swimmingpooldivein
Registered
Context
Dive Location: Ambon, Indonesia
Dive Resort: Spice Island Divers
Timeframe: April, 2024
My Credentials: PADI Rescue; 265 dives across 10 countries
Review of Diving
I spent 8 days at the resort, with about 6 full days of diving, for a grand total of 25 dives. Every day, I completed the 3 regularly scheduled day dives. Across the evenings, I completed one house reef night dive, 2 regular dive site night dives, 2 blackwater dives, and 1 Mandarinfish dive. For one of the days, I did 4 daytime dives, although two dives were shortened to 45min for scheduling reasons. Most dives were on the north side of Ambon Bay (same side as the resort), but two were on the south side upon my request. Bottom temp was 28C/29C. I did not bring a camera, and I did not rent one either.
I came here for muck diving, and I got muck diving! Each dive, the guide would find tiny critters for me and call me over to take a look. The guides were honestly rapid-fire: they found new and exciting marine life so fast, I barely even had time to find things myself. Some of their findings were so incredibly tiny, I couldn’t even make out what I was looking at! I also came to Ambon with a checklist of marine life I wanted to see. The guides were more than happy to help me complete my list. In fact, on the last day, when I shared my wish to see a flamboyant cuttlefish, the manager sent a second guide in the water just to help find one!!! That’s pretty next-level customer service. I felt safe on every dive.
The marine life was incredible. They were rich in color and beauty. I even watched a giant moray eel and snowflake moray eel get into a fight! The marine life highlights were seeing the expectations of Ambon I read about online, including harlequin shrimp, Coleman's shrimp, harlequin crab, pregnant box crab, zebra crab, orangutan crab, squat lobster, weedy scorpionfish, devil scorpionfish, leaf scorpionfish, tassled scorpionfish, painted frogfish, cockatoo waspfish, gurnard dragonet, wonderpus octopus, longarm octopus, Berry’s bobtail squid, mutualism between alpheid shrimp and shrimpgoby, ornate ghost pipefish, and robust ghost pipefish. I saw over 35 species of nudibranch and flatworm I had never seen before, including a pelagic nudibranch during a blackwater dive. Additional non-muck highlights were midnight snapper, longhorn cowfish, blue-spotted maskray, blue-spotted ribbontail ray, mandarinfish, and an absurd amount of moray eel and snake eel. Twilight Zone was my favorite muck site because we always ended the dive at the underside of a permanently moored boat with beautiful growth all over the hull. By the way, the anemonefish are aggressive, eish!!! They guard their territory akin to a titan triggerfish! (Obligatory note about psychedelic frogfish: no one at the dive shop had seen one for over 3 years.)
The ecosystem of the dive sites did unfortunately match the expectation of a muck dive site. They're all sandy slopes, large patches of rubble, and a lot of trash. Ropes, tires, bottles, just junk. Not picturesque. Sometimes, I looked up because I found a large jellyfish? No, it was a plastic bag. At the dive site Aer Manis (had one of my favorite night dives ever), there's an area on the northern side that resembled a landfill, but underwater. Alas, all these “features” provided significant coverage and safety for all the animals. Having said that, if you need a reprieve from the garbage (I certainly did), there's a nearby dive site full of coral and free of trash called Baru Badiri. I also recommend the blackwater dive.
Review of Spice Island Divers
The resort was beautiful and had a lovely view of the bay. Every single employee was beyond friendly and willing to help with anything I needed. I'm very grateful to the manager for catering to my diving requests, whether that'd be doing more dives per day or changing the dive site schedule last minute. The food was delicious: lunch and dinner were always 3-course meals. They focused on Indonesian-inspired dishes. My room, Seafront Villa, was nice and spacious, but there were lots of mosquitos inside (there's a mosquito net around the bed), something you can't avoid generally in Ambon. The room already had a spray can, which I used multiple times through the entire villa.
As for their diving services, they owned several spacious boats. Max divers to guide ratio was 4:1. Note that there's no minimum number of divers for any dive; just me was fine. Our gear was always already on the boat, and they assisted us into our BCD; similarly, they'd take all our gear off the boat on our behalf. One diver couldn't climb up the ladder with their BCD, tank, and other gear on, so the employees were happy to hoist up her gear from the water. Back on land, they had a photography room for maintenance and care for cameras. Their library contained the necessary marine life identification books. All the gear I rented was in fine shape.
Review of Non-diving Activities
The resort worked with a third-party company for organizing city tours, and I did a half-day trip. Was fun!
Summary
In all, this was a fantastic trip! I saw heaps of marine life I had never seen before, with many of them hiding in the most peculiar places. All the staff, including the guides, were excellent. I know that Spice Island Divers can be on the pricy side, but I wanted the best experience possible in Ambon, and this fulfilled my expectations!
(Thank you to the entire community for all the existing posts that helped me determine what I had wanted to dive and how! This trip report is my way of giving back.)
