krokodiver
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This June a buddy and I went diving around the island of Rao with Magic Bay Rao Morotai. Since the area is little dived and since there is even less information to be found on the net, I thought I'd share my experience with you lot.
We flew in to Morotai via Manado with a short stop in Ternate. Due to the domestic flight schedule between Manado and Morotai not playing nicely with the international flights we had to spend one night in Manado before moving on. We had the same scheduling problem on our way out and opted to spend a few days diving in Lembeh before heading back to Europe.
Shortly after touch down on the Morotai runway we were picked up by the Magic Bay operation and an hour and a bit later by means of car and boat we arrived at the beautiful batu kopi beach (coffee rock beach). The big coral rock, that has named the 2 km long beach, gives off a scent of coffee every now and then.
(The coffee rock smells like coffee...sometimes)
There, a spacious newly constructed double bungalow just next to the beach became our home for the next week. The bungalow had a dividing wall in the middle (with a door) and was easily big enough to host 2 or 3 people in each section. A simple ceiling fan was enough to keep us cool and the absence of A/C didn't bother us much. We had neither access to the internet nor any kind of coverage on our phones for the week we stayed there. That is for sure an odd and exotic experience in this day and age. There were plenty of power outlets for charging batteries and whatnots though.
All meals were brought to our bungalow and served right there on the big terrace. I am not sure what I liked best; watching the dolphins splash around in the bay while having a pancake breakfast or sipping a cold Bintang from the comfort of a cozy hammock after a full day of diving. But why choose when you can have both?!
(mmm...banana pancakes!)
The diving was all done from Magic Bays dive boat. The boat picked us up at the beach right in front of our bungalow. We mostly did 2 morning dives and 1 in the afternoon and only got to do one night dive during our stay. We did the night dive just a few hundred meters out from the beach in front of the bungalow. The dive offered a gentle sand slope with lots of cephalods, weird fish in larval stage, a rather ginormous sting ray and a scary member from the Cubozoa class (box jellyfish of some kind so you better do your night diving covered up not to get stung) .
(A Tropical bottletail squid)
Since the area is not much dived we almost exclusively engaged in exploration diving. Despite the fact that exploring a new area can be a bit hit and miss, we had almost a perfect streak of great dives. The water surrounding Rao was a comfy 30 degrees during our stay. Good visibility, calm seas and no problem finding plenty of worth while dive spots with next to no current. During the winter months big waves come rolling in from the pacific and batters Rao which makes diving less than ideal. Accordingly to the Magic Bay web-site they recommend diving Rao between May and October to avoid the wavy season.
The reefs surrounding Rao seems to be in very good condition. Not only did we see black-tip and white-tip sharks on a daily basis, but also Napoleons, bump-head parrotfishes, big groupers and of course plenty of the usual suspects you expect to see around coral reefs in the indo-pacific region. For those interested in macro photography, Rao offers more of a Romblonesk experience than a Lembish if you know what I mean. White sand and leafy greens. While we didn't see any butterfly slugs we did see the bat-winged variety and plenty of Shaun-the-sheep relatives. Talking about macro creatures, on our first dive we had a chance encounter with a hairy octopus! Hundreds of dives in Lembeh without ever seeing one and boom! there it is on our first dive in Rao. I would say that Rao is more about corals reefs and other stuff than muck and macro though. If you are in it for the muck you would be better off going to Lembeh. For an overview of fish and some other creatures you are likely to encounter while diving Rao, you can have a look at my Rao 2018 collection on flickr.
(A Twostripe goby)
The north-west side of Rao offers some quite unusual underwater scenery consisting of canyons, ravines and swim-though rock formations. Unfortunately we got to do way too few dives there and I really hope to be able to get back there for further explorations next dive season. My dive buddy even took a break from filming tiny creatures using his macro rig and whipped out his action cam to get a wide angle view of the weird underwater landscape surrounding the north-west part of Rao. You can watch his video here: diving-north-west-rao.
If you are into birding there are both Common Paradise Kingfishers and Horn-bills chirping around the coffee beach. If you are into crabbing there are coconut crabs just a short walk into the dense jungle...at night. Which means you will have to do some snaking, spider-webbing as well as general creepy crawling to get to the crabs. But Hey, Coconut crabs are cool and worth it!
In conclusion, I am super happy with my stay at Rao. Tasty food, great service despite the remote location, relaxing surroundings, a beautiful beach and nice comfy diving. If all goes well I do hope to return to Rao sometime during the next dive season.
