Wakatobi Macro Life and Dive Site Recommendations

[Cali_diver]

Yes we did every night dive... Saron shrimp and pygmy squid etc. Walls/reefs are never my favorite night dives. I will always prefer a good muck/critter night dive. I don't mean to be negative it is just that there are better places to dive in Indonesia. When we went to Wakatobi it was on a liveaboard and we had just gotten done diving Alor which is WAY better than Wakatobi so it was just kind of a let down. I think it is a great place for someone who has never been to Indonesia... honeymooners etc. or someone who wants the fancy resort feel. Good luck!

 

[rmorgan]

A couple of photographers, Pam and Wayne Osborn, have published several e-books with gorgeous images of Wakatobi divesites and, with one devoted just to the house reef. they are free to download, and, did I mention, gorgeous? Talk about a labor of love! You can find them at this link.

As to night dives, our Wakatobi experience was a week at the resort, and a week on their liveaboard. The liveaboard ranged through the park, and then west to Butan, where there is some decent muck. We only did one night dive at the resort, which was fine--not a wall, but mixed reefs and sand. (A number of the dive sites we visited were not walls, but were either massive areas of coral, or mixed corals and sand). On the boat, we did night dives every evening, and they were uniformly excellent.

We are returning because we want to do more on the house reef, which includes a good wall, a long, sloping seagrass bed, and reef-and-sand patches. (Ms. Osborne does all of her photography with a snorkel, and her house-reef book is terrific.)