Bunaken Divesites
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The Bunaken Island National Marine Park, located in Manado Bay, North Sulawesi, is made up of five islands; Bunaken, Siladen, Manado Tua, Montehage and Nain. It's one of Indonesia's most popular dive destinations and offers world class wall diving on amazingly diverse reef walls in clear blue water.
Manado city is easily reached with a 3.5 hour flight from Singapore, the islands are a further 30-60 minutes boat ride away. Divers can either stay in a Manado resort or on one of several dive resorts on the islands. Many divers choose to combine a trip to Bunaken with a trip to the nearby Lembeh Strait.
Most of the diving around Bunaken is on coral and seafan covered walls. Underwater photographers love the clear waters and colourful reefs which are great for wide angle seascapes. The marine life is prolific, from tiny nudibranchs to turtles, eagle rays and reef sharks. The area is a marine biologists dream with one of the highest biodiversity levels anywhere in the world. New species of fish are still being discovered. Sperm whales are sometimes seen migrating through the park and Orca's have been reported by divers.
Something else often spotted by divers is litter, there is too much of it in the waters around Bunaken. Garbage disposal in Manado city basically involves chucking rubbish into the sea. It's a disappointing distraction from the otherwise beautiful reefs and something that the marine park authorities are working to address.
There are several dive sites around Bunaken Island, mostly drop offs just off shore:
Bigger fish to look for includes eagle rays and black tip reef sharks. Green turtles are often seen. All the usual reef fish can be found here as well as lots of macro critters like leaffish and ornate ghost pipefish. If you'd like a challenge, try to count all the species of butterflyfish here, there are 33 different species!
Fukui Point off south west Bunaken Island was named after a Japanese Instructor who first dived here. It's more of a slope than a vertical wall and makes a pleasant change after all the other Bunaken wall dives. Maximum depth is around 30m and currents are mild. Highlights of this dive are the resident Napoleon wrasse plus schools of batfish, trevally and snapper that come to use the cleaning station services.
Mandolin, on the south west tip of Bunaken Island is exposed to the flowing water through the channel between Bunaken Island and Manado Tua so currents can be strong. The wall here is also quite deep, down to around 45 metres. The site is made up of exquisite soft corals, large gorgonian seafans and forests of whip corals. Large Napoleon wrasse are common here and reef sharks are occasionally seen. Smaller species include pygmy seahorse in pink gorgonian seafans and porcelain crabs in bubble coral.
Mikes Point, located in northeast Bunaken Island, was named after underwater photographer Mike Severns. East of Mike's Point is Sachiko's Point. These two similar wall dives are great spots for bigger marine life including schools of eagle rays, white tip and black tip reef sharks, barracuda, trevally and tuna. Schools of reef fish cover the hard and soft coral covered walls. Large gorgonians and barrel sponges are home to an astonishing amount of marine life. Currents can be strong here.
