@outpost31 that sounds like a fantastic trip, I'm very jealous already! I hope you don’t mind if I use your thread instead of starting a new one as my questions are related.
Hi all, we’re looking into next year’s family trip in late July/August (with 2 & 5 year olds) and have narrowed down on North Sulawesi. We’ll probably have 10-12 nights.
I’d really like to include Bangka Island for a few days; can anyone suggest any resort(s) that might be more child friendly in terms of facilities and beach/swimming/snorkelling? Our budget is £50-100 p/night (US$65-130) for bed & breakfast (A/C preferred but not essential). I realise many resorts offer full board packages that include diving so obviously that needs to be accounted for.
I’m also torn between including some time in Lembeh or on the mainland near Manado. I’d like to visit Lembeh for obvious reasons. We’re not particularly seasoned divers so ‘muck diving’ would be basically new for us but from what I understand Lembeh is THE place to get involved. But I’m thinking Manado may be more convenient, especially with the kids, and Bunaken National Park is fairly close for the diving (I’m currently pretty much ruling out staying on Bunaken or Siladen). Can anyone give some advice on this please.
The wider picture is that we’ll be flying from London to Bangkok and stopping in Thailand for a week or so to see my wife’s family and friends. The best/cheapest way to get to Manado from Bangkok appears to be via Singapore but an overnight stay in Singapore is needed before getting the direct flight to/from Manado. We’d probably need another overnight stay in Singapore before heading back to the UK from there.
As an alternative for less/shorter flights and less stopovers, we’re also thinking that staying on one of the inhabited islands in the Maldives may be an option, preferably within Ari Atoll. However, having looked into this my heart’s not really in it. Although it would be fantastic to have the opportunity to see some pelagics, it all seems to be very expensive in terms of transport to the islands from Male and the diving itself…I’ve also read the foods very expensive and not that good. The island I’ve looked at so far is Dhigurah island. I've read the house reef ain't up to much, and I’ve seen a resorts website offering banana boats rides! …and whale shark trips that seems to involve a search and then a whole load of boats diverging on one that’s been spotted (pardon the unintentional pun) and hordes of people jumping in with the poor thing while its trying to feed. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve jumped in with a whale shark myself for a quick snorkel but that was a random very lucky sighting during a surface interval, not a ‘hunting party’. Am I being too negative?
If anyone has any views / suggestions regarding the Maldives I’d also be happy to hear (bearing in mind my budget above). <I'm guessing I may need to copy and paste the bit on Maldives to a new thread in another forum too>
Thanks in advance, and apologies again for the hijack!
