Manado/Lembeh - Resort or Liveaboard

[djkpsu]

I am planning a trip right now to Manado/Lembeh in October and am not sure wheter I want to stay on land or on a boat.

I will be travelling by myself, and want to know where I would have the better chance of running into other single divers. Anyone have any thoughts?

I am really looking forward to the muck diving in the straights, but think it might be a nice change to hit some other spots also.

I have been looking at either Aqua One or Panunee for the liveaboard, or the resorts that Eco-divers operates with for the land based.

Any advice would be greatly appricated. Thanks

[gfac]

I had the same question when I was making my plans for diving Lembeh, and FWIW was told it doesn't pose an issue. I ended up strongarming a pal from work to come along, we'll be at Lembeh Resort if you decide to go earlier (Sep).

I am planning a trip right now to Manado/Lembeh in October and am not sure wheter I want to stay on land or on a boat.

I will be travelling by myself, and want to know where I would have the better chance of running into other single divers. Anyone have any thoughts?

I am really looking forward to the muck diving in the straights, but think it might be a nice change to hit some other spots also.

I have been looking at either Aqua One or Panunee for the liveaboard, or the resorts that Eco-divers operates with for the land based.

Any advice would be greatly appricated. Thanks

[RSdiver]

I was just at KBR for a week and then on the Ocean Rover for 10 days through the North Sulawesi Islands.

KBR/Lembeh straits offer great diving at great prices. The Ocean Rover is my favorite Asian live aboard, but there were restrictions between rival tribes in the North and we deviated to spend only three days in the North - the rest of the dives were those sites accessible to KBR/Lembeh Straits or the Tasik Ria, MiniHasa, or Thalassa land based dive resorts.

For the same price as the Ocean Rover, I could have been diving for three weeks at any combination of the above land based resorts and been at the exact same dive spots. If the same itinerary is restricted for the liveaboard you are selecting (Murex or Pendito I'm guessing?) then I'd do the land based trips.

[Rickg]

I am planning a trip right now to Manado/Lembeh in October and am not sure wheter I want to stay on land or on a boat.

I will be travelling by myself, and want to know where I would have the better chance of running into other single divers. Anyone have any thoughts?

I am really looking forward to the muck diving in the straights, but think it might be a nice change to hit some other spots also.

I have been looking at either Aqua One or Panunee for the liveaboard, or the resorts that Eco-divers operates with for the land based.

Any advice would be greatly appricated. Thanks

djkpsu,

After traveling that far you may as well do both. That is what we did last year.

Here is the URL to the trip report I posted to Scubaboard on our trip.

http://www.scubaboard.com/showthrea...highlight=Rickg

I think this might help you with your decision. Also, recommend you use the "Search" function on Scubaboard and do searches for Manado, Bunaken, Bangka, Lembeh, MUREX, Froggies, etc. You'll find that a wealth of information has already been posted on this area.

You may also want to check out "Zubi's" website for some great info on diving in Indonesia.

http://www.starfish.ch/dive/travel.html

Hope you have a good trip.

Rickg

[ssra30]

I just came back from Lembeh on the Panunee.
Basically this is my take on liveaboard in Lembeh.
The Panunee runs shorter trip, 5-6 days of diving so they concentrate more around local divesites in Lembeh. You will cover all those same sites if you do it from land. The only advantage is that the boat is traveling there so you don't spend a lot of time in small boats. The sea was very flat in Lembeh so the big boat is nice and comfortable. Panunee will do one day trip out to Banca. Since we chartered the boat, we negotiated with them to take us out to Bunaken instead which was nice and we did not waste a lot of precious divetime on traveling.
Aqua One on the other hand will do some local sites but will also go out to other islands, some very close to the Philippines border (according to the owner) so you will definitely get to some other harder to get divesites that may not be available for you if you do it landbase or the Panunee.
Personally I chose Panunee because timing was better for me and I know the boat and the staffs well and they pretty much accomodate whatever I want . Food on the Panunee will be mostly Thai, although they will tone it down for foreign guests. Aqua One is equally good at western or Thai cusine. I never dove Ocean Rover as I tend to use Aqua One and Panunee and like both boats very much.