mrrworld
Contributor
Heres my trip report from our (my wife and I) one-week trip (March 1-8) on the Pearl of Papua to Raj Ampat. This is my first trip to R4 so my excitement level was very high. Ive been living in Jakarta for the past three years, leaving in July, so this was my last chance to see this place. Id say the diving was very good, I was really amazed by the coral reefs (the colors, the size of the reefs, and how intact they are), but probably had too high expectations on the fish life or maybe we just didnt have great luck. Saw mantas on 5 of the 22 dives, which was awesome, but I was surprised by the lack of other big fish or things I had never seen before (Ive done slightly more than 500 dives). We saw some black tip reef sharks, barracudas on a few dives, an occasional turtle, but no big schools or anything really new or out of the ordinary. We did see woebbegone sharks on every dive I believe or at least so many that you werent even looking that closely for them or at them by the end of the trip. Dont get me wrong, it was fun, interesting, and well worth it, but I think my expectations were higher to see things I had never seen before.
We did central and northern R4, did not make it to the south as this was only a 7-day trip. Vis was average or what I think is expected for R4, not great but not bad. (I will take mantas over vis any day so no complaints on the vis.) Water was warm, 28 degrees. There were no currents we couldnt handle although some current on almost every dive. On one we dropped in the wrong spot and had a very tough time getting to the ridge of the reef to descend but once we did, we were ok. We did a few sites twice, which normally I would not be happy about but the second time was always much better than the first visit, reminding me that the ocean is not a zoo. Ill talk more about the boat later but here is a summary of the dives based on my sporadic entries to my log book:
1. Sorong Black Rock (Batu Hitam), Day 1: This was our checkout dive but was so disorganized, not sure what to say. We dropped-in in bad vis and a strong current, next thing I know, our group of 13 was down to 4 over some reef and no one else around. We hung around for awhile but since the vis was terrible, and there was nothing to see, and no one else seemed to be near us, we surfaced.
2. Mioskon (Dampier Strait): Highlight was the first of many woebbegone sharks and 15-20 parrot fish in a group. Celebrated doing my 500th dive here.
3. Blue Magic (Dampier Strait): This was a nice dive, with a little bit of everything BH parrotfish, 5-6 pygmy seahorses on one fan coral, a big yellow fin barracuda, and schools of yellow stripped snapper.
4. Friwinbonda (Dampier Strait): Kind of a wall dive/slopes. Lots of ledges and caves but nothing really memorable.
5. Sounek Bunde (Waisai): Night dive. Lots of crabs. Highlight was watching a waspfish walking along the sand. But too many divers under a jetty for my taste.
6. Mantap Sandy (Arborek): This was a manta cleaning station that lived up to its hype. Sometimes six mantas just sitting there getting cleaned. Three juveniles came in to swim around the adults but did not wait to be cleaned. At one point, a BH parrot fish was in the back ground. Saw a woebbegone shark as we were departing for our safety stop.
7. Mantap Sandy (Arborek): Same dive, same incredible mantas. I think the ones on this dive were bigger than the previous dive.
8. Mayhem (Yanggefo): Saw another small group of BH parrotfish, nice crocodile fish, and Schultz pipefish.
9. Eagle Rock or Point (Kawe Islands): Nice coral, saw lots of sweetlips but right at end of dive, saw 4 mantas chasing each other while doing loops. Really amazing. Than a smaller manta went right by us during our safety stop. Love when that happens!
10. White Arrow (Aljui Bay): Nice wall dive. Kind of dark since we did it late in the afternoon. Caves and ledges were cool, saw a nice featherstar dancing out in the open.
11. Reef Bayangan (Penemu Islands): Lots of life here on what looked like a long narrow hill so we went down one side and returned on the other side but easy to be on the ridge looking both ways. Saw 4-6 black tip reef sharks on this one, sharks finally making their entrance. Also lots of trevally.
12. Melissas Garden (Penemu Islands): A real coral garden, very beautiful.
13. Kerunemo Adik (Penemu Islands): Very beautiful semi wall dive with real dramatic views. At one point, looked like a forest of this whitish soft coral trees.
14. Chicken Reef (Dampier Straits): Good dive but CD had us very excited in his briefing so we didnt see as much big stuff as we expected. Did see 2 black tips right at the end of the dive.
15. Cape Kri (Dampier Straits): Nothing to report.
16. Mikes Point (Dampier Straits): Another nice dive with several caves and ledges to explore.
17. Miosokon (Dampier Straits): 2nd time around for this site but this dive was really awesome. Octopus (turned bleach white except for its head, which stayed reddish brown), blue-spotted ray, big manta near the surface above us, lots of schools of fish, some really big groupers. Probably the best dive of the trip.
