DIVING THE GURAICI ISLANDS INDONESIA

The Guraici islands are located in the district of South Halmahera in North Maluku province, Indonesia. Also known as Palau Guraici, it’s one of the best diving locations in North Maluku. On a recent voyage, Samata’s cruise director Michael Click and guests explored the following three dive sites, Michael recounts the experience: 

Tomo-Tomo

Tomo-Tomo with a large rock pillar jutting out from the sea floor. It was so nice to see such a healthy reef system with loads of fish and colourful corals. We could not have asked for a better start to our day of diving in the Guraici Islands.

Abu Bakar

Our second dive was a large sea mount called Abu Bakar. This site sits off the shore of a small rocky island right in the middle of some ripping current. We choose this as our second dive so we can dive it on a rising tide in hope the current would not be as strong. Fortunately our experience with the tides paid off again with plenty of current to keep the action up but not too much to make it too much work. This was one of our favourites in the Guraici Islands with so much fish action and large grey reef sharks, tuna, lots of little white & black tips and really pretty colourful corals.

It may seem obvious but something we consider for every dive is light. So we try as much as possible to start the day diving with something facing East and finish facing west in the setting sun. 

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Pulau Siko

We finish up the day in the Guraici Islands with a late afternoon dive on the NW cost of Pulau Siko. This reef was very active with tons of tiny little silver sides (small little fish) floating above the reef all moving in unison. This can be mesmerizing and somewhat hypnotic the way thousands of fish follow the same choreographed dance. Late afternoon dives are great primarily due to the energy and motion of everything. Similar to the mornings things are getting ready for the night either looking for food or desperately trying to avoid being food. 

We decided to anchor in front of the village for the night. We enjoyed the sunset with a couple drinks and listening to the calls to prayer coming from the village.

Interested in diving some of Indonesia’s more remote locations? Connect with Andra our host to discuss personalized trip itineraries and diving trips.