Day 74-76 / Tag 74-76 May 25-27 Dive trip to Ni'ihau

Coming from the airport we pick up Julia and drive to the only WalMart on Kau'ai, we need some camping utensils. Beach mats, a cooler, mosquito repellent, beer and juices, snacks etc. I buy a telephone sim card and activate it only 3 days later (All posts starting from Raja Ampat part 2 on we uploaded through that sim card...).

Drive to a shore and have a beer, then back to the airport where we pick up Dan, another friend of Julia and Brad, he is going to dive with us tomorrow. Later we drive to the Dive shop for check-in and payment, where we meet Jeff, a friend of the three, he invites us for dinner, because it's his birthday.

at the dive shop

Day 73-74 / Tag 73-74, May 24-25, From Indonesia to Hawaii

24.5., 1:45pm Speedboat from Gili Air to Bali
Transfer to Denpasar Airport, Bali, had a beer and Pizza
3 hours flight to Kuala Lumpur
5 hours stopover at KL, this feels very familiar already
7 hours flight KL to Tokyo, Boeing 787
3 hours stopover at Narita Airport, got some cigarettes and a powerplug adaptor for Japan and America

Kabuki on display at Narita Airport, Tokyo

Day 71-73 /Tag 71-73 May 22-24 Gili Air

Pickup from Kuta Station Hotel works like a breeze, 8:30, to the jetty of Gili Getaway, Speedboat to Gili Air with a short stopover at Gili Trawangan.

Goodbye Bali

Speedboat Bali to Gili Air. Cruise time 2,5 hours

There is no jetty on Gili Air, Speedboats simply drive onto the beach. Taking it easy there, I have a small Bintang at the bar, well, a bamboo shack with a fridge,

Day 70 / Tag 70 Sun. May 21 Traveling Sorong, Papua Barat to Bali

More group fotos

 I get my wetsuit from the Engine room, bone dry

More group fotos

Day 66-69 / Tag 66-69 May 17-20 Raja Ampat Part 2

Dive eat sleep repeat. Once in the groove, you can't imagine anything else.
minutes melt into hours, hours melt into days, quite often I don't have any idea, which date it is, let alone which weekday.

Diving is fun

Day 63-65 / Tag 63-65 May 14-16 Raja Ampat Part 1

This post covers a long timespan, three days of a full week, with a lot of diving on a confined space in a remote area. It can be only rough notes and many details will be missing. It is hard to travel and report at the same time, when you dive four times a day, surfacing after each and every dive with a smile on your face, with so much to see and so much to explore

Embarkation somewhere in the port of Sorong.
People in Papua Barat can look somehow different sometimes...

Day 62 / Tag 62 May 13, Traveling Day: Lembeh, Sulawesi to Sorong, Papua Barat

Flight goes at 7am from Manado. On Lembeh that means get up at 4am. Short Boatride to Sulawesi and the usual minivan madness to Airport Manado before the sun even goes up.

But wait, I forgot a nice foto from last nightdive:

Everybody else flies Garuda, I have a Wing ticket.
The difference? Garuda flies

Day 60-61 / Tag 60-61 May 11-12, Diving Lembeh

 

and now for something completely different...

It was just a three hours trip boat-car-boat from Bunaken to Lembeh yesterday, but the underwater world could not be more different.
Bunaken is vertical walls, Lembeh is Critters Galore, muck diving, treasure hunt.
Nightdives are a MUST here.



You crawl along the sea floor with your camera ready.

Day 59 / Tag 59 Wed. May 10 Bunaken to Lembeh

Smooth traveling with Bastianos Transport: Bunaken to Manado by boat,

Bunaken village with mosque and church

Day 55 - 59 / Tag 55 - 59 May 6-10 Bunaken

The day after arriving I start Diving Bunaken: The Wall.

Basically, you jump from the boat on the edge of the reef and descend along a vertical wall with bottom at 70 to 120 meters. Currents can get pretty tricky, moving

Day 54 / Tag 54 Fri. May 5 From Mabul to Bunaken

Traveling day...

Last time on the jetty in the morning

Cat is giving a swimming class. Many want to learn diving, but cannot even swim...

The clear waters of Mabul

Day 53 / Tag 53, Thu. May 4, Sipadan

(Preface: I am still in Indonesia with the worst possible WiFi , so I hope to get this post out with at least some fotos. Stopped thinking of video alltogether... I will update with better WiFi to come, hopefully, some day along the road.... Now already one week behind)
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Sipadan

Among the Top Ten on my diving bucketlist, if I had any, Sipadan is of fame with many divers around the world.
It is hard to get there, because access is restricted to 120 divers a day, regulated by daily permits you have to purchase, if you get one, you are lucky. That's why many resorts require you to stay a certain amount of nights to get a permit garuanteed.
Example: At Scuba Junkie you have to stay at least 5 nights to get 1 day diving Sipadan garuanteed. For 2 Sipadan days you will already have to stay at least 8 nights.
Of course you can always ask for a permit on a certain day at different dive operators in Semporna or on Mabul....

Map of Semporna, Mabul, Kapalai, and Sipadan

Divng here is very different to diving Mabul. The latter is still on the mainland shelf, while Sipadan is oceanic, though only 30 boat minutes away. Between Mabul and Sipadan the water is 600 meters deep, south of Sipadan the bottom drops to 2000 meters and more. Different conditions favor different marine life.

At Scuba Junkie, the Sipadan

Day 52 / Tag 52 Wed., May 3 Drift and Jam

Later, we will make some noise

Diving again,

Today Tom from Australia is in our group. A pleasure to dive with him

We are at "Artificial" again, I let the others explore a structure and sit down on a bench. Jessica joins me and Dionne takes some fotos of us, sitting there as if we were waiting for the bus to come...

Is this the bus stop for line M to Mabul, or are you just waiting for the boat?

Day 51 / Tag 51, Tue. May 2, Day off? Hahaha. No, go diving!

On my originally booked dive schedule, this day was a no-dive-day, but, man, come on, we have so much fun under water here, after yesterday's last dive with Azrul I booked 3 additional dives for today, two in the morning and one nightdive.




Kat, the most friendly and welcoming resort manager asked, if I request anybody special as guide.

"No," I say, "nobody in particular, as long as it's Dionne." She obviously likes that kind of humor and we both laugh loud. And so I dive with

Day 50 / Tag 50 Mon., May 1, Dive, Eat, Sleep, Repeat. Jackfish with Azrul

It's Diving Time again!

"Delicious!", he grins, when I show him the fotos and video clips of the huge cloud of Jackfish, shot at the dive site "Artificial" on Mabul, not far from the Scuba Junkie jetty, "I want this video!"
Azrul is a young local Divemaster, passed his certification as a pro only a month ago. "At the safety stop, everybody dance! Every guide does fun dives, I do funny dives!"
And we sure have a lot of fun, Azrul the guide, Lucy, a young divemaster who turned to studies now, and me, Advanced Open Water Diver. Dive times between 50 and 60 become normal again...

3 Dives: Mabul Eelgarden, Artificial, and for the third from Artificial back to the Jetty

Going for some fish here, I still find some cute small stuff.
If anyone starts getting bored with Nudibranch pictures, drop a comment, I will try to resist the next Nudi... ;-)

Gotta love them Nudis