Help me decide where to go

OK. It's official. I have about 2 weeks in August and I cannot make up my mind.

My buddy & I are thinking about something like Maldives, PNG, Mabul/Sipadan or Australia.

What are the areas the suit us the most? Given that we don't want a to do muck dives, strong currents or liveaboards. We are looking for soft corals & easy access from & to the airport.

Please help us out here. Where should we go?

No current? out goes the Maldives

Easy to airport? out goes Mabul/Sipadan

No liveaboard? Hmm, out goes Oz if you want good diving, unless you go to Ningaloo which could be an option..

How about Walindi in PNG? but then again.. no easy airport..

I suggest you go to Chuuk....

how about manado and/or bangka in northerm sulawesi, easy airport, nice walls, nice corals

You know, there is a reason why it hard to find outstanding easy diving right off the beach next to a major airport . . .

All kidding and light sarcasm aside (sorry for that), what do you mean by "easy" access to and from the airport? If you mean that you must be near a major airport with daily large jet flights then Bali or Manado might fit the bill. If you don't mind taking a turboprop from Bali to someplace with its own airstrip, a reasonably good house reef and short boat rides to other nice sites, then you might consider Wakatobi as well.

Mike

I second Mike's suggestion. Bali has great sites with excellent soft coral, especially at the Nusa Penida area. The muck dives are in Tulamben, but there is lots of beautiful soft coral there too.

Fiji is the soft coral heaven, but I have no idea how easy is the access there (never been there).

Luiz

If you live in Saudi, you have the worlds best diving not too far away: Indonesia. It depends what you mean by easy access to and from the airport; it's all relative. After diving in Raja Ampat, in the far east of Indonesia, I really don't want to dive anywhere else in the world again, it was that good.

I'm not a big live aboard fan either and Raja Ampat has a place called Kri Eco Resort on Kri Island. You can read about it here: http://www.leonandclaudia.com/pages/16/index.htm To get to Sorong is a 2 hour direct flight out of Jakarta, so you would probably fly to Dubai and then it is only a 3 or 4 hour flight to Jakarta on Emirates Air.

The boat trip to Kri from Sorong airport was long, but the resort people takes care of everything the minute you step off the plane, you don't have to worry about lugging luggage for 300 meters in the blazing sun.

Diving at Raja Ampat has everything you want and some of what you don't want. There are the best soft corals in the world, the absolute best under water vistas, and not all of the best sites have strong currents, the staff knows where to go to stay out of the currents, nobody likes to swim in a strong current while holding a $10 000 camera and housing...

Travelling to the best diving on the planet is a journey in it self; so what if you experience discomfort, it makes for better stories afterwards...