Is Palau liveaboard-only

[Cosmographer]

While I'm told there are lots of dive opportunities for hotel-based divers, how much will we be missing by not going the liveaboard route? Is it even worthwhile to go all the way to Palau without doing a liveaboard?

Also, any inexpensive liveaboard options there?

Thanks!

 

[robint]

with Palau and liveaboards - you get what you pay for!
A liveaboard will give you 4 dives per day, no hauling gear, no rinsing gear, no waiting at restaurants, and no sitting on bouncing boat for 1-2 hours a day to get to and from dives.
A liveaboard will be anchored in a harbor with no boat motion at all, and only a 5-15 minute ride out to dive sites and back each dive. Between dives you will be eating onboard the boat, food will be served as soon as you arrive back from each dive. You get up, eat light breakfast, DIVE, eat hot breakfast, DIVE, eat hot lunch, DIVE, eat snack, DIVE, eat dinner... and can do a night dive after that most nights. REALLY... best bang for your buck. It is your option to skip any dives, also, and stay on the mothership while others go out on skiff. Your gear stays on skiff all week and tanks are filled there while you eat. On my liveaboard trip, we had a diver who had previous DCS experience, so she skipped every other dive in order to get longer surface intervals... no problem. She read and relaxed while we were off diving.

If you do land-based, you will get in 2 dives a day, maybe 3 at most and will need to go into town to find dinner each night. If that is more to your liking, then I see no reason not to do land-based.

robin

 

[CAPTAIN SINBAD]

with Palau and liveaboards - you get what you pay for!
A liveaboard will give you 4 dives per day, no hauling gear, no rinsing gear, no waiting at restaurants, and no sitting on bouncing boat for 1-2 hours a day to get to and from dives.
A liveaboard will be anchored in a harbor with no boat motion at all, and only a 5-15 minute ride out to dive sites and back each dive. Between dives you will be eating onboard the boat, food will be served as soon as you arrive back from each dive. You get up, eat light breakfast, DIVE, eat hot breakfast, DIVE, eat hot lunch, DIVE, eat snack, DIVE, eat dinner... and can do a night dive after that most nights. REALLY... best bang for your buck. It is your option to skip any dives, also, and stay on the mothership while others go out on skiff. Your gear stays on skiff all week and tanks are filled there while you eat. On my liveaboard trip, we had a diver who had previous DCS experience, so she skipped every other dive in order to get longer surface intervals... no problem. She read and relaxed while we were off diving.

If you do land-based, you will get in 2 dives a day, maybe 3 at most and will need to go into town to find dinner each night. If that is more to your liking, then I see no reason not to do land-based.

robin

How are the restaurants and top side life? Worth missing a liveaboard for?

 

[baystr]

If i went to Palau again, I would do it on liveaboard. food and accomadations on the island are fine, but long boat rides in tough conditions, only allowing two dives per day vs, liveaboard, 10 minute boat rides, great food, easy accomadations, great dive deck. It's the only way to do the Rock Islands of Palau

 

[robint]

we only ate in town 1 night, our last day, at the Indian place in town, The Taj. Food was fantastic but not cheap. Our whole boat group, 8 Americans, an Aussie, and a Thai couple met in town there and got several tables pushed together for us. Everyone ordered something diff, then we passed all the plates around family style and tried everything. We split the bill evenly at the end. It was a blast. NOT something we could afford to do every night though. That is the thing about liveaboards to remember.... you are with a group of people for a full week. You will either become friends quickly, having meals together, or not. We all got along like we had known each other forever... really awesome group.
Only 1 guy was a pain as he didn't like anything (thought the dives were too advanced, too deep, didn't do nitrox like the rest of us because he didn't see the point, he didn't do safety stops every dive like the rest of us as he said it was stupid as his computer didn't say he was in deco...one of those kind of guys). He wasn't a bad guy, just a complainer.

On a liveaboard you are stuck with the group. Keep that in mind.

 

[Deep Water Dan]

We've been to Palau twice. Unless you really want to do 3-4 dives per day, shore based diving is fine. Yes, it's a long boat ride to the dive sites. But the rides are usually smooth (you're inside the reef), and you get to go through the rock islands, German Channel, etc on the way out and back. The boat rides are beautiful and time flies. At lunch time they pull the boat onto an uninhabited island for an hour or so where there's a picnic table and usually a nice beach. You get to do things like the Milky Way. The shore based boats go to the same dive sites as the liveaboards. And there is plenty of comaraderie on shore. Hanging out at Sam's after your dives is always entertaining. You can grab a cab into town and explore. Plenty of culture to absorb on shore.

 

[Cosmographer]

Thanks! This has been very helpful. Seems like Sam also offers unlimited shore diving on their wall so if 2 dives/day isn't enough, this might be a good option. Has anyone here dived Sam's wall? Any opinions on how decent a dive site it is?

 

[docbonezz]

The Taj is a great place and there is also a Thai food place that is excellent. I can't remember the name of it though. We also ate at a sushi place that was great too. We stayed at the Palau Pacific Resort and it was a real nice hotel. So nice we are going back in April.

Does anyone have any other suggestions for places to eat while we are there?

Thanks

 

[cozcharlie]

You can certainly do Palau from land. However, I wouldn't say you are missing much of the land experiences by doing a liveaboard. There are a few decent restaurants (Kramer's, Taj), a couple of decent ex-pat/tourist bars (The Drop Off, Sam's), but the islands definitely aren't known for their nightlife (or daylife for that matter).

Diving isn't going to be cheap, even from land, so I would carefully weight the full costs of hotel+diving+dining and factor in the more dives on a liveaboard. The liveaboard may not be that much more expensive given that you do essentially twice the diving. That said, at first glance some of the land-based packages were cheaper than I remembered, so it may make sense to do land based given your budget. As noted, just make certain to factor land food costs etc versus more diving on a liveaboard when you make your decision.

You can definitely get in quite a bit of good diving from land, although it may be a little bit more weather sensitive than the liveaboards (weather affects hour long boat rides from Koror more than 5 minute boat rides from a live aboard). In normal weather the dive sites are essentially the same for land based vs. live aboard--though I am not sure how often the Koror ops make it down to Peleliu. The liveaboards advantage is that they take people from Koror down to the dive sites (which are almost all south of Koror) and then just stay in that area for the week. This saves the liveaboards the commute from Koror and allows for 4-5 dives per day instead of 2 or 3.

Either way, you will have a blast.

FYI: I am partial to either the Palau Aggressor or the Tropic Dancer, but I believe the Big Blue Explorer is cheaper (though I know nothing about it, or even if it is still there)

 

[Centrals]

........though I am not sure how often the Koror ops make it down to Peleliu....

NOT very often.
Did a land-based tour before and promised myself that the next rip will be liveaboard. And it was GREAT. Went to Peleliu without any porblem or excuses.