Prioritizing Indonesia dive trip - help!

hey alliwini, your plan sounds great. i'm doing a very similar route starting early next week, and will try and keep posting on the experience.
are you travelling overland or flying between the sites in bali/nusa tenggara? if you overland it, you should consider pulau moyo near sumbawa besar. the bali-komodo liveonboards stop by here and it's supposed to be good. there doesn't seem to be much info on dive operators in sumbawa besar though.

dive-zone (www.divezone-lombok.com) seem to be the only operator covering belongas bay. their website notes that you need >100 dives in october-nov to dive the magnet, where you see the hammerheads. so it would be best to speak to them first about dive conditions around the time you're keen on visiting.

in terms of cutting destinations, i think manado/bunaken would be the most obvious candidate. it's going to be fairly pricey flying from nusa tenggara to north sulawesi (i think you need to change at makassar), and the boat takes a fairly long time as well. one option closer to makassar would be wakatobi, though i've heard it's pretty pricey

sent you a PM

With 60 dives and Sipidan experience you should be good for just about anything. You should be ready for Batu Bolong which is one of the best dive sites I've ever done. Book a flight to Flores and enjoy diving around Komodo. There is current, and it can be nuts, but think of it as a roller coaster combined with great coral, large pelagics, and anything else you might want to see. The diving was great. Wear a long suit though and be prepared to hug the coral but don't touch it. I didn't find the diving to be that hard, or keeping my buoyancy right that hard, but the drift diving and current did make it a lot more exciting and not for the novice diver.

I also did the Gilis and they're nothing special. I hadn't been diving in a while though and they were a good place for me to warm up. The problem is that if you've done a place like Sipidan then a bleached and dynamited dive spot is going to be relatively disappointing for you.

I tried to dive around Bali but I couldn't find a dive shop that made me comfortable. I made an exception for Sipidan (where the dive operators were very unimpressive but the diving was great) but normally I won't dive if a company can't make me comfortable or instill confidence in their ability and gear. If you really want to dive Bali then you probably want to time it right. The Sunfish in the south were peaking around June iirc. Menjangan might be ok but I can't imagine it holding a candle to Komodo and the dive operators I talked scared me away.

I didn't dive Sulawesi but I heard good things. I am saving that for another trip.

Overall I walked away from both Komodo and Sipidan thinking that you'd want to do those sites many times so you could experience them with different current conditions. Rather than do a plethora of dive sites, some mediocre, I'd probably recommend doing the good ones a few times each. I did Barracuda point twice for example and the two dives were very different.

Thanks to everyone who has responded so far! All extremely helpful!

I'm leaning on getting warmed up in Bali (probably just Tulamben and Nusa Lembongan, unless anyone wants to make a pitch for Menjangan) and then flying to Flores to do Komodo and maybe also Maumere. (Anyone have any comments about diving around Maumere?) Then, depending on timing, we might try to get ourselves to Flores and check out Belongas Bay, assuming the dive shop there finds us up for it. I'd still like to get to northern Sulawesi, if possible, although there's no doubt that the flight is going to add to our expenses.

Astrocase, I'm curious about your concerns about some of the Bali operators. I guess I have an idea, because I ended up with a very sketchy shop in Sipadan, but if you'd be willing to share more, please do! (Feel free to PM me if you prefer.)

Bali....leaky tanks, holey wetsuits, leaking BC's , old old old equipment and the assumption that as a customer, you know nothing... OH yeah, just what is a proper profile???? YOu pay NOW.

Before I get alot of flack for this one, this is not the norm, but more regular than it should be.

Edited by: TravellinAndi

TravellinAndi pretty much hit the nail on the head. I'd only add that the people I spoke to in Bali were very arrogant (or simply had no diving experience at better sites) and would talk to you like you're an idiot and should be thrilled to see a common lion fish on one of their dives. I politely walked away. I really couldn't tell if they were refusing to give me info on other dive sites, in the hopes that I'd dive with them, or simply hadn't dove anywhere else in Indonesia.

Komodo 7
Raja Ampat 7
Bunaken 3

Lembeh is a totally different experience than the others.

Hi,,
I have dived most of the locations you mention except South Lombok and Alor (the latter supposed to be outstanding).
The destinations I liked most in Indonesia were Komodo ( report here ) and Bangka area (N/Sulawesi : Bangka photo gallery)

Firstly I would cut Lombok and the Gilis and concentrate on the best diving. This is how I would envisage the trip in 6 weeks.

Rush to Labuan Bajo for 1 week diving in Komodo NP, better on live aboard because you can't access South Komodo site from landbased operations. I would pick Komodo dives (I've had a pretty bad experience with Reefseekers)
Continue to Kupang then Alor for 1 week of clear water diving.
Back to Bali for a one week safari : don't forget Candi Dasa area (Gili Mimpang and Gili Tepekong)
Fly to Manado for one week in Lembeh and 4 days in Bangka. you can drop Bunaken which will seem tame compared to corals you had in Komodo and Alor.
If you still have time you could slip either a few days in Ambon for muck diving or a few days on the northern tip of Sumatra in Pulau Weh.

About Maumere, I dived there last months, it's nice to see when you know the story and when you have dived many places in Indonesia, but I wouldn't recommend if you're tight on time. You can read my Maumere report on Scubaboard and look at my photogallery

I have dived Tulamben, Menjangan, and the Gili's. Of the three locations I was least impressed with the Gili's. I found a couple of the dive guides to be a bit on the reckless side there. I was quite pleased with the dive shops that I dove with in Tulamben and Menjangan. I based myself in Lovina to dive Menjangan, dove with Bali Spice Dive. One of the guide was able to find and retreive my watch when it got knocked of my wrist when climbing back onto the boat.

On caution about Tulamben. The rock-covered beach can be really tough on your feet and ankles. I wouls recommend a really good pair of booties if you go to Tualmben.

As for rental gear that is not in great shape, that is the reason that I bought my own gear and haul it with me wherever I go diving.