RalphJr
Registered
Tasik Ria Resort
40 hours of travel including a drive and three flights from Fresno CA will get you to Tasik Ria Resort in Manado Indonesia. At the end of the road where civilization is beating back the jungle Dan Green and his well-trained staff will attend to your every need. You really need to appreciate the remoteness of this facility before you can appreciate the level of comfort that they provide. The food especially the baked goods were excellent. I have some special dietary needs that were met with ease and cheer. We stayed in one of the sea view beachfront cabanas that were well kept and very comfortable. Others in our dive group of 25 persons stayed in the pool and garden view rooms and I did not hear a single complaint from any of them the whole time. Room service, Laundry service, Spa services, service, service, service, you can be pampered here. Keep in mind that this is a dive resort and they cater to divers. They also do their best for non-divers and there were a few of them in our group that seemed to stay busy with land tours, the spa, a good book and the gorgeous swimming pools. I spent my days diving.
The internet connectivity was very intermittent but as you drive along the road from Manado to the resort you can see many points where the phone and other communication service lines have been compromised by fallen vegetation just remember you are at the edge of civilization here. I did not want to communicate much with the outside world and my Republic Wireless cell phone did not work here but it just did not matter to me. The resort has an IDD phone system that works ok but the outgoing lines are often busy. Cell service is available at the resort but I do not know which carriers were working.
The electricity is 240 volt and the outlets are the two round prong European type. The resort has a generator system so that the power was always on.
The resort has its own RO water system so drinking water was plentiful and free. Tap water was for washing only. Do not drink tap water in Indonesia.
Great Job Dan, Thank you and your staff for your gracious hospitality.
Tasik Divers
Monica manages the dive shop and diving operations which are separate from the resort but on the same property in a well-organized business manner. Safe diving was a first priority and PADI rules and safe diving protocols were well followed on the boats. I travel with all of my own dive gear except for weights and tanks. The tanks provided by the dive shop were aluminum 80s with DIN or yoke valve connections. The solid lead weights were in metric values. Nitrox 32 was available. The boats were clean and comfortable with good ladders for easy exits. Camera tables and water tanks were available as well as dry areas for your other gear. Our group had booked 8 days of three tank diving, but my wife and I generally will dive three or four days in a row and then give our ears a break for a day. This is just what we ended up doing so we skipped the 5th day and went shopping for some local artwork. There are really no local artists in Manado they all seem to migrate to Bali so the artwork pickings were slim.
The Diving
There are basically three different types of diving available to you from Tasik Divers: Wall diving, Reef diving and Muck diving. Most of the wall and reef diving was in Bunaken National Park a forty five minute ride out but there was also some beautiful walls on the mainland side of the dive area accessible to the Tasik boats. Muck diving was available right out in front of the Tasik jetty. Currents were generally mild at around 1 knot to nonexistent with a couple of rare 2 knot patches. The water temperature averaged 82F air temperature 84F with humidity at 80+%. The dive dates were January 13th through the 21st. Visibility ranged from 80 feet on some of the walls to 15 feet on some of the muck dives. Be sure to bring your green water filter for muck water photography; I did not and will be spending some time in Photoshop making the corrections. A blue filter is needed out on the wall dives. Maki was our dive guide for most of the days we dove and I highly recommend him. He pointed out so many critters that I never would have found. He is fun loving with a great personality and a strong desire to please. Trash, I have observed trash in the ocean environment almost everywhere I have dove in the world since 1977 this trip was no exception. It is so painful to see our pollution of these marine environments.
Wall diving:
World class walls 40 to 100+ feet deep with a wide variety of healthy hard and soft corals and sponges. The overall health of the marine environment seemed good with very large schools of tropical fishes. Populations of food type and size fishes seemed to be low. Shark sightings were low with only a couple of white tip reef sharks observed. 4 Orcas were spotted by one of the boats. Many turtles were seen with one of them the largest I have ever observed - her shell (a confirmed female) was at least 5 or 6 feet long. Just getting to be with her was worth the entire trip; she is magnificent.
Reef diving:
We only topped out onto the reef 20 to 15 feet deep a couple of times because the currents were often not favorable to getting back to the boats but the times that we did were great. The overall health was very good with little or no manmade damage to the hard corals observed. It would seem to me that the protected park status is working. Tropical fish heaven is how to best describe the edge and top of the reef. It really is visual sensory overload and trying to describe it with words is futile.
Muck diving:
A new term to me but a type of diving I have been doing since the beginning. I got certified for the first time in Monterey Bay CA and if it were not for the presence of kelp it would be muck diving. 20 to 60 foot depth with a sandy/silt and rubble bottom, green water, and low visibility with little or no current describes Muck diving. It is important to be weighted properly for a horizontal profile and to practice good buoyancy control using a frog style kick with your knees bent to keep your fining off of the bottom otherwise you will poison the visibility for divers behind you. It also helps to be with a group of divers who are also skilled in this profile. I was in an excellent group but observed several mucky cloud enshrouded groups. The muck dive critters here in Indonesia are amazing with nutibranch, shrimp, octopus, snakes, eels, sea horses, cuttlefish, and a whole host of tropical fishes to observe. I find that even my best video efforts are a poor representation to the actual experience of these wonderful dives. We liked Muck diving so much that we booked a special trip over to Lembeh Straits on one of our dive days to experience the muck diving there. The bus ride over was an adventure all by itself as the traffic and driving style is so chaotic and different from that back home. If you travel to Tasik Ria to dive I highly recommend you take a day to travel over to Lembeh.
Thank you Monica, Maki and the rest of the dedicated crew for a great diving vacation.
