SMY Ondina – Raja Ampat trip report
Was on Ondina for a 11-day live-aboard Dec 30th to Jan 10th 2013
Short version: Amazing trip, excellent management, planning and staff. No meaningful complaints. My 7th and best live aboard experience thus far. Happily would go again.
Long version:
This is my 7th live aboard trip, I’ve done 4 in Similans, 1 in Philippines and 1 in Raja Ampat 2 years ago, so I’m not so much the live aboard rookie anymore. I have a Nauticam EM1 camera with dual strobes, just a happy snapper.
Boat
Wooden boat, I think it had 8 cabins with air conditioning, 2 people per cabin. Rooms are perfectly adequate in size. Mine had a full size bed with a twin bunk above, which I used to keep gear. I’ve been in cramped bunks before, but this was ample space. The bed was parallel with the keel. I generally prefer it to be perpendicular so I’m rocked side to side and not have my head going up down. One night the waters were a little rough and I got a little bit seasick for the first time. Cleared my head topside then just rotated 90 degrees on the bed, which fixed it. Cabins had their own heads with a manual pump toilet and shower. Shower isn’t heated, but the water tanks are by the engines, so lukewarm and not cold. Hot showers are available on the dive deck.
Dive Deck
Dive deck was plenty spacious. You had a station for your tank/BCD and a big basket underneath. Once or twice there was pretty heavy engine fumes, but most of the time wasn’t an issue. You setup your gear, test your nitrox and the boat crew will carry it to the dingy’s, you just need to carry your mask, fins and weights. A proper ladder brings you down to the dingy which takes you to the actual dive sites. Crew was incredibly helpful and friendly.
Cameras
The camera area is at the back of the boat and is open air. There were 12 divers on this trip, and half had cameras, mostly point and shoots. There was enough room for us, but if there were 10 DSLR rigs, there wouldn’t be enough space. I generally prefer an enclosed place to work on my camera, and ended up bringing just the housing down to my air conditioned room every time I wanted to open it or change ports/lens. There isn’t a proper place to charge batteries though. In the dive deck, there is a shelf with a cubbyhole for each diver with a power strip in there. But considering how wet the dive deck could be, and how I kept my computer and mask in there, I didn’t feel comfortable charging big video light batteries. I charged them in my room instead, though I’m not a fan of charging large amounts of batters in your cabin below where a fire could breakout and no one is around.
Food
Its Indonesian live aboard food and I’m Thai, meaning I didn’t like it. The only thing Thai live-aboards are superior at is food. Dinner included a soup, which was literally just boiled water with something. One soup was just broth and apples. It was hot and had calories, but that was about it. Good thing I was hungry.
I’ve been on luxurious boats with hot tubs and infinite amounts of hot, freshly dried towels, and I’ve been on ultra basic boats. This is in the upper middle range, it didn’t have the luxury amenities, but it wasn’t cramped.
Diving
Dive’s were well organized. Ricard, the owner, was cruise director for our trip. He clearly knows the dive sites. Briefings were very clear with information on current, conditions, what to see and where to look. The best dive briefings I’ve ever had. They don’t babysit you either. The guides are there to get you to the site, you are free to stick with them or do your own thing. If you do your own thing, you have to have your own SMB. The excellent dive briefings gave you all the information you need to plan your own dive. You can also dive as long as you wanted, there were no must come back with 50 bar rules… its your life after all. Do not come here if you need underwater babysitters. Ricard was very flexible on the planning/schedule and accommodating to the needs to he divers and weather/site conditions. It was definitely not a German boat. I’ve been on boats before where the course was picked to minimize fuel consumption or they demanded we stick to a fixed dive schedule. Ricard always worked to give us the best diving possible.
Guides were a mixed bag. Albert (Alby) was an excellent guide; he really knows his critters and where to find them. The local guide wasn’t so good, though Raja Ampat doesn’t have the huge pool of talented local guides as say Lembeh. The rise in the number of boats operating in the area has outpaced the amount of good guides. I almost always prefer local guides to foreign, but not this time.
The diving was in a nutshell, spectacular. We saw lots of Mantas at Manta Sands of course, at one point a parade of manta’s swimming by. I’ve been here before, and they still have the system where a line of rocks is placed a few meters off the cleaning stations. It's a little annoying that I can’t get closer to get good photos, but there are a few resorts in the area and the system works in giving divers a view of the show without scaring off the main attraction. There were soo many manta’s that at one point we broke off and found Pegasus sea months and pygmy pipe horse out in the sand. There was a woman diver from one of the resorts who came to look, and then prompted to kick the beejebus out of it as she left. Horrible, please, don’t come here if you don’t know what you are doing. In addition to Manta sands, we saw manta’s on 4 other dives. Even stopped to snorkel with them at Eagle Rock. Dolphins were spotted numerous times and someone saw a dugong. I saw a healthy amount of sharks, wobbegongs, grey reef, white and black tips. They were not overally skittish either, a few were quite curious.
