YAP, Micronesia

Copied from UK scuba conf.


Yap Report. 18th to 28th dec 2003

On arrival at Yap from Guam we noticed that the airport was a little
better than Chuuk, still very small though.
Our hotel was only 5 minutes from the airport, you can take a virtual tour
by looking at www.tradersridge.com

Again the weather here was like Chuuk, cloudy skies and rain, its not
quite so bad when the rain is warm, :^) we had a few days of clear skies
during our 10 nights here but we did have one day where we tried in vain
to get to the west side of the Island , we battled "Perfect
Storm" seas for two and a half hours only to have to turn back.
I did wonder if we got in, how the hell would we get out and back on the
boat.

The Island of Yap only has about 100 beds for accommodation purposes and
I'm told they run at about 30-40% occupancy, thats less than 3000 visitors
a year, there were only two other dive couples at our hotel so it was very
quiet and relaxing. The main town is Colonia, 100 yds from our hotel, you
can walk around at any time of day or night without having to worry about
your safety, the roads are clean and tidy, everything is well kept and
appears to be far better organised than Chuuk.
The town consists of one main street, and that is only 100 yds long with a
few shops and supermarket, opposite our hotel is the communications center
for Yap, there is internet access (pretty quick) for 4 $ US dollars an
hour.

We had come to dive and see the Manta's, nothing else, so were keen to go
diving, to get to "Mill Channel" where the Manta's could be found we had
to take the boat through the mangroves and up through the "German Canal"
this cut right through the middle of the Island to the West coast. Mill
Channel is a channel in the outer reef where the tides come in and out,
hence the Manta's.
When we first got in the water we were again disappointed by the
visibility, i have seen Stoney with much better vis than this, it was very
gloomy, no shadows, and after 3 dive days with no Manta's we were
beginning to think that this was another of those "magazine great dive
sites"....but on the fourth day we were rewarded, what a relief it was to
get something on video, we saw Manta's on every dive after that, we even
saw one leap out of the water and come crashing down belly flop style not
20 metres from the boat, we watched them, six or seven of them, playing on
the surface and "flying" under the boat, we got in again at this point,
even though we were on virtually empty, what a day that was.
The maximum depth in the Channel was 23.5m, we would make our way down to
the cleaning station and just wait, some times we were lucky while making
our way down, we didn't just drop in and descend, we would drop in and
finn for maybe 5-10 minutes making our way gradually down to the station.
Sometimes they were there sometimes not but as i say after the 3rd day we
saw them on every dive.
There were guests from the Manta Ray Bay Hotel who left Yap without seeing
them, how unlucky is that.
We dived with Beyond the Reef, who were excellent, but Yap Divers were a
much bigger outfit and operated from the Manta Ray Bay Hotel.
On Christmas day we were out in the channel and there were about 6 small
boats (they carried max about 6 people each) and i was told that this was
their busiest week of the year.....other divers on dives was never an
issue and we never felt the sites were crowded.

We met "Markuss" while here, we had watched a video one day in our hotel
room of the Manta's
and Mandarin fish, and while having dinner one night at the restaurant
behind the Manta Ray Hotel a guy came and sat down with us, my wife
recognised his voice from the commentary on the video we had watched, it
was Marcuss, he was from Bournmouth but had been on Yap a couple of years
and did the odd video for guests and did promotional video work for the
local community.....

Every one that we spoke to here asked us if we had dived at Palua, a
little further to the West, we had not, they all raved about the diving
there so it looks like Palau has to be added to the list of future
attractions. You can get direct to Palau from Manilla, Guam, Japan and
other locations so i was told.

Summing up, Our Hotel was excellent, the food there was, how can i say, it
looked like you should take pictures of it rather than eat it, IYKWIM.
We always ate at the Manta Ray Bay restaurant, an old Junk moored behind
the hotel, the food was excellent, especially the Wahoo....very cheap too.
The people were friendly and accommodating.
The diving was great if you got to see the Mantas, the rest of what i saw
was disappointing, no Coral Care.....
The weather, fine skies one minute, overcast and rain the next.
Would i go back,.......no plans to. But i would do Chuuk again.

Did we enjoy the trip, yes but flying is a real pain.

Dave Morgan in the UK.

Mantas seem to like murky water, at least that is the experience I've always
had with them. That is...in terms of any cleaning station.