I will be posting a video on Vemeo when it is compiled.
40 hours of travel including a drive and three flights from Fresno CA will get you to Tasik Ria Resort in Manado Indonesia. At the end of the road where civilization is beating back the jungle Dan Green and his well-trained staff will attend to your every need. You really need to appreciate the remoteness of this facility before you can appreciate the level of comfort that they provide. The food especially the baked goods were excellent. I have some special dietary needs that were met with ease and cheer. We stayed in one of the sea view beachfront cabanas that were well kept and very comfortable. Others in our dive group of 25 persons stayed in the pool and garden view rooms and I did not hear a single complaint from any of them the whole time. Room service, Laundry service, Spa services, service, service, service, you can be pampered here. Keep in mind that this is a dive resort and they cater to divers. They also do their best for non-divers and there were a few of them in our group that seemed to stay busy with land tours, the spa, a good book and the gorgeous swimming pools. I spent my days diving.
The internet connectivity was very intermittent but as you drive along the road from Manado to the resort you can see many points where the phone and other communication service lines have been compromised by fallen vegetation just remember you are at the edge of civilization here. I did not want to communicate much with the outside world and my Republic Wireless cell phone did not work here but it just did not matter to me. The resort has an IDD phone system that works ok but the outgoing lines are often busy. Cell service is available at the resort but I do not know which carriers were working.
The electricity is 240 volt and the outlets are the two round prong European type. The resort has a generator system so that the power was always on.
The resort has its own RO water system so drinking water was plentiful and free. Tap water was for washing only. Do not drink tap water in Indonesia.
Great Job Dan, Thank you and your staff for your gracious hospitality.
Tasik Divers
Monica manages the dive shop and diving operations which are separate from the resort but on the same property in a well-organized business manner. Safe diving was a first priority and PADI rules and safe diving protocols were well followed on the boats. I travel with all of my own dive gear except for weights and tanks. The tanks provided by the dive shop were aluminum 80s with DIN or yoke valve connections. The solid lead weights were in metric values. Nitrox 32 was available. The boats were clean and comfortable with good ladders for easy exits. Camera tables and water tanks were available as well as dry areas for your other gear. Our group had booked 8 days of three tank diving, but my wife and I generally will dive three or four days in a row and then give our ears a break for a day. This is just what we ended up doing so we skipped the 5th day and went shopping for some local artwork. There are really no local artists in Manado they all seem to migrate to Bali so the artwork pickings were slim.
The Diving
There are basically three different types of diving available to you from Tasik Divers: Wall diving, Reef diving and Muck diving. Most of the wall and reef diving was in Bunaken National Park a forty five minute ride out but there was also some beautiful walls on the mainland side of the dive area accessible to the Tasik boats. Muck diving was available right out in front of the Tasik jetty. Currents were generally mild at around 1 knot to nonexistent with a couple of rare 2 knot patches. The water temperature averaged 82F air temperature 84F with humidity at 80+%. The dive dates were January 13th through the 21st. Visibility ranged from 80 feet on some of the walls to 15 feet on some of the muck dives. Be sure to bring your green water filter for muck water photography; I did not and will be spending some time in Photoshop making the corrections. A blue filter is needed out on the wall dives. Maki was our dive guide for most of the days we dove and I highly recommend him. He pointed out so many critters that I never would have found. He is fun loving with a great personality and a strong desire to please. Trash, I have observed trash in the ocean environment almost everywhere I have dove in the world since 1977 this trip was no exception. It is so painful to see our pollution of these marine environments.
Wall diving:
World class walls 40 to 100+ feet deep with a wide variety of healthy hard and soft corals and sponges. The overall health of the marine environment seemed good with very large schools of tropical fishes. Populations of food type and size fishes seemed to be low. Shark sightings were low with only a couple of white tip reef sharks observed. 4 Orcas were spotted by one of the boats. Many turtles were seen with one of them the largest I have ever observed - her shell (a confirmed female) was at least 5 or 6 feet long. Just getting to be with her was worth the entire trip; she is magnificent.
Reef diving:
We only topped out onto the reef 20 to 15 feet deep a couple of times because the currents were often not favorable to getting back to the boats but the times that we did were great. The overall health was very good with little or no manmade damage to the hard corals observed. It would seem to me that the protected park status is working. Tropical fish heaven is how to best describe the edge and top of the reef. It really is visual sensory overload and trying to describe it with words is futile.
Muck diving:
A new term to me but a type of diving I have been doing since the beginning. I got certified for the first time in Monterey Bay CA and if it were not for the presence of kelp it would be muck diving. 20 to 60 foot depth with a sandy/silt and rubble bottom, green water, and low visibility with little or no current describes Muck diving. It is important to be weighted properly for a horizontal profile and to practice good buoyancy control using a frog style kick with your knees bent to keep your fining off of the bottom otherwise you will poison the visibility for divers behind you. It also helps to be with a group of divers who are also skilled in this profile. I was in an excellent group but observed several mucky cloud enshrouded groups. The muck dive critters here in Indonesia are amazing with nutibranch, shrimp, octopus, snakes, eels, sea horses, cuttlefish, and a whole host of tropical fishes to observe. I find that even my best video efforts are a poor representation to the actual experience of these wonderful dives. We liked Muck diving so much that we booked a special trip over to Lembeh Straits on one of our dive days to experience the muck diving there. The bus ride over was an adventure all by itself as the traffic and driving style is so chaotic and different from that back home. If you travel to Tasik Ria to dive I highly recommend you take a day to travel over to Lembeh.
Thank you Monica, Maki and the rest of the dedicated crew for a great diving vacation.
I will be posting a video on Vemeo when it is compiled.
