Travel

An anemonefish peeks out of its cozy home
 

One of my favorite places to dive is Siladen Resort and Spa off North Sulawesi. When I heard that they joined forces with Coral Eye Marine Outpost, I couldn’t wait to visit—and return to Siladen. Located on Bangka Island, Coral Eye is the perfect partner for Siladen: Both offer fantastic diving, amazing staff, service, food, and a commitment to conservation—all while enjoying laid-back luxury.

Arriving to Coral Eye, I felt immediately relaxed after my long journey. The heart of the property is a large wood-constructed open-air building, designed with a combination of local techniques and modern elegance with the environment in mind—a stunning work of architecture. Beautiful dark wood beams and soft light gave an inviting feeling that seemed to calm the mind and encourage slowing down the pace of life.
 

The pier and house reef at Coral Eye
 

The welcoming main building of Coral Eye
 

Coral Eye started out as the dream of several marine biologists to create a place to inspire collaborative work between students, researchers and universities from around the world. Large, open common spaces inspire interaction and connection. On the first level is a sunken table hosting seats for up to 16 people for meals, encouraging guests to dine together and get to know one another. Topics around the table usually focused on what we all had in common—the ocean. What we saw, what we wanted to see, and how we all wished we were staying longer. There are two rooms for dining as well, with individual tables for a more private atmosphere. Two other open rooms have couch areas with games and a desk with marine biology and fish books. Several hammocks sway in the breeze.

On the upper story, six standard rooms can be found as well as large, comfortable couches and another desk which open to the beach and ocean view. I found myself in this wonderful, breezy spot most mornings, enjoying my coffee while reading or catching up on emails. (In truth, I was there during lunch time surface intervals and post-dive cocktail hour, too!) One afternoon, it poured, and it was the most beautiful thing to sit on the couch, comfy and dry, but attuned to the sounds of the rain on the foliage around.

The partnership with Siladen has led to various improvements at Coral Eye, bringing in the former’s award-winning service standards, dining, accommodations, and dive center upgrades. They have also been adding luxury villas and by August 2024 will have 10 in total. These spacious and airy villas have large, raised beds; lounge couches that can also be converted into another bed in most villas; open-air bathrooms with lovely gardens; and classy details. They are also building a new restaurant.
 

Spacious, air-conditioned camera rooms await at Coral Eye (pictured) and Siladen Resort
 

Coral Eye has gotten some luxury upgrades, but its commitment to the ocean and environment remains the same. It is still providing a place for students, researchers and universities to meet for workshops and field courses, and as a location to conduct research. This brings scientists in direct contact with resort guests and allows for opportunities to share their knowledge. I have always felt any education component of scuba diving adds tremendously to the experience.
 

Coral Eye on Bangka Island

After a delicious breakfast the following morning, I set out diving. You can tell a trip is going to be good when there is a Bargibant’s pygmy seahorse on the first dive and a Pontoh’s pygmy seahorse on the second! The first pygmy was cooperative, but the second did not want his photo taken. A slight current made just enough water movement to prevent me from staying in the perfect spot, so I let that one go without harassing it and continued on to find a more photogenic flatworm vigorously climbing the reef. Staying with it for a while, it moved towards me, his top edge forming into what looked like two bent arrows reaching out to say hello. A mini-wall of varied colors revealed several nudibranchs and a black painted frogfish with a hint of orange “baby” spots still showing.
 

Bargibant’s pygmy seahorse is a tiny marvel
 

A juvenile painted frogfish
 

Back at the resort for lunch, I experienced first-hand the communal environment Coral Eye wants to create as I got to know fellow guests. While we hailed from different points of the globe and spoke different languages, we enjoyed some fantastic food together and had a great time discussing diving and snorkeling. Both resorts fully support snorkelers and freedivers, providing guides and floats for safety. After a quick nap in a hammock, I set out again with my guide, Oping, for an afternoon shore dive on the house reef.

Over lunch, I had learned of a school of small barracuda just next to the pier from other guests who had seen them while both diving and snorkeling, and I sort of brushed this information aside, assuming they’d be long gone. The weather had been a bit windy and visibility was not perfect, so I stuck with my macro lens to shoot the small stuff. But just as if those barracuda knew I had a macro lens mounted, not 10 minutes into the dive, they encircled me within touching distance all around! I fired a few eye shots and vowed to come back the next day with my wide angle. The barracuda followed us for most of the dive and every time I took my eyes away from the macro critters, those barracuda were there, apparently relishing my inability to capture them properly!
 

