Palau / Yap / Guam in 1 trip .. ?

Hi wetpixellers -

I am currently planning a trip with my gf to Palau/Yap/Guam, with emphasis on the first two - am wondering of suggestions from forum goers on (a) where to go/who to dive with, and (b) how long should we go for each bit. We are big on fish life (small, big, medium sized - we don't discriminate). Not against the idea of wreck diving, but 100% wreck diving (aka no fish) doesn't really do it for us - we were astounded with the Yongala in townsville, but mainly because of the massive amount of fish life living there!

At this point I am thinking a week in Yap, and slightly longer than a week in Palau - not sure if my spread is right in either direction, as we'll be coming in from Cairns/Australia but hopefully not a bad idea. Also read about a Micronesia Air Pass being able to chop down costs of flying, but I have no idea how to buy one. Anyone with recommendations on how to make airline bookings.. or is booking usually an all-inclusive thing?

Palau > One of either (a) Peleliu island + diving, or (b) Palau Agressor/Tropic Dancer. Would love to hear about experiences on either end of resort and/or liveaboard options. I think if we stay at Peleliu, curious we can get decent diving 2/3 dives a day probably (instead of start in Koror every day). I'm going to try to get in touch with the resort there..

Yap > Not sure if we want to stay at Manta Ray Bay resort or Traders, would love to hear any experiences. Also any dive operator recommendations would be awesome.

Anyhow, any experiences in general would be much appreciated!

I would not discount wrecks for no fish. I got a great shot in Palau of a Crocodile Fish sitting on the gunwales of a freighter. That said if you want wrecks in that part of the world goto Truk. For our Palau trip we dove with John McReedy on the Eclipse for 10 days (www.palau-divensail.com). They also have a motor yacht. We also dove with Sam's Tours for one day. We were on the island for two weeks diving 11 days. If we went back we would go to Peleliu. Not that we did not enjoy either of the above but Peleliu is quiet and close enough to the reefs that one does not have to do the daily rock island run. Also most of the live-a-board diving is done from a tender. On Peleliu you should have no problem get 3/4 dives a day. Probably 2 to the north around blue hole an 1/2 around Peleliu.

I would not discount wrecks for no fish. I got a great shot in Palau of a Crocodile Fish sitting on the gunwales of a freighter. That said if you want wrecks in that part of the world goto Truk. For our Palau trip we dove with John McReedy on the Eclipse for 10 days (www.palau-divensail.com). They also have a motor yacht. We also dove with Sam's Tours for one day. We were on the island for two weeks diving 11 days. If we went back we would go to Peleliu. Not that we did not enjoy either of the above but Peleliu is quiet and close enough to the reefs that one does not have to do the daily rock island run. Also most of the live-a-board diving is done from a tender. On Peleliu you should have no problem get 3/4 dives a day. Probably 2 to the north around blue hole an 1/2 around Peleliu.

I would maybe do 3-4 days at Yap, and do few at Truk as well. We dove with Fish n' Fins in Palau and stayed at the Palau Pacific Resort -- got in about 2-3 dives/day (depending on what we felt like) at all the same spots the liveaboards go, and had option for night dive. I thought both the resort and the dive operation were top notch. Richard Brooks, who often posts here, is also the photo pro at Fish n' Fins.

While I've never been to Yap we did stay in Palau for 3 weeks earlier this year and everyone who came in from Yap during that time expressed their wish that they hadn't bothered and had just stayed the extra days in Palau!

Land based we dove with Sam's Tours who I'd definitely recommend and we stayed at the Sea Passion which is a new 3 star hotel (although I think they claim its a 4 star). The staff and rooms were excellent, but the food wasn't that great. The owners had obviously thrown a lot of money at the hotel, but apparently didn't really know what they were doing so it's all a bit quirky. For the liveaboard we were on the Big Blue. While not the plushest of boats the food was great, the guides were great and the cabins were certainly good enough. Not in the same class as an Aggressor boat, but then the price is a lot less.

We had some spectacular diving while we were there. Palau has definitely become one of my favourite places on Earth

Cheers, Simon

Re Palau:

A liveaboard around Palau gives you a variety of dive sites, especially for the night dives since the boat moves around. That said, if you are big on fishlife, doing it from land could mean you can hit the best fish life sites daily or even twice a day. You won't see Yongala life on the wrecks in Micronesia. However, unless you charter your own boat, you are going to go wherever the dive ops says.

So don't feel the need to stay with one operator if the schedule or sites don't interest you. Find out the different ops schedules and decide the day before which to go with. On my stays there, I've gone with different operators due to their choice of sites on the day. You'll have to drag your gear back daily, but it's worth it for the flexibility.

Re: Yap

Known for the mantas, but not just mantas. Most people go there for the mantas. The ops tend to concentrate on the mantas. Only Beyond the Reef would venture dive on the sites to the south and not do mantas only. However, I don't know who has replaced Dave Vecella since his passing. You should also consider Pathways for accomodation. They have charming wood cottages, which are more private but more walking to get to. Traders and Manta Ray are hotel like with rooms, but Traders is definitely nicer of the 2 with the patio balconies overlooking the bay.

Yap is worth a visit if you're going to be nearby, esp if you like mantas. The dive sites in the south are definitely worth the trip down. I can only remember one site off the top of my head and that's Lionfish Wall. Very nice coral cover and fishlife. If you have time, go out to Ulithi for the very nice black corals out there.

Re Guam

I've been to Guam 4 times and really can't remember any of the diving there. But I'm weird that way.

The airpass is with Continental Micronesia.