There is current at many of the divesites we went, particulary in Misool. Again we were given proper briefings on how to manage them. Frequently we had to do negative entries. You of course, were always able to move to the leeward side of the reef if you didn’t want to deal with the currents. Last time I went north to Wayag, this trip went south to Misool. I found the Wayag trip to have great macro diving and critters, especially night dives. Around Misool, better wide angle, palegics, schools of fish, but not much macro outside a plethora of pygmy seahorses. Night dives were less interesting, except at the few piers we dove at.
I wrote my first R4 trip report 2 years ago, saying it was ridiculous diving, at times magical and awesome. It hasn’t changed. There was a non-diving family with a 9 year old on board. She knows more about marine life than many of the divers, eagerly waiting to be 10 so she could get her junior certification. One day she wrote a song about dolphins and was singing it, and in the middle of it a dolphin leapt out of the water, just off the port side of the boat. And just as 2 years ago, I saw a manta breach the surface, but this time from above.
Other
We did 4 surface excursions. One was a pre-dawn hike to see some birds of paradise. It is a 40minute hike up a hill, at times steep, often muddy and slippery. Burned more calories than I was used to at 5am just to see a bird, which was not cooperating for pictures, and then it rained on us on our way down. I honestly enjoyed every minute of it. Saw Atlas pearl farm, I thought it would be cheesy, but it was pretty cool actually. The lagoon excursion was beautiful, I just wish it wasn’t overcast that day. Lastly we stopped at a Papuan village to just walk around. It was semi-interesting; I was a little astonished how they don’t seem to pick up the litter.
Traveling to Sorong
I flew Garuda, which is great because coming from Bangkok I can purchase the entire route online with my credit card and I can have my baggage sent direct to Sorong and not have to clear customs in Jakarta. Plus they gave us 30kg each and I’m told if you show them your diver certification, you get another 15kg. No issues with excess charges. Sorong airport has vastly improved since I was here 2 years ago. Baggage claim is no longer one person pushing all the bags through a small hole in the wall. They have a conveyer built now. Bathroom in the departure lounge is no longer a WHO hot zone, but the arrival zone bathroom is still to be avoided. However on the return flight, an SUV came up to the plane as we were about to close the door and a guy came in to the plane where a long “discussion” occurred. Then we sat for 90 minutes until big shot woman showed up late. Ahhh… Indonesia.
Overall
Highly recommended, excellent staff with focus on the diver. A real divers boat.
Was on Ondina for a 11-day live-aboard Dec 30th to Jan 10th 2013
Short version: Amazing trip, excellent management, planning and staff. No meaningful complaints. My 7th and best live aboard experience thus far. Happily would go again.
Long version:
This is my 7th live aboard trip, I’ve done 4 in Similans, 1 in Philippines and 1 in Raja Ampat 2 years ago, so I’m not so much the live aboard rookie anymore. I have a Nauticam EM1 camera with dual strobes, just a happy snapper.
Boat
Wooden boat, I think it had 8 cabins with air conditioning, 2 people per cabin. Rooms are perfectly adequate in size. Mine had a full size bed with a twin bunk above, which I used to keep gear. I’ve been in cramped bunks before, but this was ample space. The bed was parallel with the keel. I generally prefer it to be perpendicular so I’m rocked side to side and not have my head going up down. One night the waters were a little rough and I got a little bit seasick for the first time. Cleared my head topside then just rotated 90 degrees on the bed, which fixed it. Cabins had their own heads with a manual pump toilet and shower. Shower isn’t heated, but the water tanks are by the engines, so lukewarm and not cold. Hot showers are available on the dive deck.
Dive Deck
Dive deck was plenty spacious. You had a station for your tank/BCD and a big basket underneath. Once or twice there was pretty heavy engine fumes, but most of the time wasn’t an issue. You setup your gear, test your nitrox and the boat crew will carry it to the dingy’s, you just need to carry your mask, fins and weights. A proper ladder brings you down to the dingy which takes you to the actual dive sites. Crew was incredibly helpful and friendly.
Cameras
The camera area is at the back of the boat and is open air. There were 12 divers on this trip, and half had cameras, mostly point and shoots. There was enough room for us, but if there were 10 DSLR rigs, there wouldn’t be enough space. I generally prefer an enclosed place to work on my camera, and ended up bringing just the housing down to my air conditioned room every time I wanted to open it or change ports/lens. There isn’t a proper place to charge batteries though. In the dive deck, there is a shelf with a cubbyhole for each diver with a power strip in there. But considering how wet the dive deck could be, and how I kept my computer and mask in there, I didn’t feel comfortable charging big video light batteries. I charged them in my room instead, though I’m not a fan of charging large amounts of batters in your cabin below where a fire could breakout and no one is around.
