Palau Liveaboard Or Peleliu Island

champ · May 5, 2003

My wife and I will be going to yap and palau this coming winter. I am trying to decide if we should spend a week on a liveaboard or stay on Peleliu island. I understand that it is a long boat ride from Koror to the good dive sites; however, I read that most of the dive sites are only a 10-15 minute boat ride from Peleliu.

For those of you have gone on a liveaboard in Palau, how long did it take to get to the dive sites on a tendor boat? Were there enough things to do to prevent you from getting cabin fever? What liveaboard do you recomend?

For those of you who have stayed on Peleliu island, how long did it take to get to the dive sites? Are there fun things to explore on the island? What places do you recomend to stay? - what was the cost? Who do you recomend to dive with? what were the costs? Can you do more than two dives a day? night dives?

LUBOLD8431 · May 5, 2003

You might want to stay away from Peter Hughes.

I would go with the Aggressor.

Do a search and you will find a story about a fatality recently in Palau who was a diver on the Peter Hughes boat. Some interesting details in the account.

h3o · May 6, 2003

The boat rides through the rock island atolls are really nice... very scenic. You'll find to enjoy them almost as much as your dives. The water is super clear so you can see the corals below, the channels through the rock islands are maze-like and you almost feel like your going through a maze of rivers rather than an ocean. We also saw turtles peeping their heads up, dolphins, squids, and other neat stuff all from the boat. If I were you, I'd stay on land near a beach.

I will also be there in late December, early January. I will be camping out on one of the rock islands for most of the time. You can arrange with the dive shops to pick you and drop you off before/after dives. You can also rent kayaks so you can explore and not be stuck on just one of the rock islands. If you are planning to stay a long time, there are a lot of apartment rentals available for about $600-700/month.

champ · May 6, 2003

H3O,

If you rent kayaks and camp on the rock islands, Do you need to bring all of your camping equipment or can you rent that too. Also do you need to bring your own freeze dried food? What other options are there for food?

Thanks,

Champ

Rickg · May 6, 2003

h3o once bubbled...
The boat rides through the rock island atolls are really nice... very scenic. You'll find to enjoy them almost as much as your dives.

h3o is right that the boat rides can be enjoyable "most" of the time. They can be brutal kidney killerswhen the wind and seas don't cooperate and a 45 minute ride turns into an 1 1/2 hour trip.

We did the hotel/2-tank boat dive route when we went and definitely recommend the liveaboard route if you can afford it. I find 4-5 dives a day from a liveaboard to be much more enjoyable than hotel/2-tank boat dives and a much better value for your money.

Rickg

h3o · May 6, 2003

champ once bubbled...
H3O,

If you rent kayaks and camp on the rock islands, Do you need to bring all of your camping equipment or can you rent that too. Also do you need to bring your own freeze dried food? What other options are there for food?

Thanks,

Champ

You can also rent camping equipment, but I'm going to bring my own. The same place that rents kayaks, also rents camping equipment (Sam's). As for food, all you need is a few fishing poles and/or sling. I've fished in Palau before and never had a problem catching fish from the shore or boat. When we went on the boat, it was literally every 3 minutes we were catching something decent. We're also planning on using the kayaks to do some deeper bottom fishing. I am going to bring some back up can goods and/or dehydrated beef, fruit, etc. but I doubt we'll need them.

Zeina · May 6, 2003

WOW... you're going to love this place!!

Peleliu sounds great... but it's 2 dives per day.
We were on the Big Blue Explorer, an AWESOME boat: extremely comfortable and roomy, great food, individual bathroom and AC, huge dive deck and camera room, and exceptional dive masters (6 of them, for a maximum of 18 divers!! :wacko: ).

We did 4 to 5 dives a day on BBE, and all of them were unbelievable!! Only for that reason, I would not go land-based.
Chaseboat rides from BBE to the dive sites were about 5 to 10 minutes. The chaseboats (BBE has 2 of them) were also very roomy and comfy.

And trust me, with 5 dives a day, there is no time for you to get cabin fever (hardly found time to watch the video we were shooting!!).

My trip report, complete with pictures and video (see links at the end of the report) is here:
http://www.scubadiving.com/members/tripreports.php?s=2011

Let me know if you have additional questions

mars2u · May 6, 2003

Good news: Excellent report Zeina.

Bad news: I'm leaving for Palau on May16th and diving the BBE. (it's good news for me...bad for you since it looked like you had an excellent time).

I'll dive Oahu the following week and once I get back I'll have a trip report also.

After reading your report...I CAN'T wait.

Question's:
I'll be diving Nitrox onboard. How is the Nitrox blending set-up? Can you dive different EAN's or are they set-up for only 32 or 36?

thanks

RSdiver · May 6, 2003

The previous point by Zeina about the number of dives has already been well made, land based will be fewer.

Since you are taking your wife another important point might be the level of comfort.

I saw this trip report and photos on Rodales :
*Click here* to see a Rodale trip report on Peleliu divers
and although it looks nice for guys used to roughing it, I know some ladies just require 4 star+ hotels/liveaboards.

mars2u · May 6, 2003

RSdiver once bubbled...
The previous point about the number of dives has already been well made, land based will be fewer.

Since you are taking your wife another important point might be the level of comfort.

Which post are you responding to RSdiver? If it's mine than you might have misunderstood my question. I'm inquiring about the Nitrox set-up on the BBE. Also, I'm not married and regardless, the level of comfort on the BBE is actually very good compared to say Blackbeards that's more like "roughing it" from what I've heard.

Palau Liveaboard Or Peleliu Island

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