Guam dive sites with MDA?

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KiiY

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Location
Tokyo, Japan
Hi everyone. My wife and I are planning a trip to Guam and I'm pretty sure we'll go with MDA once I can get her approval to blow some bubbles while on this trip. :D

For anyone who has been on one of MDA's daily boat dives, can you give me some idea of the sites they frequent? I'd like to read up on those before we go.

Thanks!
 
A friend and I spent a few days in Guam on the way home from Truk and we opted to charter MDA's six-pack boat so we could do the dives we wanted to. MDA ended up asking us if we wanted to share the boat with some like-minded wreck divers and we did. We told MDA what our gas plans were and all we did was show up at the shop, analyze tanks, and then head to the boat to dive. They were very well organized for us.

We dove the Kitsugawa Maru, the SMS Cormoran, and the Tokai Maru. The Kit and the Cormoran are WW2 and WW1 ships both sunk in the harbor and they are literally an arm's span away from each other.
 
Thanks for the message. We'll probably need to go with their regular boat group, rather than chartering a boat... so I'm wondering what sites they normally go to if it's a mixed group with, say, a lot of beginners?

My wife and I prefer shallow easy dives with lots of fish and pretty coral to look at anyway. Long bottom times are nice. :)
 
I have lived in Guam for the last three years. I used to be a fan of GTDS (Guam Tropical Dive Station), but they seem to now be almost exclusively for Japanese tourists. MDA is definitely the one to use. Their boat dives are great - the boat captain and dive masters are very professional. The best dive sites - well, they depend on your taste. Blue Hole and the Crevice are great deep dives. Visibility is awesome - 120-140 ft at 130+ feet deep. There are cave dives, reef dives, as mentioned above, the Kitsugawa Mar is a great wreck dive - it lies upright on the bottom at 140 feet. The top of the mast is at about 65 feet. The Tokai Maru and Cormoran are the ones that touch each other - Cormoran is a German boat from WW-I and Tokai is from WW-II. These aren't as deep. If you like shallow dives - Pete's Reef is great and Fish Eye has an abundance of fish (they put out fish food so tourists in an underwater structure can look out and see them) - so does Gab Gab II - (they feed the fish so the tourists can see them from the submarine ride). If you want more info, let me know.

Jim
 
Hi, Jim.

Thanks for the info. Guam seems to have a lot of really great places to dive.

I was just trying to get an idea of where MDA boats usually go.

I guess we'll just have to hop on their boat and keep our fingers crossed that they take the boat somewhere that fits our style (which would probably be considered as a boring dive for most advanced people here).

-Kevin
 
Kevin,

They schedule boat dives daily, and up to three dives on weekends. Their dive schedule is on the web site (Guam & Micronesia Pacific Scuba Diving.) and each dive site is explained. Harbor dives are okay, but if you can get the dives outside the harbor, that's where the visibility is awesome!

Jim
 
I'll second what sanjac said about diving with MDA. I've been living/diving here on Guam for about two years, and have really enjoyed all the times I've gone out with them (but have also enjoyed going out w/ GTDS). Most of the places they'll go are pretty easy and interesting, but a few really require more skill and experience (like Cocos or Ritidian) and they won't take the usual tourists there.

The daily boat locations really vary based on who is on the boat and what the weather is doing. Because they embark at Cabaras Marina inside Apra Harbor, it's a longer boat ride to some of the nice sites like Nathan's Dent (but it's still a tiny island, so nothing is all that far). It's less likely you'd go up to the farther north sites like Two Lovers Wall or Double Reef The harbor sites are pretty common daily boat sites because they're protected from the weather when it's rough outside, most are relatively shallow (usually 40-50 ft where the interesting stuff is, max ~90-120 ft for most), and they're pretty consistently at least decent. A lot of 2-tank trips will do a deeper dive outside, then stop in at one of the shallower harbor sites (like Seabee junkyard) for a second, easy dive.

The daily boats (the 8:30am M-F trips) are generally full of tourists, mostly Japanese, plus occasional US military. These tend not to be advanced dive trips, so you'll probably do fine and have a great time anywhere they'll go (coral and pretty fish are very popular). If you want to read up on likely sites for the daily boats, check out some of the harbor sites like Gab Gab, Seabee Junkyard, the Tokai Maru/Cormoran, Western Shoals, and American Tanker. Some of the closer, easy sites outside the harbor include Barracuda Rock (super easy dive; big rock+water+fish), Hap's Reef, Amtrak. Blue Hole is pretty close to the harbor but can be a challenging, weather-dependent dive, so you may or may not get to it on a daily boat.

------ End of stuff relevant to your question --- General Guam-related stuff below -----

If you want to save mad $$$ diving with MDA, buy a 5-star card for $75 (or $65 or whatever it's at right now). That gets you 6 single-tank boat rides or 3 two-tank rides (you're still on the hook for air, $6/tank delivered) and a discount on all other boat trips/purchases with them (and at a bunch of other local merchants/restaurants). There are also free, guided shore dives organized on the weekends that meet at MDA (8:30AM & 1PM, Sat/Sun) and at GTDS as well (but I've never gone out with them). They are a great way to see some interesting sites and meet fun diver people. Hit some of us up here on SB before coming out, especially if you're looking for dive buddies/ideas of stuff to do. If you want more/different diving than the boats offer, there are lots of folks here who are up for a shore dive any time. There are some great shore dives that are easy entry/exit with lots to see (Amtrak, Piti Bomb Holes/Fisheye like sanjac mentioned, Gun Beach, Tanguisson Beach).

One last note: UnderWater World Guam (the aquarium out here) does a Dive With the Sharks thing that can be pretty neat (full disclosure: I used to work there, diving with that program). You get to dive in their 800,000 gallon main tank with all the sharks/turtles/rays and such, and touch some of the zebra sharks (with guides, of course). They provide all the gear and such. Visibility is always great, with lots of critters.
 
Hi, Gismonkey.

Thanks for the very helpful reply. I'll definitely read up on those sites and hopefully be able to convince my wife to go diving both days. :)

Would be great to hook up with someone from Scubaboard while we're there, but we're on a herd tour from Japan and only there for a few weekdays.

Being weekdays it also means MDA doesn't have anything listed on their boat schedule for the time we're there. The 5-star club also sounds great, but we couldn't use all the boat rides and probably can't get back to Guam before they expire in a year.

Thanks for the tip on Underwater World Guam. Sounds interesting and may just have to try it. :)
 
I'm glad it was useful! One quick update: while on an MDA boat today (dove the Tokai Maru and Cormoran; very nice!) I asked the captain what you might reasonably expect. He said that on the daily 8:30am boats he's trying to make the first dive Blue Hole or Crevice most days now (the other captains might do something different). Visibility and conditions have been pretty great. The second dive would likely be a shallower harbor dive.

If you dive Blue Hole one day and Crevice the next, you'll have seen two of the most impressive sites on the island (I dove Crevice last weekend and am headed to Blue Hole tomorrow; both are well worth the visit).
 
great info! We are looking at a stop for a few days in Guam on our way to Micronesia next trip to Truk or Palau (or both!). :D Our trip to Palau was really stressful, so much flying for so many hours and horrible airline food, it would have been nice to take a break in Guam for a few days and do a few dives, then go on to Palau!

robin:D
 

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