Getting it down pat – at Raja Ampat

[JohnM]

Tonight it’s on the bird PER-CGK on the first leg to start on Monday an eight-night trip on a 20-pax liveaboard boat out of Sorong, West Papua moseying around Raja Ampat, famed for its spectacular marine life.

A group of us, primarily from Perth, have taken exclusive use of the boat. @Daver6 and Mrs Daver6 are part of the group. Some are divers; most are snorkellers.

Folks are making their own various ways to Sorong, most via Bali. I opted for PJM and me to go via Jakarta as we’ve not been there before. Being from WA and having visited the Batavia wreck site with its gruesome story at the Abrolhos Islands and having a couple of years ago met the late Hugh Edwards the diver/journalist who discovered the wreck, I’m keen to see the historical old town of Batavia.



We're on Mermaid II.



Raja Ampat.



Raja Ampat, or the Four Kings, is an archipelago located off the northwest tip of Bird's Head Peninsula (on the island of New Guinea), Southwest Papua province, Indonesia. It comprises over 1,500 small islands, cays, and shoals around the four main islands of Misool, Salawati, Batanta, and Waigeo, and the smaller island of Kofiau.

Raja Ampat is considered the global epicentre of tropical marine biodiversity and is referred to as ’The Crown Jewel’ of the Bird's Head Seascape, which also includes Cenderawasih Bay and Triton Bay. The region contains more than 600 species of hard corals, constituting about 75% of the world's known species, and more than 1,700 species of reef fish – including on both shallow and mesophotic reefs.

Compared to similarly sized ecosystems elsewhere in the world, Raja Ampat's biodiversity is arguably the richest in the world. Endangered and rare marine mammals, such as dugongs, whales (such as blue, pygmy blue, Bryde's, Omura's, sperm), dolphins, and even orcas occur here. Endangered whale sharks, the largest extant fish species on earth, also thrive in this region.

Boat departure point: Sorong, with Raja Ampat to the west.



As usual, most of this TR will be done after return.

 

[Cynicor]

Very interested to know how the snorkellers get on and what you can see. I’ve been scoping out this area for a snorkle resort, but maybe a luxury liveabord would be tolerable

 

[Daver6]

Good luck with the red-eye. I'll be enjoying my day flight to DPS tomorrow

 

[Daver6]

Further context from my side on this trip. @JohnM reached out to MrsDaver6 and I close to two years ago to see if we'd be interested. Since alcohol would be plentiful, I figured I could put up with him

More seriously, I don't believe in short red-eye flights and dodgy brother airlines (safety rather than LCC) are on my personal no fly list. Therefore my options to SOQ were very limited. We're take JQ up to DPS and spending a couple of nights at the airport Novotel (more on this shortly). We're then flying GA to SOQ (direct) and return with a connection in CGK. Flights booked using VS points transferred from Amex MR. Upon returning to Bali we have a five night stay the the Raffles.

Originally the GA flights between DPS and SOQ were direct and not daily. I checked on the VS website and there was J award availability to SOQ. I transferred the MR points and attempted to book. At the final stage it gave me an error. I called VS (staff are all UK based and super helpful) and was told that J awards were phantom availability. Quite annoyed as I now had a bunch of points sitting there. There was however Y availability in both directions so I just bit the bullet and booked that. Weirdly taxes are much higher in Y than J!

Then a few months later GA cancelled the direct flights and re-routed us via CGK. Absolute PITA, especially the outbound being ~10pm departure from DPS with a sub 90 minute layover in CGK. Ie a night with very little sleep. What can you do though.

About three weeks ago I just happened to check and what do you know, the direct DPS to SOQ flight is back on. Even better, no longer a red-eye with a 8am departure on Sunday. Perfect! I called VS to get moved back to that flight (same flight number as my original direct flight). Unfortunately even though GA had award seats available, there were no partner award seats. They told me to contact GA to get them released. Much messing about and eventually got GA to do what was needed, so we're back on the direct flight!

As for the Raffles, made the most of ALL points and the Accor Plus free night to keep costs down. I needed to split the 5 nights into a 3 night booking (2 paid for the 3rd free) and then points for the remaining 2 nights.

To say I'm looking forward to this trip would be an understatement. MrsDaver6 is under strict instructions not to injure herself (again) while we're overseas

 

[JohnM]

Adding a little to the back story, and relevant to AFF.

My mate Mike, the instigator of this adventure, is a retired EK A380 driver, coming out of GA in WA, TAA and QF until the pilots' dispute (he insists that I do not call it a strike), and eventually joining EK as a low-number recruit. The rest is history as EK soared.

Anyway, quite a few of the voyagers are ex pilots, with about three or four retired EK A380 drivers.

But, ultimately, the genesis of the trip is a group from Mike's North Cottesloe surf club that did it back in 2023 and raved about it.

It proved too tight to get it organised for 2025, so here we are with it coming to fruition in 2026.

We had a meetup of most of the participants over drinks a few weeks back, as many us didn't know each other. Fun group.

Looking forward to it! Should be a blast! Let's roll!