Dive Review of Teman in
Indonesia/Central Raja Ampat and Misool

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Teman: "Amazing 10 night Raja Ampat Cruise", Nov, 2024, by Nicholas Zylstra, CA, US ( Reviewer 4 reports with 1 Helpful vote). Report 13278.
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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	Incredible 10 night cruise through Central Raja Ampat and Misool. Highly recommend the Teman with its current cruise director Rayane, guides, and crew. For the rest of the review, note that my wife and I are both pretty particular and detail oriented people, and we loved the full experience. So anything critical was a minor issue for us, but sharing to help give a complete picture. Our dive guide Rendy was amazing, favorite I've ever had out of the 25-30 I've dove with. The other guides Moses and Lucky were also excellent in terms of competency, knowledge, safety, and fun from what I saw, but Rendy was did a bunch of little extra things that set him apart. He was just as excited as we were to see things underwater, had really great eyes for spotting critters big and small, and prioritized figuring out what we liked then delivering it each dive. He got my wife comfortable using a reef hook for the first time and generally comfortable diving in stronger current. Always there with an assist for photos and videos, including swimming out into lighter current a few times while we were hooked to get some incredible video of us. And a great singer and guitar player to top if off! Apparently singing is a big part of Indonesian culture and Rendy often led the crew in their evening sessions, loved hearing their songs at sunset. I wish Rendy was guiding all my trips! The cruise director Rayane was also incredible. A generally lovely human to have around. Very fun to chat with, always positive and sensible (even through a few challenging situations due to one of the other guest's health), and quickly addressed every issue brought his way. His dad is one of the two boat owners and his actions showed he is heavily invested in making everything as perfect as possible for the guests. He was also very organized and kept things running smoothly. Would also love to have Rayane on all of my trips! Food was excellent every meal, lots general Asian dishes with an Indonesian dish or two every meal - including a detailed explanation for the special ones! I'd say my wife and I, especially her, have some high food standards and we were very very happy. Probably somewhat uncommon but awesome for us detail on our cruise... We had 11 guests (of 12 max), 3 of which were snorkeling only. So with 3 dive guides and the breakdown of guest groups, that meant my wife and I had a guide to ourselves every dive except 1, for the standard price. It was amazing. She even had the guide to herself the first two days while I sat out with an infected mosquito bite on my ankle (from a land based resort prior to liveaboard). Note that it seemed like three guides is standard for the boat and I was told that Indonesia requires max 4 guests per guide. I'm not sure what the usual mix of guests is, so I suspect we got a bit lucky with this experience, but it seems more likely than a standard dive cruise since there's a mix of other activities on top diving, which may attract more non diving guests than most liveaboards. Diving itself was also amazing. Our first time in Raja Ampat and hopefully not the last. So. Much. Life. Healthiest reefs we've seen. The sites in Misool are particularly mind blowing. There's a reservation system in the southern part run by Misool Eco Resort which limits site access to one boat at a time, and only a few visits a day for each site. So we never saw another boats' divers underwater, and rarely our own boats' divers. Snorkeling at almost every dive site was also offered, and it sounded like the snorkeling was also amazing. For reference, 25 dives were offered over the 10 night trip. And I think 7 other activities like hikes and special snorkeling locations. Activities were all great - a few short hikes to beautiful vistas, jellyfish lake snorkel, shark beach snorkel, and a few lagoon explorations/snorkels. They all made for a nice mix with the diving. Boat was overall good, seemed well maintained and nicely designed. Common eating and lounging area was particularly great - spacious, well laid out, and very comfortable. If they add another dedicated fan pointed at the dining table (as Rayane said he plans to soon), it'll be even better. Roof deck lounging at sunset was beautiful. Our cabin Sulawesi had a few issues that Rayane either fixed immediately or plans to address in the next few months. The cabin is next to the engine room, so during the longer overnight motors to and from Misool it was noisier, the ac struggled to keep up, there was a slight fuel smell with the windows closed (unlike other nights). Note I brought my own CO / smoke detector and it read zero CO in the room at these times, so don't think anything dangerous was coming in. Either way, Rayane plans to improve this by further isolating the shared cabin / engine room wall with spray foam. As someone who used to work in construction, I suspect the foam will fully resolve what were minor complaints for us. I had no issues sleeping well as is, just noticed it when I got up to use the bathroom at night. On the other hand, the view out the huge window and having direct outdoor back deck access was a big plus. Other cabins all seemed a bit bigger, and probably quieter due