Dive Review of Siladen Resort and Spa in
Indonesia/North Sulawesi

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Siladen Resort and Spa: "Trip #2 to Siladen --- Great Food and Accommodations", Sep, 2023, by Michael J. Millet, CA, US ( Top Contributor 101 reports with 63 Helpful votes). Report 12629.
Photos Submitted with this Report Click on an image to see an enlarged version and captions
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	SILADEN RESORT AND SPA REVIEW After departing Gangga Island Resort , we headed over to Siladen Resort and Spa (SRS). This was my 2nd visit to this resort. The boat trip took about 1 1/2 hours. Upon arrival we were promptly checked in and shown to our cabanas, which are quite spacious with a large deck, lounge chairs, hammock and beach access. My room had large queen bed, plenty of storage space, bottled water and enough electrical outlets. The bathroom facilities are all outside with plenty of towels and various soaps. The lighting in the bathroom is a bit inadequate. The cabanas are a short walk to the bar, pool, restaurant and dive center. The bar is well-stocked with a Bintang beer and an assortment of wine and spirits. The alcohol prices are reasonable for Indonesia. The food at SRS is superb. Breakfast is served from about 6:45 AM and is primarily buffet with a made-to-order egg station. Lunch and dinner are also primarily buffet with a selections from a grill/stir fry station. The buffet offered very nice selection of beef, pork, chicken and seafood. The salads and desserts were exceptional. I enjoyed seafood at almost every lunch and dinner. On a few of the nights during my stay, the resort offered music by a group playing contemporary music and also a large group of adults and children from the nearby village singing local Siladen songs. Very nice. The dive operation is run very efficiently with our dive gear loaded on the boat before departure and unloaded and rinsed after the last dive of the day. The dive schedule consisted of a 2-tank trip departing at 8 AM and a 1-tank afternoon dive at 3 PM. If the tide is high enough, the dive boats are loaded from the nearby beach. During low tides, it is necessary to walk about 1/3 mile to the jetty to load or unload the dive boats. At times, a golf cart would run us to the jetty. At least half the time when going and coming from the jetty, there were 1-2 dive boats already tied up there. This required us to climb through or on top of these other boats to get to the jetty. A rather hazardous setup. The dive operation manager was advised of this situation but did not take any action. The diving occurred about Bunaken Island and some dive sites off of North Sulawesi. The dive crew was very good about checking the current at each site. There were a few instances when the dive site was changed due to strong currents. The various dive sites provided a nice variety of marine life and U/W topography from big walls to black sand diving. The large green sea turtles were the prime large creature attraction. Other photo ops included nudibranchs, dragonets, ribbon eels, various shrimp and crabs, scorpion and lionfish and the various anemonefish. Water entry is by back roll. The resort had 32% Nitrox. The dive crew was generally very helpful and friendly. I hired a private dive guide who was a very nice guy but his critter-finding skills were very disappointing. There were very few critters that I could not have found myself. In addition, there a couple of dives where he led us with the current away from the dive site. This required us to buck the current for several minutes to return to the dive site. The other divers started the dive by going against the current then drifting back to the dive site. This is what we should have done. After the second day of diving with this guide, I asked one of the dive shop managers for a change in dive guides. The “options” that she presented essentially left me with staying with the less than satisfactory dive guide or not have a dive guide. I reluctantly chose to stay with the dive guide. The resort has a very spacious camera room with nice lighting and plenty of outlets for charging. Outside the camera room are 2 large rinse tanks for camera rigs along with compressed air. There were times when other divers would leave their camera rigs to just soak in the tanks instead of rinsing and removing so that camera gear does not get damaged. On more than one occasion I had to remove another divers’ cameras in order rinse mine. There was one instance when I started to lift a large camera rig by what appeared to by a lanyard but realized it was the sync cord. The camera did not have a lanyard. I put the camera back into the tank and lifted it out by the tray handles. This could have resulted in damage to the strobes, the housing and/or the sync cord. I asked the dive shop manager if he would remind divers to remove their camera gear from the rinse tanks after rinsing. He told me that it was OK for divers to leave their camera in the tanks. I then replied that it makes it difficult for subsequent divers to rinse their cameras without having to handle another divers' camera gear. I told him that I had just had to remove and replace other divers’ cameras in order to rinse my cameras. The dive shop manager then left the camera room and looked in the rinse tanks. He then returned and told me that the rinse tanks are empty, implying that perhaps I was not being honest that the rinse tanks were previously full of cameras. I raised my voice and asked him if he was suggesting I was being dishonest. He then raised his voice and said that I will not talk to him in such manner and that I am agitated and I should take some deep breaths. I replied that the dive shop’s policy of allowing cameras to soak in the rinse tanks was BS. He then advanced towards me and again repeated that he will not be disrespected by me. He then left the camera room. His behavior was rude, condescending and disrespectful. So then other than this regrettable encounter and the poor response to my request to change dive guides, my stay at SRS was quite nice. The diving was pretty good (not great); the accommodations are very, very nice; and the food superb.
Reporter and Travel
Dive Experience	Over 1000 dives
Where else diving	All over the Caribbean; Galapagos, Socorro, Fiji, Solomons, GBR, Vanuatu, PNG, Philippines, Indonesia, Palau, Yap, Kosrae, Truk Lagoon
Closest Airport	Manado	Getting There	SFO-SIN-MDO
Dive Conditions
Weather	sunny, windy	Seas	calm, currents
Water Temp	78-84°F / 26-29°C	Wetsuit Thickness	3
Water Visibility	30-100 Ft/ 9-30 M
Dive Policy
Dive own profile	yes
Enforced diving restrictions	No Deco; 60-70 minute dives
Liveaboard?	no	Nitrox Available?	yes
What I Saw
Sharks	1 or 2	Mantas	None
Dolphins	None	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		Boat Facilities
Overall rating for UWP's		Shore Facilities
UW Photo Comments	The dive boats had 2 camera rinse tanks that often were not filled with enough water. The dive crew did a good job handling the camera gear.

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Dive Review of Siladen Resort and Spa in Indonesia/North Sulawesi

Siladen Resort and Spa: "Trip #2 to Siladen --- Great Food and Accommodations", Sep, 2023,

Photos Submitted with this Report

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 Siladen Resort and Spa in
Indonesia/North Sulawesi