Palau/Truk and Yap or Kosrae?

[sffrenchman]

Hi everyone:

I am starting to plan a 3-week trip to micronesia in April 2014, and plan to go to Palau and Truk. I am trying to decide whether to do the 3rd week in Yap or Kosrae. Mantas aside, how would you compare the diving between Yap and Kosrae?

Thanks,

Christophe

 

[Deep Water Dan]

I have not dove Kosrae yet, but Yap in April should be excellent. Guamrider will probably chime in here pretty soon, he has no doubt dove Kosrae a zillion times. One thing you need to consider, however, is the flight schedule. United only goes into Yap and Kosrae twice a week, so you can't just tack a week on to visit either place without some careful planning. You might want to consider Pohnpei, also. Have a great trip!

 

[pazz]

For both diving and travel reasons, I would go with Palau, Yap and Chuuk. I have dove both Yap and Kosrae, and if someone were to offer me an all-expenses paid dive trip to Yap or Kosrae, I would choose Yap. I found 3-4 days to be plenty for Kosrae: a week could feel like a longtime. Now, if the offer was all expenses paid to island hop and dive Chuuk, Pohnpei and Kosrae, I might change my mind.

 

[dbeitz]

Hi Christophe,

I own a dive resort in Kosrae, so I will "try" to give you unbiased advice on the diving here, based on what our customers tell us about their experiences in Micronesia. Of course I will give you more information about Kosrae than the other islands, as that's what I know best.
Palau - not to be missed for up close action with large pelagics, plenty of WW2 wrecks above and below the water, excellent macro if you can take your eyes off the big stuff. Up to 1.5 hour boat rides each way if you aren't on one of the many liveaboards.
Yap - Excellent chance of seeing Mantas, although as usual, the vis where they are is low.
Truk (Chuuk) - It's hard to beat it for wreck diving. Most of the dives are 80" ++, the guides will motivate you to penetrate, so best to be very comfortable in the water when you arrive there, maybe make it your 2nd stop if you won't have dived for a while.
Kosrae - Won't have large pelagics everywhere or Manta's, and very few wrecks. Will have, the healthiest hard coral you will have ever seen (anywhere), probably the best vis in Micronesia, relaxing drift dives in mild currents which make UW photography a pleasure. Some turtles, eagle rays, schools of barracuda. Kosrae is the youngest of the Caroline Island chain (made up of Kosrae, Pohnpei, Truk, Yap and Palau), so it has sunk the least. This makes the fringing reef much closer than the other islands. Boat rides with us are 5 to 25 minutes to world class sites, as we have boats at two different harbors, so we can choose which to use each day depending on the wind and swell direction.
Here is a link from our website with information about flights to Micronesia. http://kosraenautilus.com/flights.html At the bottom of that page there is information about United Airlines "Visit Micronesia" discounted airfare. As mentioned there, it is not well known with United staff, so you might have to be persistent on the phone to them. This could save you $500 to $1000 on the type of itinerary that you are planning, as it is designed for multiple island stops.
I hope I have been reasonably unbiased with my comments, but it is hard when you are passionate about what you do. Good luck with your planning, and I hope you have a very enjoyable trip to Micronesia.

 

[WetLens]

Just returned from a Chuuk/Kosrae trip. Have to agree with Pazz - 3-4 days is plenty, especially if you do 3 dives per day. The hard corals are magnificent. But that's it. Very few soft corals, no gorgonia, no whip corals, extremely few sponges (other than coating sponges on the underside of coral heads), etc. Hard corals as far as the eye can see - and we did have great vis. I've seen very few places with the pristine corals Kosrae has, but longed for some of the other animals that provide variation in texture to the reef. Lots of small fish and a nice variety of butterflyfish, but tended to get bored as we got towards our ninth and final dive.

All of the diving we did was on a sloping reef - usually from about 20' to the edge of the wall that was around 90'. Peered over the wall on several occasions, but never saw anything of interest to draw me deeper - and I love deep wall dives...

The dives we did were great, but nine dives satisfied me on diving Kosrae. Glad I did it. Not likely to go back.

 

[sffrenchman]

Thanks all for the feedback. How's the diving in yap besides the mantas? While I love mantas, I have been lucky to dive with them several times and therefore this would not be the only reason for me to dive yap.


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[Deep Water Dan]

How's the diving in yap besides the mantas?

Vertigo Wall is one of the best dives out here, in my opinion. The shark dive is to die for. I've been to Yap twice, but concentrated on sharks and mantas so I can't comment on most of the rest of the Yap dive sites.

 

[Ulithi Adv. Lodge]

Hi Christophe- If you go to Yap think about heading out to Ulithi (Google Earth it). We own a small lodge out there and it is simply stunning. Pacific Mission Airline flies out of Yap on Mondays and Fridays for $200 r/t. There even may be a dive shop out there by the time you get there. info@ulithiadventurelodge.com can answer your questions. Thanks and have a blast. John

 

[Allysimo]

I spent a year living and diving in Kosrae and never got bored. The visibility was astonishing and we regularly saw sharks, rays, turtles, dolphins, schools of barracuda, enormous maori wrasses and much more, and once were surrounded by a pod of pilot whales. There are several top-notch dive shops on the island, including Kosrae Nautilus who also replied to this post. The island is small enough so you can easily circle it to find the best site each day and there are sites all the way around. I can't wait to dive there again!

 

[volvorules]

I spent 4 days in Yap last October, and had a wonderful time. Stayed at the Yap Pacific Dive Resort, previously called Trader's Ridge. Dove with them 5 dives over 2 days. We actually didn't see that many mantas, as we were always late getting out due to the children of the other couple diving but did see a few. I will agree that Vertigo Wall was a wonderful dive. We did not bring any chum with us, but the sharks were there, 15 or 16 grey reef and blacktips. It was awesome. Here's some video I took on that dive: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joGK_nmwWFE

We also did the Mandarinfish dive with them, and it was so amazing! Spent an hour at 17 FSW watching 5 or 6 of the beautiful little fish. Definitely worth it.

Enjoy your trip, whatever you choose!