Dave Morgan wrote:

> Copied from UK scuba conf.
>
> Yap Report. 18th to 28th dec 2003
>
> On arrival at Yap from Guam we noticed that the airport was a little
> better than Chuuk, still very small though.
> Our hotel was only 5 minutes from the airport, you can take a virtual tour
> by looking at www.tradersridge.com
>
> Again the weather here was like Chuuk, cloudy skies and rain, its not
> quite so bad when the rain is warm, :^) we had a few days of clear skies
> during our 10 nights here but we did have one day where we tried in vain
> to get to the west side of the Island , we battled "Perfect
> Storm" seas for two and a half hours only to have to turn back.
> I did wonder if we got in, how the hell would we get out and back on the
> boat.
>
> The Island of Yap only has about 100 beds for accommodation purposes and
> I'm told they run at about 30-40% occupancy, thats less than 3000 visitors
> a year, there were only two other dive couples at our hotel so it was very
> quiet and relaxing. The main town is Colonia, 100 yds from our hotel, you
> can walk around at any time of day or night without having to worry about
> your safety, the roads are clean and tidy, everything is well kept and
> appears to be far better organised than Chuuk.
> The town consists of one main street, and that is only 100 yds long with a
> few shops and supermarket, opposite our hotel is the communications center
> for Yap, there is internet access (pretty quick) for 4 $ US dollars an
> hour.
>
> We had come to dive and see the Manta's, nothing else, so were keen to go
> diving, to get to "Mill Channel" where the Manta's could be found we had
> to take the boat through the mangroves and up through the "German Canal"
> this cut right through the middle of the Island to the West coast. Mill
> Channel is a channel in the outer reef where the tides come in and out,
> hence the Manta's.
> When we first got in the water we were again disappointed by the
> visibility, i have seen Stoney with much better vis than this, it was very
> gloomy, no shadows, and after 3 dive days with no Manta's we were
> beginning to think that this was another of those "magazine great dive
> sites"....but on the fourth day we were rewarded, what a relief it was to
> get something on video, we saw Manta's on every dive after that, we even
> saw one leap out of the water and come crashing down belly flop style not
> 20 metres from the boat, we watched them, six or seven of them, playing on
> the surface and "flying" under the boat, we got in again at this point,
> even though we were on virtually empty, what a day that was.
> The maximum depth in the Channel was 23.5m, we would make our way down to
> the cleaning station and just wait, some times we were lucky while making
> our way down, we didn't just drop in and descend, we would drop in and
> finn for maybe 5-10 minutes making our way gradually down to the station.
> Sometimes they were there sometimes not but as i say after the 3rd day we
> saw them on every dive.
> There were guests from the Manta Ray Bay Hotel who left Yap without seeing
> them, how unlucky is that.
> We dived with Beyond the Reef, who were excellent, but Yap Divers were a
> much bigger outfit and operated from the Manta Ray Bay Hotel.
> On Christmas day we were out in the channel and there were about 6 small
> boats (they carried max about 6 people each) and i was told that this was
> their busiest week of the year.....other divers on dives was never an
> issue and we never felt the sites were crowded.
>
> We met "Markuss" while here, we had watched a video one day in our hotel
> room of the Manta's
> and Mandarin fish, and while having dinner one night at the restaurant
> behind the Manta Ray Hotel a guy came and sat down with us, my wife
> recognised his voice from the commentary on the video we had watched, it
> was Marcuss, he was from Bournmouth but had been on Yap a couple of years
> and did the odd video for guests and did promotional video work for the
> local community.....
>
> Every one that we spoke to here asked us if we had dived at Palua, a
> little further to the West, we had not, they all raved about the diving
> there so it looks like Palau has to be added to the list of future
> attractions. You can get direct to Palau from Manilla, Guam, Japan and
> other locations so i was told.
>
> Summing up, Our Hotel was excellent, the food there was, how can i say, it
> looked like you should take pictures of it rather than eat it, IYKWIM.
> We always ate at the Manta Ray Bay restaurant, an old Junk moored behind
> the hotel, the food was excellent, especially the Wahoo....very cheap too.
> The people were friendly and accommodating.
> The diving was great if you got to see the Mantas, the rest of what i saw
> was disappointing, no Coral Care.....
> The weather, fine skies one minute, overcast and rain the next.
> Would i go back,.......no plans to. But i would do Chuuk again.
>
> Did we enjoy the trip, yes but flying is a real pain.
>
> Dave Morgan in the UK.