We returned November 3 from from our third trip to Indonesia. We started with five days at a resort on Bunaken, and then did eleven nights aboard a boat covering Lembeh, north almost to Sangihe, back down through Bunaken, and back to Lembeh. This part covers our resort portion ... more later.
Seabreeze Resort, Bunaken: 13 November - 19 November 2009
HISTORY - Seabreeze has been around for a good amount of time on Bunaken, though under previous ownership. The operation was poorly managed, and the facilities were badly neglected, falling into a state of serious disrepair. The current owners (Terry & Diana, resident owner/managers, and an Indonesian partner from Manado) have their work cut out for them, to say the least, but have made more than a dent in it. They've built a new restaurant/office on the waterfront, are in the process of upgrading the generators to augment/extend power to the resort, and have other plans in the works. My observation is that the managers probably work 16 hour days on a regular basis.
LODGING - Rooms are traditional Indonesian style bungalows ... most on stilts, lots of wood and woven panels, mandi bath with hand shower and western toilet. Ventilation is fair, as there is no cross ventilation. The resort has no air conditioning and no hot water, and I am unsure if there are any plans to change that. Beds are singles or double with mosquito nets. Power is on from roughly 6 AM to 10 PM, and the lighting in the rooms is marginal. Maybe that will improve with new generators. If this is the level of accommodation you're seeking, I can say it's a good value, the staff is pleasant and responsive, and we were treated very well.
FOOD - Meals were all more or less Indonesian, though not exotic. Rice, noodles, chicken, beef, veggies, tofu, etc. done in a variety of ways and served buffet style. You will probably not see it written up in a culinary magazine, but the food was good and there was always enough. Alcohol and soft drinks were extra. The restaurant setting on the water is a really pleasant place to eat and just hang out. Also has a little library and TV in the corner, though I didn't see it get much use, if at all. A group of locals from the village came over one night with guitars (their homemade string bass stays in the corner of the restaurant, and is worth a picture ... maybe later) and started singing. They're all part of a local choir, and the singing eventually led to dancing. You have to love the Indonesians for their smiles and pleasant dispositions.
DIVING OPERATION - The dive boats handle six divers and two guides fairly comfortably. They're made to handle more, but it gets pretty cozy when they do. The guides we dove with were all Indonesian with good English, friendly and personable, and all excellent critter finders. We were a group of three, and generally dove with one guide. There were some occasions where our group was more than three. Terry was involved in laying out our daily dive itinerary, and really made an effort to gear our dives toward our preferences, as far as what we would like to see.
On the downside, if your feelings regarding marine life are that you don't harass it, this might not be the operation for you. This was our third trip to Indonesia, and on previous trips the guides were a lot gentler with the critters they found, and I'm being very restrained in my language here. In my mind, when a turtle which had been sleeping on a ledge is roused and tries for several minutes to literally burrow into the wall to escape a throng of gawking divers, that is an animal under stress. Critters of all sizes got the same treatment, the smaller ones with more bodily contact. I don't know whether this is accepted practice by all dive operations in the area or not.
DIVE SITES - Bunaken is a combination of walls and slopes with varying degrees of flora and fauna. Many if not most dive sites top out right at low tide level, meaning rich stony coral gardens in bright sunlight and no necessity for a safety stop where you're just hanging out watching the clock. Plenty of nudis, frogfish, crabs, the usual reef fish. Fair amount of turtles, a few reef sharks thrown in, some napoleons under one meter. Some sites had virtual clouds of smaller reef fish, while others were less animated. No sightings of big pelagics or rays. We had possibly our all-time best night dive (of the wall variety) on Timur II, practically in front of the resort. Tons of life!
Our Indonesian experience is not extensive ... Wakatobi, southern Raja Ampat (Misool &Triton Bay), and this trip. If I had to rank them, as far as the coral, gorgonians, etc., essentially everything except the fish and critters, Wakatobi wins for the profusion and variety of life. In terms of fish life, I'd put Bunaken and southern Raja Ampat together for numbers of fish, southern Raja Ampat ahead for variety. We've heard of others diving here experiencing incidences of trash in the water. We didn't have any of that when we were there, and the visibility was good to excellent on all dives. As a whole we thought it was high quality diving, and would recommend it as a quality diving experience. YMMV.
MISCELLANEOUS - The mosquitoes on Bunaken chewed us up. Incidence of malaria in the area is not high, so we were not taking any preventative. No problems so far, a month later.
Most of the guests are European. I know it's common in parts of Europe to find no soap in a hotel room, but for us crazy Americans, finding no soap and then having to buy a bar of it, added to your resort tab, is downright amusing.
Another picky American trait ... we are not smokers, and we were glad to return home to a relatively smoke-free environment. Not sermonizing here ... just saying given the choice, we'd rather not be around it, and the number of locals smoking was right up there with France and Spain.
And the bottom line is ... we had a great trip. Everything ran smoothly, the resort and the diving were good, and if you have the chance to go, you'll enjoy yourselves.
Addendum: After thinking about it, I would also give Wakatobi the edge over Bunaken and "the portion of Raja Ampat that we visited" as far as the amount of macro life. But then as far as macro goes, I guess you would also have to be using the same dive guide all three places to make an apples to apples comparison.