Happy diving!
We flew in to Morotai via Manado with a short stop in Ternate. Due to the domestic flight schedule between Manado and Morotai not playing nicely with the international flights we had to spend one night in Manado before moving on. We had the same scheduling problem on our way out and opted to spend a few days diving in Lembeh before heading back to Europe.
Shortly after touch down on the Morotai runway we were picked up by the Magic Bay operation and an hour and a bit later by means of car and boat we arrived at the beautiful batu kopi beach (coffee rock beach). The big coral rock, that has named the 2 km long beach, gives off a scent of coffee every now and then.
(The coffee rock smells like coffee...sometimes)
There, a spacious newly constructed double bungalow just next to the beach became our home for the next week. The bungalow had a dividing wall in the middle (with a door) and was easily big enough to host 2 or 3 people in each section. A simple ceiling fan was enough to keep us cool and the absence of A/C didn't bother us much. We had neither access to the internet nor any kind of coverage on our phones for the week we stayed there. That is for sure an odd and exotic experience in this day and age. There were plenty of power outlets for charging batteries and whatnots though.
All meals were brought to our bungalow and served right there on the big terrace. I am not sure what I liked best; watching the dolphins splash around in the bay while having a pancake breakfast or sipping a cold Bintang from the comfort of a cozy hammock after a full day of diving. But why choose when you can have both?!
(mmm...banana pancakes!)
The diving was all done from Magic Bays dive boat. The boat picked us up at the beach right in front of our bungalow. We mostly did 2 morning dives and 1 in the afternoon and only got to do one night dive during our stay. We did the night dive just a few hundred meters out from the beach in front of the bungalow. The dive offered a gentle sand slope with lots of cephalods, weird fish in larval stage, a rather ginormous sting ray and a scary member from the Cubozoa class (box jellyfish of some kind so you better do your night diving covered up not to get stung) .
(A Tropical bottletail squid)
Since the area is not much dived we almost exclusively engaged in exploration diving. Despite the fact that exploring a new area can be a bit hit and miss, we had almost a perfect streak of great dives. The water surrounding Rao was a comfy 30 degrees during our stay. Good visibility, calm seas and no problem finding plenty of worth while dive spots with next to no current. During the winter months big waves come rolling in from the pacific and batters Rao which makes diving less than ideal. Accordingly to the Magic Bay web-site they recommend diving Rao between May and October to avoid the wavy season.
The reefs surrounding Rao seems to be in very good condition. Not only did we see black-tip and white-tip sharks on a daily basis, but also Napoleons, bump-head parrotfishes, big groupers and of course plenty of the usual suspects you expect to see around coral reefs in the indo-pacific region. For those interested in macro photography, Rao offers more of a Romblonesk experience than a Lembish if you know what I mean. White sand and leafy greens. While we didn't see any butterfly slugs we did see the bat-winged variety and plenty of Shaun-the-sheep relatives. Talking about macro creatures, on our first dive we had a chance encounter with a hairy octopus! Hundreds of dives in Lembeh without ever seeing one and boom! there it is on our first dive in Rao. I would say that Rao is more about corals reefs and other stuff than muck and macro though. If you are in it for the muck you would be better off going to Lembeh. For an overview of fish and some other creatures you are likely to encounter while diving Rao, you can have a look at my Rao 2018 collection on flickr.
(A Twostripe goby)
The north-west side of Rao offers some quite unusual underwater scenery consisting of canyons, ravines and swim-though rock formations. Unfortunately we got to do way too few dives there and I really hope to be able to get back there for further explorations next dive season. My dive buddy even took a break from filming tiny creatures using his macro rig and whipped out his action cam to get a wide angle view of the weird underwater landscape surrounding the north-west part of Rao. You can watch his video here: diving-north-west-rao.
If you are into birding there are both Common Paradise Kingfishers and Horn-bills chirping around the coffee beach. If you are into crabbing there are coconut crabs just a short walk into the dense jungle...at night. Which means you will have to do some snaking, spider-webbing as well as general creepy crawling to get to the crabs. But Hey, Coconut crabs are cool and worth it!
In conclusion, I am super happy with my stay at Rao. Tasty food, great service despite the remote location, relaxing surroundings, a beautiful beach and nice comfy diving. If all goes well I do hope to return to Rao sometime during the next dive season.
Happy diving!
