Best value diving in Indonesia

[Centrals]

There are THREE different time zones in the country.
Do not make the mistake of trying to cover too many places.
Have you ever heard Toraja Land in Sulawesi? This is the only place in Indonesia that will forever last in my memory. Well worth a trip on its own.

 

[Centrals]

It's the wrong idea...but as you say you're more interested in things other than diving then stay away.

It is NOT wrong because there are few places like this in Bali which is packed with tourists. Even then it is no where as seedy as Kata Beach in Phuket.
I could not recognize the modern day Ubud from the one I had visited in 1992.
You do not know much about Thailand and even less about Indonesia! LOL.

 

[matts1w]

1. Do you surf?

2. What are you planning to do in West Sumatra/Padang for three weeks? My wife's family is from Padang and Bukittinggi. There is some cool stuff and AMAZING food, but I don't know about three weeks...unless you surf.

3. In the world of the interwebs, Insta-tik-tok-book, 4G service in the middle of the most remote corners of the Coral Triangle, $10 drones with 100 mega-super-cameras, etc... ain't nothin' under the radar anymore.

 

[dumpsterpurrs]

100% Pulau Weh! On the best days it's better than Sipadan and Similan. Incredibly fishy, and the fish aren't shy at all. Ginormous morays. Some of the most mind-blowing dives I've done. Not the most colorful corals, but the pink fans and green branches look like a charming sakura garden. Best in the summer. I had some magical dives in August-Sep, still very good til Oct-Nov. Winter there is super sketchy, completely avoid Dec-Feb. 2.3M idr/10 dives w/o gear, hard to be cheaper. Accom and food are reasonable too though not high quality. Very lovely, peaceful place. I keep coming back and spend so much time there each trip. However it can have spells when conditions are bad then everything would be bad. Better to stay a bit longer.

 

[Dan]

Mermaid 1 LoB is about the whole budget we have for Indonesia Your Sumbawa whale sharks are intriguing though I have not heard of that before and we missed them on the Phillipines, being too far from Donsol/Leyte and not wanting to do Oslob.

After doing some reading, we decided to skip Weh. We fly to Padang, spending some 3ish weeks on Sumatra on land, flying to Labuan Bajo. There we try to snatch a bargain for LoB, and if not, maybe dive from land. About 7-10 days spent on Flores incliding Komodo NP, move to Sumbawa, do whale sharks and possily other locations, which will at least cut the horrendous journey in half. Visit Lombok for a week, possibly adding a day of diving, move to Nusa Penida, if sunfish will have arrived already and spend the rest of days on Bali north, adding some more shore diving if we have time and money. In total we have 57 days in Indonesia before flying out.

What do you think? Any specific tips for our locations? Is there possibly some under the radar great diving on Sumbawa?
Thank you.

Below is my trip video of diving with Saleh Bay Whalesharks, which also posted here: Saleh Bay Whalesharks


I drove from Medan to Padang / Bukit Tinggi back in 1995. It's interesting place to visit, not sue I would spend 3 weeks there though.

I did spent 3 weeks cruising & diving along the way from Bali to Komodo and back to Bali. Will do it again this coming August.

There are some muck diving places in Sumbawa, specifically in Moyo island, called Angel Reef, Satonda Reef, Sumbawa Surprise. You just need to find a dive guide who is familiar with the dive sites, which would be hard to find since there is no dive resort there other than the Amanwana, Luxury Resort on Moyo Island, Indonesia - Amanwana where Princess Diana used to stay, when she went on vacation in Indonesia. I think I spent $1500 / night there back in 2014. Last August, when we were in the neighborhood of Amanwana, we planned to have dinner at the resort and they would charge us $100 / person, so we decided to let our chef to cook a good dinner and ate on the boat instead.

Just curious on how you get the tourist visa for 57 days? Indonesian Immigration Office issues Visa on Arrival (VoA) only for 30 day stay. To stay for > 30 days, you will need to go to closest Immigration Office at day 30 to extend the VoA. I did that once, while I was in Berau, Kalimantan. It's pain in the rear end to apply for the VoA extension. I had to have a sponsor. Luckily my Indonesian cousin, who lives in Jakarta, was willing to be my sponsor and the head of Immigration Office in Berau was kind enough to help me filled out the form and approved it and put an extension stamp on my US passport.

 

[dumpsterpurrs]

Just curious on how you get the tourist visa for 57 days? Indonesian Immigration Office issues Visa on Arrival (VoA) only for 30 day stay. To stay for > 30 days, you will need to go to closest Immigration Office at day 30 to extend the VoA. I did that once, while I was in Berau, Kalimantan. It's pain in the rear end to apply for the VoA extension. I had to have a sponsor. Luckily my Indonesian cousin, who lives in Jakarta, was willing to be my sponsor and the head of Immigration Office in Berau was kind enough to help me filled out the form and approved it and put an extension stamp on my US passport.

I think Indonesia offers the eVOA now, which allows only extension too. Started late last year for some nationalities and early this year for some others.

VOA extension on Pulau Weh was super duper easy and fast. You still have to come twice, but everything else is pleasant. Amazing gov officers, super nice and competent, which I thought was unthinkable for Indonesia.

 

[DiveOregon]

I think Indonesia offers the eVOA now, which allows only extension too. Started late last year for some nationalities and early this year for some others.

VOA extension on Pulau Weh was super duper easy and fast. You still have to come twice, but everything else is pleasant. Amazing gov officers, super nice and competent, which I thought was unthinkable for Indonesia.

Last fall my family stayed one day over on our visas and it was a million a day fine.

 

[Indah]

Last fall my family stayed one day over on our visas and it was a million a day fine.

Indeed, that is the official fine. Could have been prevented by extension in time.

 

[Asanoth]

Yes, it can all be done online now: VoA (quite an oxymoron ) and the extension.

How much do you think a budget LoB from Komodo can cost per day? I am thinking something like 10-12 dives, so 3-4 full days?

 

[dumpsterpurrs]

Yes, it can all be done online now: VoA (quite an oxymoron ) and the extension.

How much do you think a budget LoB from Komodo can cost per day? I am thinking something like 10-12 dives, so 3-4 full days?

I usually use the rates of Sokaraja LOB and Scuba Junkie Komodo as baseline to compare others.