Bucket List Diving

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Scapa. If all goes well, I'll be headed up there next summer to dive there. That's really it for my bucket list. I've done the Coolidge. It was okay. I don't like pretty fish and reefs. I'd like to go back to Croatia, but that's it really
 
That could make a good thread; might get a little contentious, but interesting. Since you brought up Australian diving, the major glorified dive destination not on my bucket list is the Great Barrier Reef! When I 1st got into scuba, it seemed the major big name destinations were the Bahamas (locally) and the Australian Great Barrier Reef.

Now, several years later, I'm finally putting the Bahamas in my sights for next year, Lord willing and providing; I've read you need to do a live-aboard to get to the better Bahamas diving, and that there's better elsewhere in the Caribbean. People talk about algae on reefs, for example. If not for a scheduling conflict I'd have tried for AquaCat this year; now I'm hoping for Blackbeard's next year.

If I understood correctly from other threads, the best of the GBR is likewise hit by live-aboard. And Australia is a long (& expensive) way from Kentucky! If I ever have the abundance of money and free time to undertake such a trek, there's Komodo, Bali, Palau, PNG and the Philippines to think about. So from a U.S. perspective (mine, anyway), the GBR's pull as a bucket list destination suffers the same drawback many others do; the competition has such a strong reputation!

For other U.S. divers (& Canadians, I suppose, since distance ought to be similar), I wonder how big a deal it is to you to hit the GBR at least once in your life? Does it move up the bucket list line because it's famous with the general public? Is there something specific there you want to see?

Richard.

Same feelings about Australia. Great diving but the cost to value ratio does not match for us living on East Coast USA. Some of the highly recognized destinations that I have chosen to remove from my bucket list are:

Australia: The cost of travel and diving make this one a bit impractical. If I was going to spend over 5K to travel and dive a place then I could do so many other places that are so much higher end than this one that Australia does not give a good cost to value ratio. If I was on the West Coast and there was a cheaper flight then things would be different.

Cayman Islands: The cost for diving the "Bloody Bay Wall" is pretty much the in the same range as a Red Sea trip or even a cheap Asia Pacific trip like Thailand. I would skip this for the better places available in the same cost.

Belize: The seasonal whale shark factor makes this a bit hard to ignore but travel lodging and diving here in the far well known sites still makes it a bit in the same category as Cayman Islands. Better diving can be done in the same $$$

Palau: Flight prices are freaking expensive!!! This place has gotten praise from a lot of folks so I am sure that it must be something but you can dive Philippines, Maldives and Komodo for less money than this one. The question then becomes after doing all these cheaper more accessible places, would it make sense to spend extra money for Palau? Would it really be that much better than all these? Perhaps more experiences divers who have done all these places could offer a cost vs value comparison.

Fiji: As an ethnographic film-maker I am interested in visiting this place for culture and since this is also a great diving destination, I will probably visit this place someday. Had it been purely for diving then I ask the same question. When Philippines, Maldives, Komodo etc can be done in less money then does Fiji deserve to be on a "bucket list?" Does it really beat all these places with significant enough of a margin to be worthy of the extra money? I don't know.

PNG: Diving this place is easily in the 7K USD range. I totally understand the remoteness factor associated to this place and to be honest, I am driven to this place for the same reason as Fiji. It gives a chance to study and film a native and indigenous culture that has evolved with relatively little contact to the outside world but for purely diving reasons, it would have to beat Raja Ampat by a huge margin to justify the price and inconvenience associated with it. I would have to do far more research into this location before I can say that it is in my REALISTIC bucket list.

Truuk and Bikini Atoll: I hate to take these off of my list but I live next to the Great Lakes and they can feed my lust for historic wrecks for many life times. Had the travel and diving costs not been so high then I would definitely have done these two but in terms of cost vs value Scapa Flow seems more do-able. This attitude of mine can change because I intend to do a wreck penetration course and then all these places that I am keeping off of my list may make their way back in. Till then Id like to limit my wreck diving interests to historic wrecks closer to home.
 
I'd say my experience with what I have seen of the GBR, PNG and Indonesia is that the reef systems are comparable. IMHO a lot of people go to the GBR to say they did it... tick it off the list. I think there are indeed cheaper options with diving that is comparable. I like pretty fish and pretty corals. The reef offers both but so did the locations we went to in PNG and Indonesia. I was impressed by the pretty fish in Florida but found the reefs and corals pretty humdrum compared to Indonesia, PNG and GBR

Blue Heron Bridge was on my bucket list. It was everything it was promised to be. The muck diving in Lembeh straight was comparable. Sydney has a muck dive site called Clifton Gardens that is also quite comparable but MUCH MUCH smaller. It doesn't have tide issues at all and is shallow so you can have very long dives there too. Lots of seahorses, frogfish, cuttlefish and pipefish.. hidden stuff. Not quite the variety of Lembeh and BHB but a pretty close.

