Diving Malpelo and Coiba aboard the Yemaya (Panama)

[mvk777]

Malpelo and Coiba are located literally in the US backyard but for some strange reason they are completely overlooked by American divers. Lack of information might be that reason. Four years ago, when I moved to California, I also did know nothing about those islands. After I’ve done here some of the usual places, like Hawaii, Channel Islands, Cortez Sea, Socorro and Cocos, my next destination should naturally be the Galapagos. And so it would be, but, absolutely accidentally, when surfing the net I bumped into coibadiveexpeditions.com website and I saw small bird-view picture of Malpelo. It looked so cool - I decided to put off Galapagos and give Malpelo a try. Since then I did Malpelo two more times, so much for Galapagos.

Malpelo now is more or less covered by internet information, but still mostly in Europe. Unbelievable as it is, even in Russia(!) we have web-domain malpelo.ru – check it out! But Coiba is still terra incognita in diving media. On my first trip to Malpelo, Yemaya stopped at Coiba for one day and the number of fish (and quality of fish – hey, I’m spearfisher!) which I saw there was absolutely astonishing. Yemaya turned out to be a perfect dive-boat and, since they do exclusive week-long Coiba trips, no wonder, I went with them to Coiba on my next trip. The island is sure special, and Hannibal bank nearby is a world top dive spot.

This small comment was not supposed to be a detailed dive report. I just wanted to do some justice to those great places. I was really surprised that this forum has so little information about them. Also, there is no need to list all the possible encounters which you might get over there. First of all, Malpelo has absolutely everything what Eastern Pacific is all about. But, secondly, there is no guarantee for each specific species. Thanks God this is still far-away place and those are truly wild animals, not a freaking zoo. On one trip we saw a lot of whale sharks, on the other there was none. Hammerheads were always abundant though. These pictures might give some better idea of what those places are about:
https://picasaweb.google.com/109551523806240479497/MalpeloDiving
https://picasaweb.google.com/109551523806240479497/MalpeloColombia
https://picasaweb.google.com/109551523806240479497/CoibaPanama
https://picasaweb.google.com/109551523806240479497/MalpeloIslandColombia
Apparently, as an amateur photographer I could capture only a small fraction of what I saw. Take it into account. But this is also not a professionally commercial set-up. Count this too.

Now about the boat and the dive operator. According to my four-trip experience, they are absolutely reliable, as much as Pacific it allows, of course. To put more credential to my humble opinion, in this region I did trips with Don Jose, Horizon, Solmar V, Nautilus Explorer, and Aggressor. So far, Yemaya is the best. Period.

This is NOT only MY opinion, folks.
Mikhail
PS. My nick is also my gmail address and I will gladly answer any specific question. Please.

 

[Augustus]

malpelo can be incredible. the main problem is some trips have great viz others the water is green. But when conditions are good.......

 

[LazyDiver2012]

I just wanted to do some justice to those great places. I was really surprised that this forum has so little information about them. Also, there is no need to list all the possible encounters which you might get over there. First of all, Malpelo has absolutely everything what Eastern Pacific is all about. But, secondly, there is no guarantee for each specific species. Thanks God this is still far-away place and those are truly wild animals, not a freaking zoo. On one trip we saw a lot of whale sharks, on the other there was none. Hammerheads were always abundant though.

Now about the boat and the dive operator. According to my four-trip experience, they are absolutely reliable, as much as Pacific it allows, of course. To put more credential to my humble opinion, in this region I did trips with Don Jose, Horizon, Solmar V, Nautilus Explorer, and Aggressor. So far, Yemaya is the best. Period.

This is NOT only MY opinion, folks.
Mikhail

Mvk777, I have just been to Malpelo on the Yemaya. I agree with you on your comments above. Luckily, conditions were great on our trip so we got to visit the zoo. We went to La Gringa for the big schools of hammerheads, silkies and galapagos, Three Musketeers for the school (more like a large underwater cloud) of jacks and resident snappers, and the Altar for the huge ball of barracudas. I'm raving too much about our encounters, but I can't help it. It was a spectacular trip.

The crew and the food on the Yemaya - you're right, absolutely the best.

 

[Shasta_man]

<<This is NOT only MY opinion, folks.>> HA HA HA HA HA.....

 

[arthur 72]

Just back from a Malpelo trip on Yemaya, was amazing, we dived in a baitball with hundreds of silky sharks, tunas, dolphins and even some galapagos sharks showed up. During drifts from Nevera to the south we encountered tunas and silkies and far out a huge groups of hammerheads, actually the largest group I have ever seen, in our diving group we guessed about 500 animals. Twice we met whale sharks, once in Nevera and once in Monster reef, was a spectacular trip.




Diving Malpelo

 

[chuckf]

I agree, absolutely top notch diving in Malpelo!

We´ve been on a trip in May on the Yemaha and had the most wonderful time. It´s quite a ride out there but it´s definitely worth it. I haven´t seen so much life underwater for a long time. An abundance of fish on every dive, hammerhead- and silky sharks in the hundreds, the Galapagossharks were very curious and we could get quite close for some great photos and video. We even had a whaleshark and a baitball.
Viz was almost always ok, sometimes good, but never brilliant. But that´s how it is, when you are in the mix of so many different currents and thermoclines.

The boat has lot´s of room on the upperdeck, a spacious dive deck and a great crew and cook, competent captain, skiffdriver and diveguides. We loved it.

 

[arthur 72]

Hi Malpelo friends,

Here our travel report from the August 2012 trip with Yemaya, DIVING TRAVEL REPORTS | MALPELO DIVING | COLOMBIA DIVING | COIBA DIVING just amazing!

 

[Nonna]

Hello, we are looking at doing a trip late March next year on the Yemaya to Coiba. Great reports about Coiba and about the boat operation itself but I have concerns about the diving. Even though we are all advanced divers and have been to Galapagos and Socorro, not sure I want to spend a week diving in freezing water with very high current. I have read everything I could and it appears that on many trips, every single dive has a lot of current. And on a few reports that I read, the water temperature at depth was in the 60's! And the viz was minimal as well. I get cold easily so it doesn't sound great. I am interested in any input you might have... thanks in advance!