18. Sounek Jetty (Dampier Straits): Night dive. great dive. Couple of crocodile fish, snake eel, too many crabs to remember. Saw a tiny octopus with really long tentacles in comparison to its head size that went down the tiniest of holes in the sand once the lights shone on it for too long.
19. Sardine Run (Dampier Straits): Some black tips.
20. Blue Magic (Dampier Straits): 2nd time around and last dive ending with a whopping bang. Pretty strong current resulting in an unbelievable dive with lots of mantas, black tip sharks, one big grey reef shark cruising back and forth along the reef, Spanish mackerel, small schools of two types of barracudas (yellow tail fin and black tail fin), sea snake, big school of trevally, black crocodile fish. At one point I was following a manta, looked down to see a woebbegone shark swimming below me, and then the big grey reef shark coming from the opposite direction of the manta. One of those dives you surface with your last breath of air and think this is exactly why you go diving.
The Pearl of Papua is a mid to low range boat on the cost scale, I think, so it was not luxury but was fine. It holds 14 divers. We had one of the two rooms above deck. Small but ok. I did not see what the rooms below deck were like but I think I would rather be above deck. Our room was ensuite, had hot water (there were also a few hot water showers at the back of the boat). The crew cleaned up the room every day and would do laundry for a price. Area to gear up was pretty big and there didnt seem to be any problem with gearing up before the dives despite having 13 divers on the boat. They had fresh water to rinse or soak your stuff after a dive. We had several serious photographers on the boat (I am not one of them) and I did not hear them complain about the set up for their camera equipment but I wasnt really paying attention.
They took the divers out in two small chase boats, the slower one could fit 4-6 divers, the faster one took 8-10 divers. We all dove together at the same time, which was sometimes chaotic. Id have preferred that they broke us up but after a few dives, we all seemed to be going our own pace so it wasnt too bad. Some dives it seemed we were all bunched up looking at the same things or in the same area.
The crew and dive guides were ok. There was a scheduling problem with the CD so the first two days were kind of disorganized including the dives but order was restored when the CD, who was very good in all respects, arrived at the end of the second day. But it did get the trip off to a shaky start and didnt build a lot of confidence. The two local dive guides I thought were average at best. Nice guys, helpful especially with your gear and carrying stuff, but underwater they were kind of clueless. They did know the reefs but didnt seem to know how to pace the group and safety didnt seem to be their strong suit. Its ok as I can handle myself underwater but when currents switched, you didnt always know to turn back, keep going. There were some other dicey situations at times underwater but it all worked out. I cant remember the guides ever pointing out anything to me other than pygmy seahorses, which unfortunately for them, I am not a pygmy seahorse fanatic. Like I said, nice guys, tried hard, but were lacking underwater.
The CDs dive briefings were very good. Each dive was 1 hour long but with each dive, they seemed to allow us to stay longer and longer and many people were coming up after 70 minutes. Night dives were no more than 90 minutes, which was nice. 70 minutes seemed to be what most people did.
Other random thoughts were two people rented equipment and seemed to have lots of problems with the rental equipment. There is probably two sides to the story on the state of the equipment but it is something to consider if you are renting equipment. On the flip side, the entire crew was very helpful in trying to fix things if you had a problem. My mouthpiece broke and they fixed it quickly for me; my wife had a new regulator that a dive shop in Jakarta mangled in setting up all the hoses but the crew noticed something was wrong while setting up her gear and fixed the problem. I appreciated how flexible the CD was. He wasnt a stickler on bottom time, he agreed to our plea to do 5 dives one day (we usually did 4 including one night dive), agreed to a request to take a break on a beach somewhere (where I promptly stuck my knee flush into a stinging soft coral or anemone while swimming around!), and a few other things. When we went far north, the morning was supposed to be for a hike to take some pictures instead of diving. But they accommodated a few divers who wanted to go diving instead of hiking even though the diving was not that good in that area. In any event, the boat was open to suggestions.
Food was typical rice, fish/shrimp and chicken fare, mainly Asian with an occasional western dish. It wasnt gourmet but it was pretty good. They always had some green vegetables and a salad, which was nice. I am no vegetarian but I think if you were, youd be fine on this combined with the fruit they always served. They had a basket of snacks you could grab from at any time and unlimited drinks. They did run out of orange juice and on the last day, ran out of bottled water. The one problem was the dining area barely fit 13 people so it was a little tight. I have no idea what they would do if there were 14 people on the boat since the dining room did not seat 14 without a very tight squeeze.
There was a nice deck area to hang out but like the dining room, really wasnt big enough for 14 people. Fortunately for us, part of the group liked to watch videos between dives, which they did in the dining room so there was no fighting for deck chairs. Nothing like internet connection on the boat.
