Dive Review of Grand Komodo/Raja Ampat Dive Lodge in
Indonesia/Raja Ampat

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Grand Komodo/Raja Ampat Dive Lodge: "Diving the Dampier Strait", Oct, 2014, by Dan Purnell, WA, US ( Reviewer 6 reports with 4 Helpful votes). Report 8035.
No photos available at this time
Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Accommodations		Food
Service and Attitude		Environmental Sensitivity
Dive Operation		Shore Diving	N/A
Snorkeling	N/A
Overall Rating
Value for $$
Beginners
Advanced
Comments	Raja Ampat still has some of the finest diving in the world. My journey began in Portland Oregon, to Jakarta and then to Sorong. I highly recommend taking the direct flight from Jakarta to Sorong. It is a fast and efficient way to get to Sorong. From Sorong, you take a 2 hour boat trip to the Raja Ampat Dive Lodge, situated right on the Dampier Strait. I was excited to return to the current swept Dampier Strait. I had last visited this area 10 years ago when Raja Ampat was just being opened to recreational divers. During that trip, there were only a couple dive resorts and liveaboards. As we plied the waters, we saw no other divers or boats during our 12 day adventure. There has been a lot of development during the past 10 years, but the diving is still incredible! The Raja Ampat Dive Lodge is a great place to stay and enjoy great diving. Most of the rooms are right on the water, the food is good and everybody is very friendly and helpful. Everything is kept very clean. I liked the chattering birds from the surrounding jungle. The dive area has fresh water tanks for cameras, and it is conveniently located near the dock and dive boats. Most of your gear stays on the dive boats during the week. Nice and easy! There are 2 morning dives, 1 afternoon dive and a night dive offered each day. The night dives are all on the House Reef. The Dampier Strait diving is outstanding! The hard and soft coral gardens were amazing and generally pristine. Some of the table corals and sea fans were two times my body length wide. There were fields of acropora / staghorn corals, smothered with waves of anthias, stretching as far as you could see. The healthy coral reefs and walls pulse with life. When the currents are running, the reefs go wild. Schools of fusiliers are so dense, that they can impair your vision. Hunting schools of jacks would cause mayhem, scattering thousands of fish. With the recent protections, we saw black tip and wobbegong sharks on almost all our dives. Commonly sighted were sweet lips, napoleon wrasses, turtles, groupers, barracudas, trevallies, angel and butterfly fish, pigmy sea horses, pipe fish, bat fish, glass fish, scorpion, unicorn, bumphead parrot, leaf fish and so many, many more. We were also fortunate to see a few mantas, toad fish and Spanish dancers. I had sensory overload on a number of Dampier Strait sites. It is hard to take in the blizzard of activity. This is a very fish place! If you are comfortable with current, and you have good buoyancy skills, Raja Ampat is a great diving destination. Unlike 10 years ago, the reefs are now getting a lot of diving pressure. During my brief stay, I saw a lot of coral being damaged by inexperienced divers and photographers. We divers, are going to have to do a much better job, avoiding contact with the reefs, if Raja Ampat is going to remain an amazing place to dive 10 years from now.
Websites	Grand Komodo
Reporter and Travel
Dive Experience	501-1000 dives
Where else diving	PNG, Raja Ampat, Banda Sea, Bali, Halmahera, Yap, Palau, Bonaire, Honduras, Little Cayman, Red Sea, Washington, Oregon, Flower Gardens - Texas, Fiji, Galapagos
Closest Airport	Sorong	Getting There	Jakarta to Sorong
Dive Conditions
Weather	sunny, dry	Seas	calm, currents
Water Temp	82-84°F / 28-29°C	Wetsuit Thickness	3
Water Visibility	60-100 Ft/ 18-30 M
Dive Policy
Dive own profile	yes
Enforced diving restrictions
Liveaboard?	no	Nitrox Available?	no
What I Saw
Sharks	Lots	Mantas	1 or 2
Dolphins	Schools	Whale Sharks	None
Turtles	> 2	Whales	None
Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):
Corals		Tropical Fish
Small Critters		Large Fish
Large Pelagics
Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Subject Matter	N/A	Boat Facilities	N/A
Overall rating for UWP's	N/A	Shore Facilities	N/A
UW Photo Comments	[None]

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Dive Review of Grand Komodo/Raja Ampat Dive Lodge in Indonesia/Raja Ampat

Grand Komodo/Raja Ampat Dive Lodge: "Diving the Dampier Strait", Oct, 2014,

Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Overall Rating

Reporter and Travel

Dive Conditions

Dive Policy

What I Saw

Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):

Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Dive Review of Grand Komodo/Raja Ampat Dive Lodge in
Indonesia/Raja Ampat