Best shore diving PLUS non-diving topside in exotic location?

[Tassie_Rohan]

North bali would fit the bill - good shore dives (nice macro) and excellent culture to explore top side. Cheap as well. Seraya is a great place to stay.

THe old Sipdan would of been perfect, but its a 20 minute boat ride nowadays from Mabul. Mabul has nice diving but not much to do top side, and its reached by a 1 hour boat ride.

Lembeh does not have much to do top side, but the boat rides tend to be short - great muck diving.

You can stay on Bunkaken (after a boat ride) but again not much top side but rest and its walls are ok - to me they seem depleted in big stuff compaired to sipidan.

You can stay on Liang-Liang but again not much to do top side but rest. Its walls are pretty good and are reached by short boat rides.

There are plenty of resort islands along the great barrier reef that offer ok diving. Lady Elliot Island is less developed but seems prefered by divers - I havn't been there, yet.

Palau and Truk are great, but require long boat rides.

Raja Ampat and PNG, neither of which I have dived, may have one or two resorts that have short boat rides.


Cheers,
Rohan.

 

[jlevine]

I would also add a vote for Roatan. The travel advisories are way overhyped. It is so unfortunate that the governments of the US and other countries have come down on Honduras for following its own laws in dealing with its previous leader. Roatan is beautiful. Most diving is just 10-15 minutes away on smooth water. If you are going in January, you should stay on the south side of the siland where the walter is calmer during winter. In terms of topside life, you won't find huge shopping malls (but a small one just opened) but there are lots of restaurants. You will probably want to rent a car if you are staying on the south side. If you stay at Coco View or Barefoot Cay you will probably not even want to leave your resort. I have not stayed in either but have heard great things about them. Check out Roatan Info - Roatan Hotels, Resorts, Diving, Maps, News, Real Estate, Pictures, Weather, Tours & Chat. for more info.

 

[divenski]

I have a different perspective - I also used to get horribly seasick (and elevator sick and moving sidewalk sick and swingset sick - you get the picture....) until I was introduced to a wonderful miracle motion-sickness drug on a liveaboard in Australia. There it's over-the-counter and called Kwells. In the U.S. it's prescription and called Scopace - oral scopolamine. No side effects, works like a charm. I could eat, read, spend time below decks, everything. Last year I even went on a week-long sailing trip in the BVI (I wouldn't have even considered a day sailing before!), and I've not had a bit of motion-sickness. This may give you a few more options - for diving and/or other activities at your destination.

 

[octopuppy]

If you're considering Caribbean, both of you try running this vacation advisor. It will recommend the top 1-5 locations based on your interests.

FYI - not selling anything nor am I a travel agent. It's just a fun interactive system using expert system technology. :admingreet:

 

[Damselfish]

fun, but I don't think I'd trust it to make good suggestions. (Data seems a little suspect - if you set one thing to "very important" and all the rest to "not interested" to see better what data it might be basing it's suggestions on, it comes up with a lot of pretty odd results.)

 

[Doc]

- if you set one thing to "very important" and all the rest to "not interested" to see better what data it might be basing it's suggestions on, it comes up with a lot of pretty odd results.)

I did what you suggested and gave 100% weight to "scuba diving".

The Top 5 choices in the Caribbean were Curacao, St. Croix and Tortola, Cayman, and a generic reference to the name "Bahamas".

Allrightythen.

Gotta love the nets.

(That website is merely a technology database demonstration.
They're hoping to sell that type of website "search engine" to people that might want to market cars, digital cameras, or ___________, based on categories selected by the end user)

 

[full fin]

So where did you end up going and what did you think?

 

[tracydr]

So where did you end up going and what did you think?

Was wondering the same thing.
I might have put in some suggestions like Costa Rica, Ecuador and Tanzania/Mozambique.

 

[Howard Kaiser]

Hey ...not sure if I can find culture anywhere...Grand Cayman has excellent restaurants and shopping.....you WILL see a dent in your credit cards...shore diving much more available than you'd think..many years ago, we used to travel on a real budget and found great spots on Grand Cayman..does she play golf? GC has two highly regarded courses...let me know if you'd want to know more about the shore dives..

hk