Part 4 - Lumbalumba Resort
Our welcome to Lumbalumba Resort felt somewhat disjointed and lukewarm. We werent really sure what we were supposed to do when we first arrived, and had to ask for help with the luggage. It was not a good first impression. When we later met Jude (one of the owners), he couldnt have been nicer or more accommodating.
This is a small, beautifully landscaped resort that, for what it offers, is a value for the price. The resort is built on a hillside, with the dive operation located at the bottom of the hill and across the street on a man made jetty. The open air restaurant/bar and reception area is about halfway up the hillside, and near the beautiful new pool. The cottages are located a little farther up the hill. The climb up to the cottages from the water is pretty steep, but not so bad if you take it slowly. The amount of hard work that the owners have put into creating this resort is amazing and admirable. The staff was very friendly. I understand that most of their business is from repeat customers. We were the only Americans staying there. There were 6-8 other guests, with another couple from England, and the others from Switzerland and Germany. There was a bit of anti-American sentiment from some of the guests, but we were not there to talk politics, and so ignored some of the comments.
Accommodation:
We had one of the cottages for 2 people. The cottage had a nice, large veranda with a fantastic view of the water and Bunaken Marine Park. The inside of the cottage was somewhat sparsely furnished, but adequate. As you enter the cottage, you are in a narrow entrance hall, that has a small refrigerator stocked with water, a wardrobe and a safe. Directly in front of you off of the entrance hall is a toilet room and to the left is a small bedroom. The bedroom had a double bed that wasnt very comfortable, and the bed linen consisted of 2 thin narrow pieces of material (that each covered one person). Off of the bedroom was a room with a sink and shower that always had plenty of hot water. Soap was provided, but no lotion, shampoo or hair dryer. There was AC (that tended to blow right on you, so we usually ended up turning it off) and a ceiling fan in the bedroom. The bedroom also had sliding doors that opened onto the veranda.
Food:
Breakfast was served buffet style and was good, with juice, fruit, croissants, pancakes, and also eggs/bacon/ham cooked to order. Instant coffee and tea were also available. Lunches (see below) were ordered from a small menu and served on the dive boat I liked the fried rice. The dinners were served buffet style with a limited selection, but the food was very fresh and very good to excellent, especially the satay. Drinks were inexpensive: 1 large beer was 3 USD, and a coke was 1.30 USD.
Diving:
The dive operation was good. The divemasters were knowledgeable, and all of the dive staff was very friendly with a great sense of humor. Like the other dive ops, they took good care of our equipment (rinsing, storing, setting up). The dive briefings were good. The diving was on one of the two boats (the other of the two was out of commission) that was fast and comfortable but needed some maintenance (mostly cosmetic torn cushions, and small white paint chips that liked to stick to your skin and wetsuit). The ride out to Bunaken dive sites was about 1 hour, and on one of the trips we saw pilot whales and dolphins (very nice!). We did two dives each day on air (nitrox wasnt available), but a third/night dive could also have been arranged. All dives were over one hour, and were just the two of us with a divemaster. Water, hot tea or instant coffee was available all the time on the boat, and a towel was provided to each diver. Lunch was eaten on the boat during the long surface interval between dives. On one trip, a diver was surprised with a grilled satay lunch prepared on the boat that he shared with the other divers, and that was delicious.
As far as the diving, we dove the nearby muck site called Pohpoh (by the way, Jude told us that they really dont like to refer to it as Bethlehem, a name apparently coined by some other divers). Pohpoh really didnt compare to Lembeh. There was just not the density and variety of critters there that we saw at Lembeh we did see some ornate ghost pipefish, scorpion leaffish, lionfish and a few nudibranchs, small crabs, shrimp... Most of the other dives were wall dives some with nice overhanging coral, and large schools of smaller fish, with a rare appearance of a large guy (like a Napoleon wrasse, turtle, distant black tip shark). During some of the wall dives, the divemaster frequently switched direction because of the currents, which ranged from strong to mild, so we typically zigzagged up the wall. We were not able to do the safety stop on top of the reef for most of our wall dives because of the tides. We were not really impressed with Bunaken wall diving. As I mentioned earlier, we had a hard time not comparing it to other places that weve dived with better overall wall diving, in terms of the coral (which I know was not at its best in Bunaken with no sun shining on it, but some of the coral didnt appear to be very healthy), the visibility, and the variety and abundance of fish life. Although we would not return to Bunaken, we thought that it was interesting to spend a few days diving it to see it for ourselves, and it added to the diversity of our dive trip.