Coral Eye’s house reef barracuda—captured with a macro lens!
 

I had not dived around Bangka Island before, but I was familiar with Bunaken National Park (where Siladen is found) and the Lembeh Strait. As expected, the diving did not disappoint. While it did not have the sheer wall dives of Bunaken or quite the critter concentration as Lembeh, it had rolling patches of coral loaded with soft corals and abundant reef life as well as sandy muck areas with plenty of critters to be found. This area is in the heart of the Coral Triangle and is known to have some of the most biodiverse waters on Earth.

My camera got valet service between land and water and the dive guides hardly let me touch it. They carried it—in its own padded box—from the camera room to the boat. My rig appeared on the boat each morning, and in the evening, it was back in the dive room, washed and drying like magic. Underwater, my eagle-eyed guide was constantly pointing out amazing things, showing me rare nudibranchs and spotting pygmy cuttlefish from what seemed like miles away.

Back at the resort, I couldn’t help but notice the place has a vibe about it—sort of zen, simple but elegant, unpretentious luxury. It’s all in the details. Local handmade soap in the bathrooms, dried limes as garnish in my gin and tonics, and as the sun set, candles were lit around the main building, making it glow throughout.
 

The colorful Nembrotha kubaryana nudibranch
 

An impossibly cute pygmy cuttlefish
 

The next day, we took a short boat ride to the mainland for some black sand muck diving, and Oping found all sorts of wonderful marine life for me to photograph. We found one large purple frogfish that had a small frogfish sitting on its back, mating perhaps? In the afternoon I wanted to return to the house reef with wide angle and try to get those barracuda.

To access the house reef at high tide you can walk right off the beach, and at lower tides you walk down stairs on the pier. After getting in the water, I looked behind me and the part of the stairs that are always underwater were absolutely magical. Decorated with coral and sponges, they were like something out of a mermaid movie. I snapped a few shots and Oping modeled for me under the pier where the pillars had red sea fans and lots of fish congregating.

We headed for deeper water and the large coral bommie where the barracuda swarmed me the day before. Of course, they were nowhere to be found. I took some photos of anemones and clownfish and sea fans with a school juvenile blue-stripe snappers and decided to call it a day, swimming back towards the stairs. As we were about to get out, Oping signaled that maybe we should swim a bit more and keep looking. Why not, right?
 

Two frogfish in an interesting position
 

The “mermaid stairs” to Coral Eye
 

The current had picked up, and if nothing else, at least I’d get a little exercise before what I knew would be another fantastic three-course dinner. There were pretty coral heads and orange Anthias swimming with all their might into the breeze. Then I heard the sound of a noise-maker; Oping had gone quite far ahead of me, so I quickened my pace. There they were, the missing barracuda. And just like that, they encircled us. The visibility wasn’t ideal, but for several minutes, I was completely surrounded by barracuda and in absolute bliss snapping photos.

Oping kindly modeled for me and after I was sure he thought I was a crazy woman swimming in circles with fish, I signaled we could go. As we swam away, I kept looking back and the barracuda were following us. Oping kept looking back at me as if he knew I was going to turn around and shoot a few more shots. I resisted though; there was a gin and tonic calling my name.
 

Coral Eye’s house reef barracuda return in wide angle

Siladen Resort: Gateway to Bunaken

It’s incredibly easy to combine Coral Eye and Siladen in a single trip, with the option to be transported between the two morning dives. I packed up my dry luggage, but my camera and dive gear were transported like a normal dive. By midday, we had arrived at Siladen to enjoy lunch on the resort’s beach, my dive gear seamlessly moved from one boat to another. If you want, you can easily do an afternoon dive as well.

Siladen Resort occupies a lovely white sand beach and beautiful garden area, facing the photogenic Manado Tua volcanic island. The diving is a great complement to Bangka, with sheer walls swarming with fish and packed with coral, sea fans, and huge barrel sponges. Created in 1991, Bunaken National Park is known for its biodiversity, healthy reefs, schools of fish, and more turtles than you can count.
 

Bunaken National Park is famed for its magnificent walls...
 

...but the turtles always steal the show!
 