Food
Its Indonesian live aboard food and I’m Thai, meaning I didn’t like it. The only thing Thai live-aboards are superior at is food. Dinner included a soup, which was literally just boiled water with something. One soup was just broth and apples. It was hot and had calories, but that was about it. Good thing I was hungry.
I’ve been on luxurious boats with hot tubs and infinite amounts of hot, freshly dried towels, and I’ve been on ultra basic boats. This is in the upper middle range, it didn’t have the luxury amenities, but it wasn’t cramped.
Diving
Dive’s were well organized. Ricard, the owner, was cruise director for our trip. He clearly knows the dive sites. Briefings were very clear with information on current, conditions, what to see and where to look. The best dive briefings I’ve ever had. They don’t babysit you either. The guides are there to get you to the site, you are free to stick with them or do your own thing. If you do your own thing, you have to have your own SMB. The excellent dive briefings gave you all the information you need to plan your own dive. You can also dive as long as you wanted, there were no must come back with 50 bar rules… its your life after all. Do not come here if you need underwater babysitters. Ricard was very flexible on the planning/schedule and accommodating to the needs to he divers and weather/site conditions. It was definitely not a German boat. I’ve been on boats before where the course was picked to minimize fuel consumption or they demanded we stick to a fixed dive schedule. Ricard always worked to give us the best diving possible.
Guides were a mixed bag. Albert (Alby) was an excellent guide; he really knows his critters and where to find them. The local guide wasn’t so good, though Raja Ampat doesn’t have the huge pool of talented local guides as say Lembeh. The rise in the number of boats operating in the area has outpaced the amount of good guides. I almost always prefer local guides to foreign, but not this time.
The diving was in a nutshell, spectacular. We saw lots of Mantas at Manta Sands of course, at one point a parade of manta’s swimming by. I’ve been here before, and they still have the system where a line of rocks is placed a few meters off the cleaning stations. It's a little annoying that I can’t get closer to get good photos, but there are a few resorts in the area and the system works in giving divers a view of the show without scaring off the main attraction. There were soo many manta’s that at one point we broke off and found Pegasus sea months and pygmy pipe horse out in the sand. There was a woman diver from one of the resorts who came to look, and then prompted to kick the beejebus out of it as she left. Horrible, please, don’t come here if you don’t know what you are doing. In addition to Manta sands, we saw manta’s on 4 other dives. Even stopped to snorkel with them at Eagle Rock. Dolphins were spotted numerous times and someone saw a dugong. I saw a healthy amount of sharks, wobbegongs, grey reef, white and black tips. They were not overally skittish either, a few were quite curious.
There is current at many of the divesites we went, particulary in Misool. Again we were given proper briefings on how to manage them. Frequently we had to do negative entries. You of course, were always able to move to the leeward side of the reef if you didn’t want to deal with the currents. Last time I went north to Wayag, this trip went south to Misool. I found the Wayag trip to have great macro diving and critters, especially night dives. Around Misool, better wide angle, palegics, schools of fish, but not much macro outside a plethora of pygmy seahorses. Night dives were less interesting, except at the few piers we dove at.
I wrote my first R4 trip report 2 years ago, saying it was ridiculous diving, at times magical and awesome. It hasn’t changed. There was a non-diving family with a 9 year old on board. She knows more about marine life than many of the divers, eagerly waiting to be 10 so she could get her junior certification. One day she wrote a song about dolphins and was singing it, and in the middle of it a dolphin leapt out of the water, just off the port side of the boat. And just as 2 years ago, I saw a manta breach the surface, but this time from above.
Other
We did 4 surface excursions. One was a pre-dawn hike to see some birds of paradise. It is a 40minute hike up a hill, at times steep, often muddy and slippery. Burned more calories than I was used to at 5am just to see a bird, which was not cooperating for pictures, and then it rained on us on our way down. I honestly enjoyed every minute of it. Saw Atlas pearl farm, I thought it would be cheesy, but it was pretty cool actually. The lagoon excursion was beautiful, I just wish it wasn’t overcast that day. Lastly we stopped at a Papuan village to just walk around. It was semi-interesting; I was a little astonished how they don’t seem to pick up the litter.
Traveling to Sorong
I flew Garuda, which is great because coming from Bangkok I can purchase the entire route online with my credit card and I can have my baggage sent direct to Sorong and not have to clear customs in Jakarta. Plus they gave us 30kg each and I’m told if you show them your diver certification, you get another 15kg. No issues with excess charges. Sorong airport has vastly improved since I was here 2 years ago. Baggage claim is no longer one person pushing all the bags through a small hole in the wall. They have a conveyer built now. Bathroom in the departure lounge is no longer a WHO hot zone, but the arrival zone bathroom is still to be avoided. However on the return flight, an SUV came up to the plane as we were about to close the door and a guy came in to the plane where a long “discussion” occurred. Then we sat for 90 minutes until big shot woman showed up late. Ahhh… Indonesia.
Overall
Highly recommended, excellent staff with focus on the diver. A real divers boat.
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