Komodo and Bali - Trip Report Random Comments

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Valwood1

Contributor
Messages
322
Reaction score
20
Location
Texas
# of dives
200 - 499
LabuanBajo: Accommodations and Other
1. Eco Lodge is about an hour walk from town, though the hotel will drive you in for. I believe, about $3.50. Think of it like the AIs on the southern end of Cozumel, but the food isn't as good (it's okay but not great). Staff is very nice.
2. Green Hill Inn -- in town across from Bajo Dive and Reefseekers. New, 4 rooms, hot water, A/C. On a small hill right above the main road (which has almost-2 blacktop lanes), and a pretty view of the harbour. 10 minute or so walk to Reefseekers boat dock. Main downside is the noise -- traffic (trucks and motorbikes) begins early, the sound of the small boat motors carries really well over water, and the Mosque's call to prayer seems to start about 5AM, on a loudspeaker. I have no idea why the "N"s in the GreeN Hill INN sign have the diagonal line reversed, but they do.
3. Food at Hotel Gardena and Pesona is okay, but a bit hit-or-miss.
4. For 5000 rupiah or so (50 cents), Bimo buses will get you to the grocery store, where you can walk up two floors to, apparently, the town's sole internet site, which can be one of the slowest in the world.

Diving with Reefseekers for Five Days (10/8-10/12)
1. A good operation. Safety-conscious. Crew is nice and helpful. Good dive-site briefings, with drawings of the site (helpful to those of us who are visually oriented). Each day has two dives. Dives generally last an hour. All dives begin with a giant stride and negative entry (i.e., you sink immediately on hitting the water and form the dive group underwater).
2. Ernest gives an excellent "boat and procedures" lecture to divers on their first day aboard. Kath gives an excellent daily "lecture" on some aspect of marine life on the way to the dive site; these bits are informative and very entertaining, though Kath clearly seems to favor the female of a species in her reviews.
3. Boats leave at reasonable hours (8 or 8:30) and return at 3:30-4:30. The ride to the dive sites is 1.5-2.5 hours; I thought that this time would be unbearable, but it was not bad at all -- we had pretty smooth seas and the boat is much more stable than the typical dive boat in Mexico or the Caribbean, and Kath's lectures were quite interesting. Boat has plenty of room to spread out -- we had 12 divers on the last day, and no one felt cramped.
4. We dove only the central and northern sites (Batu Bulong, Crystal Rock & environs, Tatawa Besar, Mauan, Tatawa Kecil, Orange Moon), and saw the usual fishy suspects (including a mandarin fish); Crystal Rock and its nearby spots are an outstanding group of dive sites. On one day, some of us saw a dugong (apparently, a rare event) at a location that cannot be disclosed. Some current in a few spots, but dive leaders were careful to keep us out of anything especially unpleasant.
5. Aside from one fellow who was there doing a divemaster certification, I was the only American on board, out of perhaps 25 different divers over the five days. I suppose that the European clientele is a reason that smoking is permitted on the boat -- that and the fact that Ernest smokes; I smoke, too, so that's not a complaint.

Nusa Penida - 1 Day (3 dives) with Blue Season Bali in Search of Mola Mola (10/15)
Thank you, Putu, for spotting the mola mola, thus giving me no further reason to endure another bouncy 45 minute ride, on a crowded boat, to Crystal Bay, and sit through a dreadfully-bouncy, rolling SI at that spot, and swim through really cold thermoclines, and see not a whole lot of stuff (but one nudi was pretty good). There were at least ten dive boats in the small bay, and it was the most crowded dive site that I've ever seen -- think, the underwater scene in "Thunderball"; according to one guide, there are thirty boats or more at the site during prime mola mola season. The third dive at Toya Pakeh is a nice drift dive.
 
Thanks! We are thinking of Eco Lodge in January. Did you make the day trip to Rinca?
How remote is it?
 
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