The water temp was warm (around 82 F), and the visibility usually ranged on the wall sites from 50 to 60 feet, with one site over 80 feet. Topside weather was generally overcast with intermittent rain showers. My husband wore a dive skin, and I wore a 1 mm wetsuit.
Other:
A couple of the divers unfortunately developed ear infections while there, and the owner gave them some antibiotic ear drops to use. I felt bad for the divers because I know that they were pretty uncomfortable. Since ear infections can absolutely ruin a dive trip, one tip for those of you prone to ear infections (that I suspect many of you may already know) is to consider as a preventive measure using an ear solution to rinse out your ears after a day of diving or after swimming in a pool. These come as commercially made or home made brews. We use a home made solution of 50% white wine vinegar and 50% isopropyl rubbing alcohol. Youre supposed to keep this in your ear for about 5 minutes. There are different versions of this home brew, but this is one of those mentioned on Divers Alert Network as a way to help reduce your risk of ear infections (by keeping your ears clean and dry, and by changing your ears pH to one that bacteria arent crazy about). If youre interested, you should check out their articles on ear infection and care at Divers Alert Network : DAN Medical Center : Medical Articles
The resort did not have a separate spa facility available/open during our stay as advertised on their website. However you could get an excellent traditional massage in your cottage from one of the staff that lasted about an hour and a half (30 USD).
On check-out, settling the bill with USD was a little confusing as some of the charges were in Euros and some were in Rupiahs.
Our welcome to Lumbalumba Resort felt somewhat disjointed and lukewarm. We werent really sure what we were supposed to do when we first arrived, and had to ask for help with the luggage. It was not a good first impression. When we later met Jude (one of the owners), he couldnt have been nicer or more accommodating.
This is a small, beautifully landscaped resort that, for what it offers, is a value for the price. The resort is built on a hillside, with the dive operation located at the bottom of the hill and across the street on a man made jetty. The open air restaurant/bar and reception area is about halfway up the hillside, and near the beautiful new pool. The cottages are located a little farther up the hill. The climb up to the cottages from the water is pretty steep, but not so bad if you take it slowly. The amount of hard work that the owners have put into creating this resort is amazing and admirable. The staff was very friendly. I understand that most of their business is from repeat customers. We were the only Americans staying there. There were 6-8 other guests, with another couple from England, and the others from Switzerland and Germany. There was a bit of anti-American sentiment from some of the guests, but we were not there to talk politics, and so ignored some of the comments.
Accommodation:
We had one of the cottages for 2 people. The cottage had a nice, large veranda with a fantastic view of the water and Bunaken Marine Park. The inside of the cottage was somewhat sparsely furnished, but adequate. As you enter the cottage, you are in a narrow entrance hall, that has a small refrigerator stocked with water, a wardrobe and a safe. Directly in front of you off of the entrance hall is a toilet room and to the left is a small bedroom. The bedroom had a double bed that wasnt very comfortable, and the bed linen consisted of 2 thin narrow pieces of material (that each covered one person). Off of the bedroom was a room with a sink and shower that always had plenty of hot water. Soap was provided, but no lotion, shampoo or hair dryer. There was AC (that tended to blow right on you, so we usually ended up turning it off) and a ceiling fan in the bedroom. The bedroom also had sliding doors that opened onto the veranda.