Seabreeze Resort, Bunaken: 13 November - 19 November 2009
HISTORY - Seabreeze has been around for a good amount of time on Bunaken, though under previous ownership. The operation was poorly managed, and the facilities were badly neglected, falling into a state of serious disrepair. The current owners (Terry & Diana, resident owner/managers, and an Indonesian partner from Manado) have their work cut out for them, to say the least, but have made more than a dent in it. They've built a new restaurant/office on the waterfront, are in the process of upgrading the generators to augment/extend power to the resort, and have other plans in the works. My observation is that the managers probably work 16 hour days on a regular basis.
LODGING - Rooms are traditional Indonesian style bungalows ... most on stilts, lots of wood and woven panels, mandi bath with hand shower and western toilet. Ventilation is fair, as there is no cross ventilation. The resort has no air conditioning and no hot water, and I am unsure if there are any plans to change that. Beds are singles or double with mosquito nets. Power is on from roughly 6 AM to 10 PM, and the lighting in the rooms is marginal. Maybe that will improve with new generators. If this is the level of accommodation you're seeking, I can say it's a good value, the staff is pleasant and responsive, and we were treated very well.
FOOD - Meals were all more or less Indonesian, though not exotic. Rice, noodles, chicken, beef, veggies, tofu, etc. done in a variety of ways and served buffet style. You will probably not see it written up in a culinary magazine, but the food was good and there was always enough. Alcohol and soft drinks were extra. The restaurant setting on the water is a really pleasant place to eat and just hang out. Also has a little library and TV in the corner, though I didn't see it get much use, if at all. A group of locals from the village came over one night with guitars (their homemade string bass stays in the corner of the restaurant, and is worth a picture ... maybe later) and started singing. They're all part of a local choir, and the singing eventually led to dancing. You have to love the Indonesians for their smiles and pleasant dispositions.
DIVING OPERATION - The dive boats handle six divers and two guides fairly comfortably. They're made to handle more, but it gets pretty cozy when they do. The guides we dove with were all Indonesian with good English, friendly and personable, and all excellent critter finders. We were a group of three, and generally dove with one guide. There were some occasions where our group was more than three. Terry was involved in laying out our daily dive itinerary, and really made an effort to gear our dives toward our preferences, as far as what we would like to see.
On the downside, if your feelings regarding marine life are that you don't harass it, this might not be the operation for you. This was our third trip to Indonesia, and on previous trips the guides were a lot gentler with the critters they found, and I'm being very restrained in my language here. In my mind, when a turtle which had been sleeping on a ledge is roused and tries for several minutes to literally burrow into the wall to escape a throng of gawking divers, that is an animal under stress. Critters of all sizes got the same treatment, the smaller ones with more bodily contact. I don't know whether this is accepted practice by all dive operations in the area or not.
DIVE SITES - Bunaken is a combination of walls and slopes with varying degrees of flora and fauna. Many if not most dive sites top out right at low tide level, meaning rich stony coral gardens in bright sunlight and no necessity for a safety stop where you're just hanging out watching the clock. Plenty of nudis, frogfish, crabs, the usual reef fish. Fair amount of turtles, a few reef sharks thrown in, some napoleons under one meter. Some sites had virtual clouds of smaller reef fish, while others were less animated. No sightings of big pelagics or rays. We had possibly our all-time best night dive (of the wall variety) on Timur II, practically in front of the resort. Tons of life!
Our Indonesian experience is not extensive ... Wakatobi, southern Raja Ampat (Misool &Triton Bay), and this trip. If I had to rank them, as far as the coral, gorgonians, etc., essentially everything except the fish and critters, Wakatobi wins for the profusion and variety of life. In terms of fish life, I'd put Bunaken and southern Raja Ampat together for numbers of fish, southern Raja Ampat ahead for variety. We've heard of others diving here experiencing incidences of trash in the water. We didn't have any of that when we were there, and the visibility was good to excellent on all dives. As a whole we thought it was high quality diving, and would recommend it as a quality diving experience. YMMV.
MISCELLANEOUS - The mosquitoes on Bunaken chewed us up. Incidence of malaria in the area is not high, so we were not taking any preventative. No problems so far, a month later.
Most of the guests are European. I know it's common in parts of Europe to find no soap in a hotel room, but for us crazy Americans, finding no soap and then having to buy a bar of it, added to your resort tab, is downright amusing.
Another picky American trait ... we are not smokers, and we were glad to return home to a relatively smoke-free environment. Not sermonizing here ... just saying given the choice, we'd rather not be around it, and the number of locals smoking was right up there with France and Spain.
And the bottom line is ... we had a great trip. Everything ran smoothly, the resort and the diving were good, and if you have the chance to go, you'll enjoy yourselves.
Addendum: After thinking about it, I would also give Wakatobi the edge over Bunaken and "the portion of Raja Ampat that we visited" as far as the amount of macro life. But then as far as macro goes, I guess you would also have to be using the same dive guide all three places to make an apples to apples comparison.
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