Komodo - landbased or liveaboard ?

[redstrom]

Wife and I will be in Bali for 11-12 days in Sept and hope to include at least 3 full days of diving in Komodo Marine Park. Although liveabord would be my first choice (not necessarily my wife's...), my sense is it will be hard to find one for that short amount of time that will also fit our travel schedule (which is pretty much locked in).

What landbased options are there ?

Do they operate on most of the dive sites ?

We may opt to rent dive gear, any sense for what the standard of equipment is ?

Are there any decent moderately priced dive resorts/accomodations ?

Lots of questions...

Any tips/suggestions/partial answers would be greatly appreciated.

 

[danz]

I was in Komodo last summer and it is was really good. I booked a liveaboard for 4 days with the Mona Lisa (I booked with Dive Komodo who offers also landbased diving) and I can really recommend it. The advantage is that you can pick in whenever you want because they bring you with a speedboat to the ship. I liked it very much because you can do 4 dives a day. If you dive landbased you will spend a lot of time travelling to the divespots and you can do only 2 dives a day.

 

[OnTheSpot]

Agree with Danz about KLM Moana you can get lots more great dives off a liveaboard rather than daytrips.

 

[redstrom]

Thanks guys I will definitely look into this !

 

[PeCaRi]

Bali in September = Mola season.

the other thing is, I haven't been to Komodo, but I dived with this company: MV Tarata - Grand Komodo Indonesia Liveaboard

Prices reasonable and adequate. As much as I know, a lot of experience, also in that region.

 

[Valwood1]

What landbased options are there ?
Do they operate on most of the dive sites ?
We may opt to rent dive gear, any sense for what the standard of equipment is ?
Are there any decent moderately priced dive resorts/accomodations ?

Landbased means staying in Labuanbajo; it's an easy flight from Denpasar. There are several good shops there that make day trips. The trips usually are limited to the center and northern parts of Komodo Pass, and even then it can take two hours to get to the dive site. Two tank dives.

I know that Reefseekers has gear for rent, and assume that other ops do as well.

Accommodations in Labuanbajo are spotty. The Eco-Lodge is a bit out of town, and you're pretty well stuck there unless you catch a cab into town. The dive ops can recommend hotels.

 

[Wayan]

The day operators rarely head off down to the southern sites.

Hotels there are some nice hotels in Labuan Bajo now. recently stayed at the bay View garden and these were very nice

Bayview Garden Hotel Labuan Bajo - Bay View Cottages in Labuan Bajo - Luxury Villas in Labuan Bajo Flores - Labuhan Bajo Sea View Villas All rooms had a great view of the harbour.

Most operators will hire gear Dive Komodo certainly does and regularly services it. They could also help out of a LOB as well.

Going to komodo for 3 days of diving is going to require you to use up half of your time a day travel each way. (sometimes the flights can be in unreliable in regards to scheduling)

Do not leave booking to last minute as they are nearly always full.