Food:
Breakfast was served buffet style and was good, with juice, fruit, croissants, pancakes, and also eggs/bacon/ham cooked to order. Instant coffee and tea were also available. Lunches (see below) were ordered from a small menu and served on the dive boat I liked the fried rice. The dinners were served buffet style with a limited selection, but the food was very fresh and very good to excellent, especially the satay. Drinks were inexpensive: 1 large beer was 3 USD, and a coke was 1.30 USD.
Diving:
The dive operation was good. The divemasters were knowledgeable, and all of the dive staff was very friendly with a great sense of humor. Like the other dive ops, they took good care of our equipment (rinsing, storing, setting up). The dive briefings were good. The diving was on one of the two boats (the other of the two was out of commission) that was fast and comfortable but needed some maintenance (mostly cosmetic torn cushions, and small white paint chips that liked to stick to your skin and wetsuit). The ride out to Bunaken dive sites was about 1 hour, and on one of the trips we saw pilot whales and dolphins (very nice!). We did two dives each day on air (nitrox wasnt available), but a third/night dive could also have been arranged. All dives were over one hour, and were just the two of us with a divemaster. Water, hot tea or instant coffee was available all the time on the boat, and a towel was provided to each diver. Lunch was eaten on the boat during the long surface interval between dives. On one trip, a diver was surprised with a grilled satay lunch prepared on the boat that he shared with the other divers, and that was delicious.
As far as the diving, we dove the nearby muck site called Pohpoh (by the way, Jude told us that they really dont like to refer to it as Bethlehem, a name apparently coined by some other divers). Pohpoh really didnt compare to Lembeh. There was just not the density and variety of critters there that we saw at Lembeh we did see some ornate ghost pipefish, scorpion leaffish, lionfish and a few nudibranchs, small crabs, shrimp... Most of the other dives were wall dives some with nice overhanging coral, and large schools of smaller fish, with a rare appearance of a large guy (like a Napoleon wrasse, turtle, distant black tip shark). During some of the wall dives, the divemaster frequently switched direction because of the currents, which ranged from strong to mild, so we typically zigzagged up the wall. We were not able to do the safety stop on top of the reef for most of our wall dives because of the tides. We were not really impressed with Bunaken wall diving. As I mentioned earlier, we had a hard time not comparing it to other places that weve dived with better overall wall diving, in terms of the coral (which I know was not at its best in Bunaken with no sun shining on it, but some of the coral didnt appear to be very healthy), the visibility, and the variety and abundance of fish life. Although we would not return to Bunaken, we thought that it was interesting to spend a few days diving it to see it for ourselves, and it added to the diversity of our dive trip.
The water temp was warm (around 82 F), and the visibility usually ranged on the wall sites from 50 to 60 feet, with one site over 80 feet. Topside weather was generally overcast with intermittent rain showers. My husband wore a dive skin, and I wore a 1 mm wetsuit.
Other:
A couple of the divers unfortunately developed ear infections while there, and the owner gave them some antibiotic ear drops to use. I felt bad for the divers because I know that they were pretty uncomfortable. Since ear infections can absolutely ruin a dive trip, one tip for those of you prone to ear infections (that I suspect many of you may already know) is to consider as a preventive measure using an ear solution to rinse out your ears after a day of diving or after swimming in a pool. These come as commercially made or home made brews. We use a home made solution of 50% white wine vinegar and 50% isopropyl rubbing alcohol. Youre supposed to keep this in your ear for about 5 minutes. There are different versions of this home brew, but this is one of those mentioned on Divers Alert Network as a way to help reduce your risk of ear infections (by keeping your ears clean and dry, and by changing your ears pH to one that bacteria arent crazy about). If youre interested, you should check out their articles on ear infection and care at Divers Alert Network : DAN Medical Center : Medical Articles
The resort did not have a separate spa facility available/open during our stay as advertised on their website. However you could get an excellent traditional massage in your cottage from one of the staff that lasted about an hour and a half (30 USD).
On check-out, settling the bill with USD was a little confusing as some of the charges were in Euros and some were in Rupiahs.
