry a forked stick they can use to fend off an attack from the scary-as-hell small dinosaurs. We saw dragons from baby 18-inch ones to monster 2m long ones. It was then a 1-hour walk past a nest and up a hill for panoramic views of the island. There are two and three-hour walks but I see little need for more than what we did. The Rangers are a treasure trove of information.
#71 Komodo
#72 name? many giant mantas.
TOGEAN ISLANDS, SULAWESI INDONESIA
With golden beaches, lagoons, lost coves and arguably the best diving in Sulawesi, the Togeans are difficult to get to but supposedly difficult to leave. It is possible to explore all three major reef systems: atoll, barrier and fringing. However, I have heard that dynamite fishing has taken its toll on the fish and the diving is only mediocre. There are no big fish, always a marker of a healthy reef. In my determination to do the entire “travellers trail” from Makassa to Manado, I will continue doing it the hard way.
Wakai is not a place to stay so arrange accommodation at any of the resorts listed in the travel facts section.
There are no flights to the Togeans. Ferries leave Ampana to Wakai every morning but Friday at 10 am. Buy tickets on the boat. Ongoing ferries from Wakai to Gorontalo leave on Mondays and Thursdays at 4 pm. So I took the ferry on Tuesday, stayed at Blue Marlin Dive Resort on Kadadiri Island and departed on Thursday.
Black Marlin Dive Resort is on Kadadiri Island and they will pick you up at the ferry dock in Wakai. A standard room with a bathroom was 200,000 per night with all meals included. The diving is reasonable at 28€ but everything else is expensive: a large Bingtang is 55,000, an orange juice that normally costs 7,000, is 15,000 and the food is mediocre at best. Water runs from 8-9 and 5-6 and the electricity is on from 5-11pm. The owner has the worst personality in the world and is a real businessman.
#73 Minicanyon.
The ferry to Gorontalo leaves on Mondays and Thursdays at 4 pm. You can rent an AC cabin, AC business seat or sleep in economy with 2 tiers of mats on the second deck that has open sides that can be covered if it rains (72,000 with a mat called a tatami). Anyone could go into the AC Business and sleep on the floor. I chose the latter and slept alone on the open-top deck with great views of all the stars. Although it was advertised as a 13-hour trip, it took 11 1/2, and we arrived at 3:30 am. Significantly, we crossed the equator on the way.
RAJA AMPATS, PAPUA INDONESIA 5-14/01/2015