We had a very good group from several countries. I think we used every imaginable airline to get to Sorong. Only the merpati flight was a problem as the airline is bankrupt and had canceled its flights from Bali to Makassar without telling the travelers. Last dive of the trip ended around 11:30 am so having a late morning or afternoon departure flight the next day would leave enough time for a surface internal. for the record, the serious photographer group from Malaysia liked Komodo Islands over Raj Ampat. Id say the Maldives were better but all agreed it was a good diving trip.
We did central and northern R4, did not make it to the south as this was only a 7-day trip. Vis was average or what I think is expected for R4, not great but not bad. (I will take mantas over vis any day so no complaints on the vis.) Water was warm, 28 degrees. There were no currents we couldnt handle although some current on almost every dive. On one we dropped in the wrong spot and had a very tough time getting to the ridge of the reef to descend but once we did, we were ok. We did a few sites twice, which normally I would not be happy about but the second time was always much better than the first visit, reminding me that the ocean is not a zoo. Ill talk more about the boat later but here is a summary of the dives based on my sporadic entries to my log book:
1. Sorong Black Rock (Batu Hitam), Day 1: This was our checkout dive but was so disorganized, not sure what to say. We dropped-in in bad vis and a strong current, next thing I know, our group of 13 was down to 4 over some reef and no one else around. We hung around for awhile but since the vis was terrible, and there was nothing to see, and no one else seemed to be near us, we surfaced.
2. Mioskon (Dampier Strait): Highlight was the first of many woebbegone sharks and 15-20 parrot fish in a group. Celebrated doing my 500th dive here.
3. Blue Magic (Dampier Strait): This was a nice dive, with a little bit of everything BH parrotfish, 5-6 pygmy seahorses on one fan coral, a big yellow fin barracuda, and schools of yellow stripped snapper.
4. Friwinbonda (Dampier Strait): Kind of a wall dive/slopes. Lots of ledges and caves but nothing really memorable.
5. Sounek Bunde (Waisai): Night dive. Lots of crabs. Highlight was watching a waspfish walking along the sand. But too many divers under a jetty for my taste.
6. Mantap Sandy (Arborek): This was a manta cleaning station that lived up to its hype. Sometimes six mantas just sitting there getting cleaned. Three juveniles came in to swim around the adults but did not wait to be cleaned. At one point, a BH parrot fish was in the back ground. Saw a woebbegone shark as we were departing for our safety stop.
7. Mantap Sandy (Arborek): Same dive, same incredible mantas. I think the ones on this dive were bigger than the previous dive.
8. Mayhem (Yanggefo): Saw another small group of BH parrotfish, nice crocodile fish, and Schultz pipefish.
9. Eagle Rock or Point (Kawe Islands): Nice coral, saw lots of sweetlips but right at end of dive, saw 4 mantas chasing each other while doing loops. Really amazing. Than a smaller manta went right by us during our safety stop. Love when that happens!
10. White Arrow (Aljui Bay): Nice wall dive. Kind of dark since we did it late in the afternoon. Caves and ledges were cool, saw a nice featherstar dancing out in the open.
11. Reef Bayangan (Penemu Islands): Lots of life here on what looked like a long narrow hill so we went down one side and returned on the other side but easy to be on the ridge looking both ways. Saw 4-6 black tip reef sharks on this one, sharks finally making their entrance. Also lots of trevally.
12. Melissas Garden (Penemu Islands): A real coral garden, very beautiful.
13. Kerunemo Adik (Penemu Islands): Very beautiful semi wall dive with real dramatic views. At one point, looked like a forest of this whitish soft coral trees.
14. Chicken Reef (Dampier Straits): Good dive but CD had us very excited in his briefing so we didnt see as much big stuff as we expected. Did see 2 black tips right at the end of the dive.
15. Cape Kri (Dampier Straits): Nothing to report.
16. Mikes Point (Dampier Straits): Another nice dive with several caves and ledges to explore.
17. Miosokon (Dampier Straits): 2nd time around for this site but this dive was really awesome. Octopus (turned bleach white except for its head, which stayed reddish brown), blue-spotted ray, big manta near the surface above us, lots of schools of fish, some really big groupers. Probably the best dive of the trip.
18. Sounek Jetty (Dampier Straits): Night dive. great dive. Couple of crocodile fish, snake eel, too many crabs to remember. Saw a tiny octopus with really long tentacles in comparison to its head size that went down the tiniest of holes in the sand once the lights shone on it for too long.
