Dive Review of Telita in
Papua New Guinea/Milne Bay, Kimbe Bay

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Telita, May, 2007, by Jennifer Meriwether, CA, USA ( Reviewer 4 reports). Report 3389.
No photos available at this time
Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Accommodations		Food
Service and Attitude		Environmental Sensitivity	N/A
Dive Operation		Shore Diving
Snorkeling	N/A
Overall Rating
Value for $$	N/A
Beginners
Advanced
Comments	We were originally scheduled for 10 days on the Telita on a repositioning cruise from Alotau in Milne Bay to Tufi. We had so much fun on the boat that we ended up canceling our further land plans and staying on for another 10 day repositioning cruise from Tufi to Walindi in Kimbe Bay. The new owner/captain of Telita, Paul Baker, is very friendly and customer service oriented. His main concern is to make sure that his guests have the best possible dive trip. We had horrible weather for the first 10 days of the trip, including a cyclone in the Solomon Sea that caused rough conditions in Milne Bay so Paul completely revised his plans and concentrated on taking us to dive sites that were more protected. The boat is very comfortable with 5 ensuite guest cabins. The bathrooms are quite large for a liveaboard with plenty of hot water and even seats in the downstairs cabin showers so that you can sit down and take a shower while the boat is moving (something we really appreciated in the rough seas we encountered). The boat has passive stabilizers that are lowered when at anchor and they help minimize boat rocking. The food was not gourmet, but it was tasty and filling with plenty of meat (fresh fish if we'd caught any that day), veges, fresh fruit and wine with dinner. Lunches were always prepared meals, not cold sandwiches. Afternoon tea brought an assortment of treats including freshly baked scones, carrot cake, caramel peanut butter bars and yummy brownies. The dive deck is large and easy to move around in with two hot showers and a really good swim-up ladder. Depending on the current most of the dives either started from the boat and ended with a pickup in the zodiac, or vice versa. Nitrox is available and all of the boat's mechanical systems were well-maintained. Except for a few muck sites in Milne Bay, most of the diving was on bommies that were a mile or more off shore. Our trip included lots of exploratory dives and Paul really enjoys trying new sites. Even on his established itineraries, he always tries to do at least one or two exploratory dives. Some sites had really great coral and/or gorgeous walls, others showed a large amount of damage from coral bleaching episodes, especially in Milne Bay which had a really bad bleaching about 5 years ago. In spite of Milne's reputation for muck-diving, we found the "critter" count to be rather low compared to the diving we've done in Indonesia. However, PNG has an abundance of fish large and small. Because the population of PNG is relatively small and the Asian fishing fleets have not yet fished it out, you get to see a complete ecosystem instead of seeing only smaller fish and nothing large. We had at least 1-2 sharks on most dives, sometimes up to 10, mainly grey reefs with the occasional white tip, black tip and silvertip. We also saw grouper, snapper, mackeral, barracuda, dog tuna, napoleon wrasses, bumpheads, turtles and rays (eagle, manta and stingray) making it a really good destination for those who like the big stuff.
Reporter and Travel
Dive Experience	251-500 dives
Where else diving	Indonesia, Thailand, Hawaii, CA, Cozumel, Curacao, Bonaire, Little Cayman
Closest Airport		Getting There
Dive Conditions
Weather	windy, rainy, cloudy	Seas	choppy
Water Temp	82-85°F / 28-29°C	Wetsuit Thickness	3
Water Visibility	35-65 Ft/ 11-20 M
Dive Policy
Dive own profile	yes
Enforced diving restrictions	None
Liveaboard?	yes	Nitrox Available?	N/A
What I Saw
Sharks	Lots	Mantas	1 or 2
Dolphins	None	Whale Sharks	None
Turtles	> 2	Whales	None
Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):
Corals		Tropical Fish
Small Critters		Large Fish
Large Pelagics
Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Subject Matter		Boat Facilities
Overall rating for UWP's		Shore Facilities	N/A
UW Photo Comments	large camera worktable, rinse bucket on dive deck, 110/220 charging station

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Dive Review of Telita in Papua New Guinea/Milne Bay, Kimbe Bay

Telita, May, 2007,

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):

Dive Review of Telita in
Papua New Guinea/Milne Bay, Kimbe Bay