The deep channels between islands in Bunaken National Park make it a fantastic place for blackwater photography. Each night, the world’s largest vertical migration occurs with the weird and the wild coming up from the depths to shallower waters to feed on plankton. These dives are a nightly offering. A 45-foot line floats with over 100,000 lumens of light to attract marine life. Being mildly obsessed with this type of diving, I was surprised that Siladen offers a 1:1 guide-to-diver ratio on blackwater dives for the ultimate in both critter spotting and safety.

Every time I do a blackwater dive, I am blown away. Every night is different and my first night, dive guide and manager Frenki found a thorny seahorse clinging to a piece of seagrass and floating around eating plankton. There were also many tiny crab and shrimp larvae and some sort of cephalopod that may have been a juvenile coconut octopus or possibly a bobtail squid. On my second night, we were invaded by fast-moving squid of several sizes and lots of interesting juvenile fish, including a tiny boxfish the size of a peanut.
 

Blackwater critters (clockwise from top-left): boxfish, thorny seahorse on a blade of seagrass, juvenile coconut octopus or bobtail squid (probably), juvenile fish, mantis shrimp larva, juvenile pufferfish
 

Don’t worry if blackwater isn’t your thing; Siladen offers many different types of dives and water activities. The whiteboard in the dive center reads like a candy shop for ocean lovers. What do you want to do today? Dive beautiful walls packed with corals and turtles? Take a day trip to Bangka Island? Maybe a bonfire dive? Or a good-old-fashioned night dive? Mandarinfish night dive? How about a dolphin tour? Oh, wait, we are supposed to be on vacation and relaxing, but who has time to relax with so many options for diving? Three trips to Siladen later, and I’ve still not even once sat next to their pool or been in it!

Of course, Bunaken’s wall dives—and turtles—are at the very top of the list of Siladen experiences, and they were just as splendid as I remembered. With Frenki as my expert guide, we drifted in easy currents spotting fish, critters and plenty of turtles. There is nothing more inspiring than seeing your dive guide also moved by the dive. As it was almost raining red-faced triggerfish, he was just looking out into the blue (as was I), taking the view in, arms open like, “Look at this!” That was exactly what I was thinking too. And then there were the turtles. At times, I was shooting one turtle cozied up on a ledge only to notice another one just a few feet above it and after taking another shot, seeing a silhouette of another up near the surface.
 

A beautiful balled-up anemone on a wall dive
 

Bunaken is all about the turtles!
 

Raining red-faced triggerfish

Why Visit Both?

Quite simply, between Coral Eye and Siladen, you can experience the best diving the area has to offer, and the resorts make it seamless to transit between the two. You can expect the same service, food, and comfort between both resorts and both fully support photographers. The large, air-conditioned camera rooms with individual spots are great places for photographers to set up gear, and there’s lots of charging space. There are also tables in both for photo editing as well as books for critter identification.

Both resorts have spacious dive boats with plenty of room for dive gear and cameras—they provide large boxes for divers to put their cameras in to be carried for protection. There are also drink stations with tea and coffee, and snacks, and a lovely touch was the crew singing all the time! Guitars and voices: on the way to dive sites, during the surface intervals, and on the way back. It was joyous! Probably my favorite detail was after each dive the crew provided a warm aromatherapy towel. My post-diving sinuses have never felt better. Attention to detail in service make both ideal places to unwind, relax and truly enjoy a vacation.
 

The crew at both Coral Eye and Siladen showed off their musical talents. Here, Oping serenades during a surface interval
 

It’s also heartwarming to see conservation and environmental protection at the core of both resorts. Coral Eye’s efforts have already been mentioned, and Siladen also has long-term projects, including a turtle conservation program, buoy installation, and many social responsibility initiatives on the island and with nearby communities. Both resorts make efforts to conserve resources like water, as much reduction of soap use as possible, reduction of single-use plastics, outreach education to children and local villagers, beach cleanups, and more.

I was also delighted to see women working both as boat crew and dive guides at both resorts. They have created a safe and supportive community for female industry interns to learn the trade and many stay on as full-time hires. It is an uncommon sight in this area of the world, and I couldn’t be happier to see it. Plus, they are awesome! Every bit as tough and as good—if not better—at critter finding.

So it was no surprise that my trip felt way too short. I felt sad to leave, but in my mind, I was already planning a return. Between the wonderful diving, amazing food, exceptional service, and commitment to the environment and social responsibility, it doesn’t get much better than this.
 

An exquisite tiger butterfly sea slug—Cyerce nigra