I went to Bali with the sole aim of diving in its crystal clear waters and seeing the amazing underwater creators of Indonesia. I ain't professional divers with uncountable stars or master of open water realm. I dive for real fun but I need to cooperate with some people like many of you. On the other hand, I know well enough that diving is not a joke and you should go for trusted dive centers. I normally do research about the dive centers before I go to a place for that. But this time I was luckier than other times because a Dutch friend of mine, who have spent many years as a dive master at Gulf of Thailand, recommended me a dive center named Bali International Diving Professionals. I contacted them by email beforehand. I wanted to see not only their offers but also the options because my major aim was to dive for manta rays and mola molas. I must say that they were quite fast with the communication. I have my answer in the next day and it included both Manta Point and Crystal Bay which is known for mola mola encounters. There was also another bonus track: USS Liberty wreck! I am going to write on my experiences about those dive points locate at Tulamben and Nusa Penida. However, I would like to talk about the dive school now.
First the prices! Finally after exchange of some email for the arrangements, I decided to have 3 dives at Tulamben where the shipwreck is and 2 dives around Nusa Penida which is the island on southeast of Bali. They first gave me the price of 103 USD and 100 USD respectively. These prices excludes the equipment rent which is 20 USD/day but includes transfer for/to your hotel if it is located at Sanur, Kuta, Nusa Dua, Jimbaran areas. I was not that lucky to find a decent hotel at that region for a good price and unfortunately had to stay at Hotel Ecosfera in Echo beach, Canggu. That was not only a bad accommodation experience but also almost an hour away from the dive school where we have to pass by before the dives in very early in the morning. And on top of it I had to pay extra money. Before I got to the island, I am not gonna lie, I was a bit suspicious about this charge. But after you get to the place and understand the scales of the distances in Bali. I actually understand why they were asking extra. The distances are huge in Bali. Another good example would be the way to Tulamben dive point. It takes two and a half hour to get there from the dive center at Sanur. You can really sleep in the van before the dives and actually I think you should! The only good think about those trips is that the transfer, lunch, which was extremely good both at Tulamben and on the boat, and drinking water are all included in the price. Coming back to the price, after a bit of iteration to convince the lady I contacted for a lower price, I finally ended up 275 USD for 5 dives including the equipment and hotel transfer. Well it was not that much of a bargain to be frank but it was worth to have good dives. There was only one thing annoying about the monetary part that they have never warn me about the bank charges they reflect on the payment although I have explicitly said I will be paying with the credit card. They might have skipped this detail but finally I had to pay ~4.5% for the payment by AMEX. The fee is a little bit lower for MasterCard and VISA, like 3%. So I recommend you to be aware of it.
For the technical part of the dives, they were quite ok. The ratio of diver to dive master is less than 4 which is pretty good. They group people according to the experiences so that you don't surface unnecessarily early. For the dives with large groups, like the ones I had in Nusa Penida, they had a couple of extra dives to check around. So overall they helped a lot to spot the creatures around like lobsters or scorpion fishes in the cracks or disguised. The only thing disappointed me for the dives, and I want to share with you guys, was end of one dive I had in Tulamben. I have not been diving for a while, and naturally I was consuming air badly. Thus I depleted my air quite fast for the first day. In the second dive, we were diving 3 people: me, dive master and another customer. As my bottle was at 50 bars, the other guy was a bit above 100. In this situation, the dive master took me 5 meters for 3 minutes of safety stop. And signed me to follow the bottom then surface and swim to the beach. So this was, honestly, not nice. I am not very familiar to the dive centers way of doing the business but I have mostly dived with university societies where no such thing can happen especially when you are diving in a completely now point. Other than that everything was cool with those guys. They were extremely cool and kind. The briefs before the dives were satisfactory. The equipment they offered were pretty new. So they can be used with no worries.
Overall, I recommend you to dive with those guy but I also recommend check out other dive school beforehand just to be sure that you don't have a price lower than 60 USD per dive including everything. Frankly speaking, this seemed to be a bit extreme after diving for 30 USD at Kata Beach Phuket.
First the prices! Finally after exchange of some email for the arrangements, I decided to have 3 dives at Tulamben where the shipwreck is and 2 dives around Nusa Penida which is the island on southeast of Bali. They first gave me the price of 103 USD and 100 USD respectively. These prices excludes the equipment rent which is 20 USD/day but includes transfer for/to your hotel if it is located at Sanur, Kuta, Nusa Dua, Jimbaran areas. I was not that lucky to find a decent hotel at that region for a good price and unfortunately had to stay at Hotel Ecosfera in Echo beach, Canggu. That was not only a bad accommodation experience but also almost an hour away from the dive school where we have to pass by before the dives in very early in the morning. And on top of it I had to pay extra money. Before I got to the island, I am not gonna lie, I was a bit suspicious about this charge. But after you get to the place and understand the scales of the distances in Bali. I actually understand why they were asking extra. The distances are huge in Bali. Another good example would be the way to Tulamben dive point. It takes two and a half hour to get there from the dive center at Sanur. You can really sleep in the van before the dives and actually I think you should! The only good think about those trips is that the transfer, lunch, which was extremely good both at Tulamben and on the boat, and drinking water are all included in the price. Coming back to the price, after a bit of iteration to convince the lady I contacted for a lower price, I finally ended up 275 USD for 5 dives including the equipment and hotel transfer. Well it was not that much of a bargain to be frank but it was worth to have good dives. There was only one thing annoying about the monetary part that they have never warn me about the bank charges they reflect on the payment although I have explicitly said I will be paying with the credit card. They might have skipped this detail but finally I had to pay ~4.5% for the payment by AMEX. The fee is a little bit lower for MasterCard and VISA, like 3%. So I recommend you to be aware of it.
For the technical part of the dives, they were quite ok. The ratio of diver to dive master is less than 4 which is pretty good. They group people according to the experiences so that you don't surface unnecessarily early. For the dives with large groups, like the ones I had in Nusa Penida, they had a couple of extra dives to check around. So overall they helped a lot to spot the creatures around like lobsters or scorpion fishes in the cracks or disguised. The only thing disappointed me for the dives, and I want to share with you guys, was end of one dive I had in Tulamben. I have not been diving for a while, and naturally I was consuming air badly. Thus I depleted my air quite fast for the first day. In the second dive, we were diving 3 people: me, dive master and another customer. As my bottle was at 50 bars, the other guy was a bit above 100. In this situation, the dive master took me 5 meters for 3 minutes of safety stop. And signed me to follow the bottom then surface and swim to the beach. So this was, honestly, not nice. I am not very familiar to the dive centers way of doing the business but I have mostly dived with university societies where no such thing can happen especially when you are diving in a completely now point. Other than that everything was cool with those guys. They were extremely cool and kind. The briefs before the dives were satisfactory. The equipment they offered were pretty new. So they can be used with no worries.
Overall, I recommend you to dive with those guy but I also recommend check out other dive school beforehand just to be sure that you don't have a price lower than 60 USD per dive including everything. Frankly speaking, this seemed to be a bit extreme after diving for 30 USD at Kata Beach Phuket.
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