Ultimate 6 month dive trip circumnavigating the globe

[b-man]

hey guys,

I've been guiding a nice guy from Australia over the last few days who is a teacher and gets long breaks every 4 years for working in the Aussie outback miles from anywhere and he is a experienced diver and we were talking the other day about where he could go on his next 6 month break. He reckons this will be a bit of a once in a lifetime ultimate trip for him and I suggested he ask you guys, and that I had a account and would post on his behalf... So any suggestions, however brief or detailed, would be great. What would you want as part of your ultimate dive itinerary? :shortbus:

cheers,

Will

 

[b-man]

oh yeah. budget is around US 10k I think. (top end, obviously the cheaper the better!)

 

[drbill]

Back in 2001 I did a three month trip around the North and South Pacific (and several Pacific islands) for $4,500 all inclusive (airfare, domestic travel, food, accommodations, diving and gifts). Of course the US dollar is much weaker now than it was then.

If I were to do a trip like that, here are the regions I'd visit:

the Philippines
Japan (to film some of the Asian seaweeds that are invasive here in SoCal)
western Australia (Ningaloo Reef)
Malaysia
the Maldives
Madagascar
South Africa
the Red Sea
Greece
Brazil (Fernando de Noronha, Abrolhas)
Chile (kelp forests)

That's where I'd want to dive (excludes a number of areas I've already been). His mileage may be very different.

 

[TSandM]

Well, some of the places that would be exotic and hard to reach for me would be comparatively accessible to someone from Australia (like New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, and Indonesia). But I don't think ANY "ultimate dive trip" around the world would be complete without some cold water diving off the North American west coast -- the kelp forests in the Channel Islands, the hydrocoral in Monterey, and the huge walls, densely coated with life, of Northern Vancouver Island.