Re Palau:

A liveaboard around Palau gives you a variety of dive sites, especially for the night dives since the boat moves around. That said, if you are big on fishlife, doing it from land could mean you can hit the best fish life sites daily or even twice a day. You won't see Yongala life on the wrecks in Micronesia. However, unless you charter your own boat, you are going to go wherever the dive ops says.

So don't feel the need to stay with one operator if the schedule or sites don't interest you. Find out the different ops schedules and decide the day before which to go with. On my stays there, I've gone with different operators due to their choice of sites on the day. You'll have to drag your gear back daily, but it's worth it for the flexibility.

Re: Yap

Known for the mantas, but not just mantas. Most people go there for the mantas. The ops tend to concentrate on the mantas. Only Beyond the Reef would venture dive on the sites to the south and not do mantas only. However, I don't know who has replaced Dave Vecella since his passing. You should also consider Pathways for accomodation. They have charming wood cottages, which are more private but more walking to get to. Traders and Manta Ray are hotel like with rooms, but Traders is definitely nicer of the 2 with the patio balconies overlooking the bay.

Yap is worth a visit if you're going to be nearby, esp if you like mantas. The dive sites in the south are definitely worth the trip down. I can only remember one site off the top of my head and that's Lionfish Wall. Very nice coral cover and fishlife. If you have time, go out to Ulithi for the very nice black corals out there.

Re Guam

I've been to Guam 4 times and really can't remember any of the diving there. But I'm weird that way.

The airpass is with Continental Micronesia.

We dove with Fish n' Fins, and they send out enough different boats, you can usually go to the sites you want if you let them know ahead of time. I liked Fish n' Fins because they really tried to match up divers with similar/complimenting diving styles, and tried to time their dives to avoid the crowds at big sites as much as possible. Highly recommend them. The Palau Pacific Resort is also really nice, although you definitely pay for what you get there.

We dove with Fish n' Fins, and they send out enough different boats, you can usually go to the sites you want if you let them know ahead of time. I liked Fish n' Fins because they really tried to match up divers with similar/complimenting diving styles, and tried to time their dives to avoid the crowds at big sites as much as possible. Highly recommend them. The Palau Pacific Resort is also really nice, although you definitely pay for what you get there.

I've dived with F n F as well, also Neco and Sam's among others over the years. Each ops has 3-5 boats, but the mix of skills, numbers and sites may not be always what one wants. Neco's rarely had more than 6 people on the boat, and their cattle car japanese boat was always diving elsewhere. The boats are generally in better shape than others and the staff add that personal touch.

Sam's was nice because they give you unlimited shore diving with EAN36 included in the price, even on boat dives (what a great way to limit depth for clients and make some EAN courses money as well). The packages have great value but the boats are quite full because of that.

F n F has great flexibility with diving schedule but also can be a bit crowded. I put it as a mix between the crowds at Sam's and the personable service at Neco.

If I want a certain shot, it's a viable option to change operators. For eg. on one trip, I went to Jellyfish lake for 5 days in a row with 3 ops because none would do it continuously while I was there.

I can't really fault Palau Pacific Resort but for my tastes, the Nikko Palau Royal Resort is also very nice. The PRR caters to the Japanese crowd mostly and it's got a big hotel feeling. But the pull is the Mandara Spa (which has better facilities than the PPR one) and the rooms which are very well decorated (for my taste, better than the PPR). There's a fake lagoon with sand but as a diver, I'm out in the sun all day and the last thing I want is to lay out when I'm back at the hotel when I can be at the spa . The boats from dive ops can come pick you up and staff will happily help you with gear to the pier if asked.

Another place I like a lot is Carolines. It's a no frills quiet bungalow hill top place that gives you privacy and great views, albeit with simple decor and amenities. It's a nice walk down to PPR for dinner.

Re: Peleliu

I recommend staying on Peleliu to have access to the dive sites around there. Dolphin Bay is a rustic place that is clean but definitely a few stairwells down from the resorts at Koror. What I like about Peleliu is that the marquee sites are closer. However, you have to deal with basic amenities and the boats aren't as slick as the Koror ops.

Hi,

I would recommend staying on Peleliu too especially if you are interested in WWII history. The island has a serenity now that is beautiful, although the tanks, gun emplacements, caves, museum and memorials to the thousands of fallen soldiers tell a gruesome story, it is well worth the time to take a guided tour.

Additionally it's a shorter boat ride daily to the top notch dive sites. I can't really advocate any dive operator in Koror, might be seen as blatant promotion.....

The best time to be here is in January/February/March/April when you can get huge spawning aggregations of fish. Imagine a school of Sailfin Snappers (Symphorichthys spilurus) a mile long.....the Gray Reefs also tend to mate at this time after they've fed well on the spawning aggregations.......

I saw a set of photos recently from a guy who had just dived in Yap, it appears that they do shark feeding there now, he certainly got some very close encounters, certainly closer than here in Palau where feeding, direct or indirect, is illegal.

As for Mantas I don't know how many have been spotted in Yap recently but we had 5 on a dive 5 days ago and 2 yesterday for 1/2 hour literally inches away from my lens, these guys should be around from now till April/May time.

Hope that helps

Richard

Thanks all ! We have decided on the following:

> Yap for a week with Manta Ray Bay

> Koror for about 10 days

>> 6 days on the Safari / Eclipse liveaboard (woot)

>> 4 days at Sea Passion Resort (PPR/PRR fully booked) - we have yet to finalise details at Sea Passion and figure we can sort it out later.. but will get in touch with operators to see how we go!

Appreciate all the inputs, we had thought about staying at Peleliu but decided based on reviews that we're not 100% sure of the operators there - so we are taking a different approach. Looking forward to the trip!