Indonesia advice

Hi everyone, I'm looking for some help in narrowing down locations for an upcoming trip (2 weeks somewhere in Nov '12-Mar'13 range). I want to do Indonesia, but there are so many different places, it's all pretty confusing. I'm looking for advice on an area that has good variety- great coral, great reef life, great macro, some muck. Also would like a good house reef. If somebody could help me narrow down to a location, that would be awesome, and i'll look into resorts from there. Thanks!!

I have visited the area around north Sulawesi a couple of years in a row, and really like it. I will be going now in a couple of weeks again, to Bangka and Lembeh. There is also great wall diving at some of the places around Bunaken. And Lembeh would be really hard to beat for muck diving.

Resorts in the area are plentiful and varies from very simple and very, very cheap to quite expensive and luxurious.

Bali also seems to have great variety and a lot of nice lodging. Compared to the north Sulawesi area I believe that there will be more to do topside , and some dives not available in north Sulaweis (molls and mantas are not very common in the Lembeh/Bangka/Bunaken area). I guess it depends on what ones priorities are whether Bali or the north Sulawesi area would be the best. You probably will be happy with both. I´m of to Bali next year btw!

Best regards

Bent C

There's plenty of info in the archives. Do a search on Indo and you should have plenty of suggestions.

Thanks Bent, I appreciate it!

Wakatobi!

For great diversity, hard and soft coral with great reef life and macro do a live-a-board that travels between Bali and Komodo. Just make sure the boat spends a day in horseshoe bay so you can enjoy the cannibal rock, it is on the top 10 dive site list.

It really depends on your budget. If you don't have much, I think Bali is the best option. It is relatively cheap (doesn't require domestic flights) and excellent diving. If you have more to spend, there are many options: Wakatobi, Sulawesi, Raja Ampat...

you can't beat Wakatobi. That house reef just blew my mind.

I posted a separate Wakatobi writeup in this area. It should explain pretty clearly why it is the best land destination if you have the budget.

Tom

Alor Divers: we have excellent house reef, may be not as good as Wakatobi, but still very good ( i never dive Wakatobi so cannot compare ). In November December you can even see sperm whale passing just in front of the resort. coral reef are very healthy , fish life is amazing and to make it perfect we have excellent muck dives. All at once in less than 30 min speed boat.

You could try Tulamben, Bali - variety of resorts at varying prices. Excllent dive sites and you can do day trips to various other locations around the island such as Amed, Seraya, PJs, Mola Molas at Lembongan etc.

Karl