location, but didn't have the big window / direct outdoor access. I also noted that my side of the mattress had my butt sagging into the wooden frame below. Rayane said he'd get a new one before next cruise. So some tradeoffs between Sulawesi cabin and the others. Until they do the additional isolation, I'd personally go for not Sulawesi. Once they do that isolation, Sulawesi will definitely be the best cabin. Seas were super calm the whole trip, glassy many days, so no comments on boat stability. Had a journey with a perceived bit of fuel smell in the compressed diving gas that I think was a result of antibiotics affecting my sense of smell. I thought the gas (nitrox 32%) had a bit of fuel smell and taste on day 3 once I finally started diving. I cut my first dive shorter and shallower since it was very noticeable clearing my mask a couple minutes in. Discussing after, one of the dive guides agreed it smelled after smelling my tank's gas, which happened to have been sitting for 3 days and was the first nitrox fill of the trip. They thought I got a one off bad fill from the start of the trip, so they swapped tanks and changed the compressor filters just in case. I still thought it smelled and tasted weird after though. So Rayane, who often dove with us, helped survey the guides and some guests of the air and nitrox fills. The survey included a guest with over 3000 dives, and no one else thought there was an abnormal smell. A few hours later it occurred to me that I was on antibiotics for my ankle and discovered they can affect your sense of smell, which seemed like the best explanation for the situation. Rayane had kept digging into things until we came up with an explanation though. I did the rest of the dives without any noted issues, even though the smell never went away for me (I was on antibiotics through the second to last dive day). Another guest also said they thought the gas smelled on the last day though, so not 100% sure it was the antibiotics. Discussing more at the end of the trip, Rayane said they've got a whole new (and larger) air compressor and nitrox membrane system on order to be installed in a few months because the current one is getting old and needing more frequent maintenance. They're also planning some additional engine room spray foam isolation on the side nearest the dive deck and compressors, for next general maintenance in April. So not sure if it was just the antibiotics, or something else, but seems like if there is anything going on, it should be resolved by April at the latest. That all said, it didn't cause any issues for other guests or guides as far as I'm aware, so the most likely explanation seems to be the antibiotics. Curious if anyone else has experienced something similar with antibiotics. Another note, got an ear infection last night on the boat. And the other ear three weeks after. First time while diving. Two other guests and our guide also got ear infections at the end of the trip. My wife, who wore a hood, did not. I was even using ear drying solution after the last dive each day, next time I'll be doing every dive. First infection quickly resolved with drops for me though. Second just popped up today, but expecting similar quick resolution. Overall, Rayane the cruise director, Rendy our dive guide, the food, a great group of guests, and the amazing underwater life made the trip for us. Also despite missing the first two days of diving, they were still amazing thanks to everything else the cruise had going for it. And just can't say enough about Rayane and Rendy, I would very happily do any liveaboard where they're involved. Great trip, feel so fortunate to be able to do things like this.
Websites	Teman
Reporter and Travel
Dive Experience	101-250 dives
Where else diving	Raja Ampat, Sea of Cortez, Monterey, San Diego, Greek Islands, Similan Islands, Roatan, Cozumel, Belize, Aruba, Curacao, El Hierro Spain, Cabo Pulmo, Homestead Crater Utah
Closest Airport	SOQ	Getting There	SFO - SIN - CGK - SOQ, TPE instead of SIN on way home. If you can break it up with a night somewhere along the way, would recommend. Way out we had a 10 hour layover in SIN and saw the city a bit. Way back stayed in TPE for a few days to tour around.
Dive Conditions
Weather	sunny, windy, rainy, cloudy, dry	Seas	calm, currents, no currents
Water Temp	84-88°F / 29-31°C	Wetsuit Thickness	3
Water Visibility	30-80 Ft/ 9-24 M
Dive Policy
Dive own profile	no
Enforced diving restrictions	Stay near guide, safety stop at 50 bar
Liveaboard?	yes	Nitrox Available?	yes
What I Saw
Sharks	Lots	Mantas	Squadrons
Dolphins	Schools	Whale Sharks	None
Turtles	> 2	Whales	1 or 2
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	Small area on main deck for storage and charging. Only one person had a big rig in our group, so worked well. But if more than 4 people had big rigs, it'd be challenging.

Subscriber's Comments

By report author: Nicholas Zylstra in CA, US at Jan 19, 2025 21:02 EST

Update after messaging with the cruise director last week - they have a week planned this February 2025 to better seal off the engine room and install a new nitrox membrane and compressors. So sounds like all the issues around gas and smells I noted would be resolved at that point.

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Dive Review of Teman in Indonesia/Central Raja Ampat and Misool

Teman: "Amazing 10 night Raja Ampat Cruise", Nov, 2024,

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):

Subscriber's Comments

Dive Review of Teman in
Indonesia/Central Raja Ampat and Misool