Palau and Yap

[jenofozz]

Sam's tours in Palau were great, they have great staff. The diving there is also fantastic and as mentioned above the bar/restaurant is also cool.

One point for staying on the island... there are great restaurants! Indian, Thai, Palauan... really really good food reasonably priced.

As for hotels, I stayed at the west plaza malakal and it was nice., Nothing amazing but did the job, clean, big rooms, friendly helpful staff, good restaurant nearby run by a Canadian where they give guests 10% off.

PPR and Carolines are both approx 3 times more expensive. If oyu do a hotel search on the net for Palau you can find these out. I did a dive package from Guam including flights, transfers breakfasts, pickups etc and it was good value.

The other dive shops there seemed good but as I didn7t use them I can't compare the service, I did however meet the staff and they seemed helpful and friendly.

 

[champ]

I just got back from my Yap/Palau trip.

Yap was a very nice place. The people were very friendly (locals, visitors, and ex-pats). We stayed in the Manta Ray Bay Hotel for $170 per night. That was the lowest rate I could find so I booked it on expedia. It did not seem like they would negotiate with people off the street. The Pathways would negotiate down to $40 per night - Note that Micronesia has been hit hard the last couple of years by the down-turn in travel.

Unfortunatly, in Yap the typhoon came by and the mantas left the channel for safety. We only saw one in the distance (poor vis) and one breached by the boat (cool). We left Yap early after only 4 dives. Two of the dives were in the channel to see the mantas and two were on the reef. Yap has good reef diving, its not just manta diving. We talked with a couple of people who visited the outer islands in Yap. I think I will do this the next time I go - It is very primative (national geographic). No electricity, grass huts, tarro and fish to eat. Women are bare breasted with grass skirts and men wear a colorful diaper ...

Palau was great diving. For part of the trip we stayed at the Palau Pacific Resort. I booked it on-line at http://palau.panpacific.com/ for $170 per night. This was cheaper than anyone else I talked to at the hotel (even walk-ins from the streat). If you want to stay at a nice hotel with a beach this is the only real choice. The Carolines have beautful huts overlooking the ocean but you would never make the long hike to PPR. The cheapest I could find the Carolines was $150 anyways. Also the Neco marine has a free shuttle every hour between downtown Koror and PPR. If you want a more reasonable deal the Palau hotel had nice clean rooms with air, cable tv, and refrigerator for $30 per night in Koror.

We also spent a lot of time on a liveaboard (Ocean Hunter). I had never stayed on a liveaboard before but I think it was a great way to do Palau. Because things are slow on Palau the liveaboards offered great discounts (30-50% off) for people walking in off the street. I did 5 dives a day and was treated like a king. The food on the boat was GREAT. The chef made special food for each individuals crazy diets. We also were able to dive the popular dive sites when they were not crowded with day boats. With a max of six divers, the Ocean Hunter was a great liveaboard. We also went fishing from the boat which was fun (fresh sashimi - tuna and wahoo). The can bring sea kayaks out too if you would like.

I'll try to write up a better trip report after the holidays when I have more time.