Sydney doesn't have the hard corals but some nice soft corals and really unusual fish. We get some accidental tropicals and the sponge gardens are very colourful and full of life. I would say the Pygmy Pipehorse compares well to Pygmy Seahorse. Weedy Seadragons, Red Indian Fish, Eastern Bluedevils, velvetfish, and Cuttles are just some of the attractions here. We have sites that are a nudibranch lovers dream!

Melbourne has amazing Pier Diving with Tassled anglerfish (frogfish), Weedies, velvetfish, blue ring octopus, pajama squid nudibranches and pleurobranchus the size of dinner plates. I haven't even mentioned the wreck diving!

There are so many sites in Australia that don't get a look because everyone wants to follow the crowd to dive the GBR. A lot of the options are a whole lot cheaper believe me. My advice would be to do your research and ask the locals before you go to the expanse of booking flights.

It just seems too common for people to think it will cost too much. Yep it will unless you do your homework. Homework and patience may put the seemingly impossible into your possible. I guess my opinion is "Don't discount what is in your own back yard and assume that far away is so much better." I have been amazed at just how similar the critters are in the wide spread areas I have been fortunate enough to get to dive!
 
I'd say my experience with what I have seen of the GBR, PNG and Indonesia is that the reef systems are comparable. IMHO a lot of people go to the GBR to say they did it... tick it off the list. I think there are indeed cheaper options with diving that is comparable. I like pretty fish and pretty corals. The reef offers both but so did the locations we went to in PNG and Indonesia. I was impressed by the pretty fish in Florida but found the reefs and corals pretty humdrum compared to Indonesia, PNG and GBR

Blue Heron Bridge was on my bucket list. It was everything it was promised to be. The muck diving in Lembeh straight was comparable. Sydney has a muck dive site called Clifton Gardens that is also quite comparable but MUCH MUCH smaller. It doesn't have tide issues at all and is shallow so you can have very long dives there too. Lots of seahorses, frogfish, cuttlefish and pipefish.. hidden stuff. Not quite the variety of Lembeh and BHB but a pretty close.

Sydney doesn't have the hard corals but some nice soft corals and really unusual fish. We get some accidental tropicals and the sponge gardens are very colourful and full of life. I would say the Pygmy Pipehorse compares well to Pygmy Seahorse. Weedy Seadragons, Red Indian Fish, Eastern Bluedevils, velvetfish, and Cuttles are just some of the attractions here. We have sites that are a nudibranch lovers dream!

Melbourne has amazing Pier Diving with Tassled anglerfish (frogfish), Weedies, velvetfish, blue ring octopus, pajama squid nudibranches and pleurobranchus the size of dinner plates. I haven't even mentioned the wreck diving!

There are so many sites in Australia that don't get a look because everyone wants to follow the crowd to dive the GBR. A lot of the options are a whole lot cheaper believe me. My advice would be to do your research and ask the locals before you go to the expanse of booking flights.

It just seems too common for people to think it will cost too much. Yep it will unless you do your homework. Homework and patience may put the seemingly impossible into your possible. I guess my opinion is "Don't discount what is in your own back yard and assume that far away is so much better." I have been amazed at just how similar the critters are in the wide spread areas I have been fortunate enough to get to dive!

After this post PNG and Australia are out of my bucket list and Raja Ampat replaces them as the high budget trip for me. The more important thing is that Lembeh is out and Blue Heron Bridge replaces it as the muck photography destination. See you saved me sooo much money! But yes what you write makes sense. After reading a lot of reviews I think I will do Fiji instead of Palau as it is cheaper.
 
After this post PNG and Australia are out of my bucket list and Raja Ampat replaces them as the high budget trip for me. The more important thing is that Lembeh is out and Blue Heron Bridge replaces it as the muck photography destination. See you saved me sooo much money! But yes what you write makes sense. After reading a lot of reviews I think I will do Fiji instead of Palau as it is cheaper.

The reefs in truk are just as good as Fiji and you have the killer wrecks

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The reefs in truk are just as good as Fiji and you have the killer wrecks

Sent from my LG-H812 using Tapatalk

Id like to get tech-certified with TDI advanced wreck before I do Truuk etc.
 
The reefs in truk are just as good as Fiji and you have the killer wrecks

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The wrecks in Truk are their own mini-artificial reef structures, and with only 70 years of soft/hard coral growth on the more popular wrecks like the Shinkoku Maru or Fujikawa Maru, surprisingly they do compare nicely & almost rival the soft coral reefs I've seen in Fiji. . .

Coral Montage: The Wrecks of Truk Lagoon - ScubaBoard Gallery
Coral Montage 2: Truk Lagoon Wrecks - ScubaBoard Gallery

Truk Lagoon Diving|Underwater Photography Guide
http://www.uwphotographyguide.com/images/truk_lagoon_soft_coral.jpg
http://www.uwphotographyguide.com/images/chuuk_lagoon.jpg
 
Id like to get tech-certified with TDI advanced wreck before I do Truuk etc.

Yeah man more bottom time is better and some of the deeper wrecks are amazing. Go all out get a rebreather

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