NDC Resort, Manado
NDC Resort, Manado
NDC (Nusantara Diving Centre) was the first hotel in the region and offers truly world class diving in the Bunaken National Park and surrounding North Sulawesi area. The traditional style resort has 49 rooms with air conditioning, mini bar, fridge, tea and coffee facilities, satellite TV, telephone, private terrace and a semi open-air bathroom. The resort is situated on the waterfront with large grounds complete with their own coconut plantation, large mango trees and a huge variety of other exotic tropical fruits and flowers. There is also a large 2 level pool, restaurant, souvenir shop, laundry service, money exchanger, tour desk and wireless hot spot access. Their major attraction though is the most experienced dive center in the region and the friendly staff.
NDC Resort is in the village of Molas, a quiet rural village, about 7km from Mando, which is a busy Indonesian city.
There are 34 different dive sites within a 30 minute boat trip from NDC ranging from coral wall drop offs, caves, world war 2 ship wrecks, drift dives and black sand muck dives. NDC was the first dive center in the region and discovered most of the dive sites. Some of the dive guides have worked at NDC for over 20 years and this experience ensures that you will see the best of the unique critters in the area. They also have some of the most qualified and extensively trained new guides in the area giving the center a great mix of youth and experience
Dive sites with in the Bunaken National Park include Lekuan’s 1,2,&3, which consists of a 2km length of wall where you can regularly see turtles, huge range of nudibranchs, reef sharks, moral eels and millions of reef fish. Fekui Point consists of a gently sloping wall with giant clams, garden eels, batfish and schools of reef fish looking to be hand fed. Raymond point is a drift dive along a wall with a cave at 20 meters with lots of painted cray fish inside. Siladen Island is the picture perfect tropical island complete with white sand and great snorkeling on the reef flats. The wall drops away into turquoise blue water with an amazing array of feather stars and gorgonian fans. Meras consists of a sandy sloping wall where Mandarin fish are seen regularly here. Locki Point, less than a 5 minute boat trip from NDC, has a World War 2 wreck sitting at 40 meters. Batas Kota is right in the middle of Manado and is a shallow black sand muck dive. Various species of frogfish, mimic octopus, mantis shrimp, flamboyant cuttle fish, juvenile scorpion fish, pygmy sea horse, ribbon eels and ghost pipe fish are regularly seen here.
NDC also runs dives at Lembeh, an hour’s drive to the other side of Sulawesi. These are all muck dives where you will see the most amazing array of critters including nudibranchs, pygmy sea horses, Pegasus sea horses, electric clams, shrimps, crabs and moray eels.
The value of an experienced and knowledgeable dive guide cannot be over stated, as most of the areas unique critters are small and well camouflaged. The guides at NDC have an incredible ability to find the smallest creatures that will test your macro photography.
A typical day at NDC starts with full breakfast including traditional Indonesian food from 7am. All your dive gear will be ready on the boat waiting for your arrival at 9am followed by a short boat trip to the dive site. You can have 3 dives lasting up to 11/2 hours each, broken up with a cooked meal, plenty of snorkeling opportunities and shore exploration. Usually returning to NDC by 4pm where most people seem to enjoy a swim in the pool whilst being served with local Indonesian afternoon tea. The restaurant serves an amazing array of food professionally prepared by their wonderful cooks.
There is a great variety of non diving activities in the area as well ranging from a walk through the local village to the market, walks up volcanoes, tours through mountain villages, walks through the rain forest where you will see Tarsiers (the worlds smallest monkeys) black macaques and hornbills or just exploring the city of Manado. All these can be organized and personalized by the staff at NDC.
We will be running a fully escorted 10 day trip in June 2010 and can also help coordinate your own trip.
For more information visit http://ndcresort-manado.com or contact us.
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