Tidbits for Future Travelers
Dive Location: Ambon, Indonesia
Dive Resort: Spice Island Divers
Timeframe: April, 2024
My Credentials: PADI Rescue; 265 dives across 10 countries
Review of Diving
I spent 8 days at the resort, with about 6 full days of diving, for a grand total of 25 dives. Every day, I completed the 3 regularly scheduled day dives. Across the evenings, I completed one house reef night dive, 2 regular dive site night dives, 2 blackwater dives, and 1 Mandarinfish dive. For one of the days, I did 4 daytime dives, although two dives were shortened to 45min for scheduling reasons. Most dives were on the north side of Ambon Bay (same side as the resort), but two were on the south side upon my request. Bottom temp was 28C/29C. I did not bring a camera, and I did not rent one either.
I came here for muck diving, and I got muck diving! Each dive, the guide would find tiny critters for me and call me over to take a look. The guides were honestly rapid-fire: they found new and exciting marine life so fast, I barely even had time to find things myself. Some of their findings were so incredibly tiny, I couldn’t even make out what I was looking at! I also came to Ambon with a checklist of marine life I wanted to see. The guides were more than happy to help me complete my list. In fact, on the last day, when I shared my wish to see a flamboyant cuttlefish, the manager sent a second guide in the water just to help find one!!! That’s pretty next-level customer service. I felt safe on every dive.
The marine life was incredible. They were rich in color and beauty. I even watched a giant moray eel and snowflake moray eel get into a fight! The marine life highlights were seeing the expectations of Ambon I read about online, including harlequin shrimp, Coleman's shrimp, harlequin crab, pregnant box crab, zebra crab, orangutan crab, squat lobster, weedy scorpionfish, devil scorpionfish, leaf scorpionfish, tassled scorpionfish, painted frogfish, cockatoo waspfish, gurnard dragonet, wonderpus octopus, longarm octopus, Berry’s bobtail squid, mutualism between alpheid shrimp and shrimpgoby, ornate ghost pipefish, and robust ghost pipefish. I saw over 35 species of nudibranch and flatworm I had never seen before, including a pelagic nudibranch during a blackwater dive. Additional non-muck highlights were midnight snapper, longhorn cowfish, blue-spotted maskray, blue-spotted ribbontail ray, mandarinfish, and an absurd amount of moray eel and snake eel. Twilight Zone was my favorite muck site because we always ended the dive at the underside of a permanently moored boat with beautiful growth all over the hull. By the way, the anemonefish are aggressive, eish!!! They guard their territory akin to a titan triggerfish! (Obligatory note about psychedelic frogfish: no one at the dive shop had seen one for over 3 years.)
The ecosystem of the dive sites did unfortunately match the expectation of a muck dive site. They're all sandy slopes, large patches of rubble, and a lot of trash. Ropes, tires, bottles, just junk. Not picturesque. Sometimes, I looked up because I found a large jellyfish? No, it was a plastic bag. At the dive site Aer Manis (had one of my favorite night dives ever), there's an area on the northern side that resembled a landfill, but underwater. Alas, all these “features” provided significant coverage and safety for all the animals. Having said that, if you need a reprieve from the garbage (I certainly did), there's a nearby dive site full of coral and free of trash called Baru Badiri. I also recommend the blackwater dive.
Review of Spice Island Divers
The resort was beautiful and had a lovely view of the bay. Every single employee was beyond friendly and willing to help with anything I needed. I'm very grateful to the manager for catering to my diving requests, whether that'd be doing more dives per day or changing the dive site schedule last minute. The food was delicious: lunch and dinner were always 3-course meals. They focused on Indonesian-inspired dishes. My room, Seafront Villa, was nice and spacious, but there were lots of mosquitos inside (there's a mosquito net around the bed), something you can't avoid generally in Ambon. The room already had a spray can, which I used multiple times through the entire villa.
As for their diving services, they owned several spacious boats. Max divers to guide ratio was 4:1. Note that there's no minimum number of divers for any dive; just me was fine. Our gear was always already on the boat, and they assisted us into our BCD; similarly, they'd take all our gear off the boat on our behalf. One diver couldn't climb up the ladder with their BCD, tank, and other gear on, so the employees were happy to hoist up her gear from the water. Back on land, they had a photography room for maintenance and care for cameras. Their library contained the necessary marine life identification books. All the gear I rented was in fine shape.
Review of Non-diving Activities
The resort worked with a third-party company for organizing city tours, and I did a half-day trip. Was fun!
Summary
In all, this was a fantastic trip! I saw heaps of marine life I had never seen before, with many of them hiding in the most peculiar places. All the staff, including the guides, were excellent. I know that Spice Island Divers can be on the pricy side, but I wanted the best experience possible in Ambon, and this fulfilled my expectations!
(Thank you to the entire community for all the existing posts that helped me determine what I had wanted to dive and how! This trip report is my way of giving back.)
Tidbits for Future Travelers
- Bring a mosquitos repellent spray bottle.
- Several dive shops and resorts closed due to Covid, and new ones have sprung up, but online information is out of date. As of March, 2024, I believe the operational businesses are Spice Island Divers, Laha Dive Packer, Ambon Blue Rose Divers, Ambon Dive Explore, and (per @Luko) Ambon Dive Resort.