19. Sardine Run (Dampier Straits): Some black tips.
20. Blue Magic (Dampier Straits): 2nd time around and last dive ending with a whopping bang. Pretty strong current resulting in an unbelievable dive with lots of mantas, black tip sharks, one big grey reef shark cruising back and forth along the reef, Spanish mackerel, small schools of two types of barracudas (yellow tail fin and black tail fin), sea snake, big school of trevally, black crocodile fish. At one point I was following a manta, looked down to see a woebbegone shark swimming below me, and then the big grey reef shark coming from the opposite direction of the manta. One of those dives you surface with your last breath of air and think this is exactly why you go diving.
The Pearl of Papua is a mid to low range boat on the cost scale, I think, so it was not luxury but was fine. It holds 14 divers. We had one of the two rooms above deck. Small but ok. I did not see what the rooms below deck were like but I think I would rather be above deck. Our room was ensuite, had hot water (there were also a few hot water showers at the back of the boat). The crew cleaned up the room every day and would do laundry for a price. Area to gear up was pretty big and there didnt seem to be any problem with gearing up before the dives despite having 13 divers on the boat. They had fresh water to rinse or soak your stuff after a dive. We had several serious photographers on the boat (I am not one of them) and I did not hear them complain about the set up for their camera equipment but I wasnt really paying attention.
They took the divers out in two small chase boats, the slower one could fit 4-6 divers, the faster one took 8-10 divers. We all dove together at the same time, which was sometimes chaotic. Id have preferred that they broke us up but after a few dives, we all seemed to be going our own pace so it wasnt too bad. Some dives it seemed we were all bunched up looking at the same things or in the same area.
The crew and dive guides were ok. There was a scheduling problem with the CD so the first two days were kind of disorganized including the dives but order was restored when the CD, who was very good in all respects, arrived at the end of the second day. But it did get the trip off to a shaky start and didnt build a lot of confidence. The two local dive guides I thought were average at best. Nice guys, helpful especially with your gear and carrying stuff, but underwater they were kind of clueless. They did know the reefs but didnt seem to know how to pace the group and safety didnt seem to be their strong suit. Its ok as I can handle myself underwater but when currents switched, you didnt always know to turn back, keep going. There were some other dicey situations at times underwater but it all worked out. I cant remember the guides ever pointing out anything to me other than pygmy seahorses, which unfortunately for them, I am not a pygmy seahorse fanatic. Like I said, nice guys, tried hard, but were lacking underwater.
The CDs dive briefings were very good. Each dive was 1 hour long but with each dive, they seemed to allow us to stay longer and longer and many people were coming up after 70 minutes. Night dives were no more than 90 minutes, which was nice. 70 minutes seemed to be what most people did.
Other random thoughts were two people rented equipment and seemed to have lots of problems with the rental equipment. There is probably two sides to the story on the state of the equipment but it is something to consider if you are renting equipment. On the flip side, the entire crew was very helpful in trying to fix things if you had a problem. My mouthpiece broke and they fixed it quickly for me; my wife had a new regulator that a dive shop in Jakarta mangled in setting up all the hoses but the crew noticed something was wrong while setting up her gear and fixed the problem. I appreciated how flexible the CD was. He wasnt a stickler on bottom time, he agreed to our plea to do 5 dives one day (we usually did 4 including one night dive), agreed to a request to take a break on a beach somewhere (where I promptly stuck my knee flush into a stinging soft coral or anemone while swimming around!), and a few other things. When we went far north, the morning was supposed to be for a hike to take some pictures instead of diving. But they accommodated a few divers who wanted to go diving instead of hiking even though the diving was not that good in that area. In any event, the boat was open to suggestions.
Food was typical rice, fish/shrimp and chicken fare, mainly Asian with an occasional western dish. It wasnt gourmet but it was pretty good. They always had some green vegetables and a salad, which was nice. I am no vegetarian but I think if you were, youd be fine on this combined with the fruit they always served. They had a basket of snacks you could grab from at any time and unlimited drinks. They did run out of orange juice and on the last day, ran out of bottled water. The one problem was the dining area barely fit 13 people so it was a little tight. I have no idea what they would do if there were 14 people on the boat since the dining room did not seat 14 without a very tight squeeze.
There was a nice deck area to hang out but like the dining room, really wasnt big enough for 14 people. Fortunately for us, part of the group liked to watch videos between dives, which they did in the dining room so there was no fighting for deck chairs. Nothing like internet connection on the boat.
We had a very good group from several countries. I think we used every imaginable airline to get to Sorong. Only the merpati flight was a problem as the airline is bankrupt and had canceled its flights from Bali to Makassar without telling the travelers. Last dive of the trip ended around 11:30 am so having a late morning or afternoon departure flight the next day would leave enough time for a surface internal. for the record, the serious photographer group from Malaysia liked Komodo Islands over Raj Ampat. Id say the Maldives were better but all agreed it was a good diving trip.
