MANADO / BUNAKEN ISLAND, IN NORTH SULAWESI

MANADO / BUNAKEN ISLAND, IN NORTH SULAWESI

We had high hopes for this place, the tropical island report we had been looking forward to.  Spending the last week of our vacation in a very classy place, drinking cocktails on the beach, blah blah blah.  Well, let me tell you that Bunaken is BLAH!!  For starters, there is no electricity on the island from 5AM to 6PM, so most places do not install AC in the rooms.  If you are not a diver, you need to pay about 20 Euros more per person, and even when we said we were divers, the rates for low end mid-range was U.S.$25 per person.  We stayed for one night at this place run by an Italian diver instructor, whose Indonesia girlfriend was a cheap person.   She found us a massage lady for 12.50$.  We had already found one for $7.50 (who is actually just a walking tee-shirt seller), so she told that lady to never come back onto their property.  We had to go to the beach at a hotel next door for our massage.  That was the last straw.  We decided to leave the next day and stay in a four star hotel in Manado City for only 14$ more a night.  The Italian guy let us go along on a dive trip though, for free, where we snorkeled along a wall.  At least he was pretty lenient, as the people on the dive were all very inexperienced, but he let them all play around, come out of the water, go back down, which preserved their air.  I did some skin diving, and went much deeper than the divers themselves.  Carol and I followed a wall, where I found the skull of some kind of large sea creature, maybe a dolphin or manta-ray.  I played around with it for a while, until I tried giving it to Carol, who didn't take the catch and the skull dropped into the depths. Later that night, over dinner, we met a very cool couple from Poland, who backpack every summer for three weeks with their three kids. 

We ended up staying at the Manado Quality four Star Hotel with buffet breakfast included.  Watched lots of TV, got fat, got massages, walked around malls and ate at seaside restaurants.  Manado city center is busy and is not nice.  The hotel was nice.

Than we went to Singapore for a two day visa run. I had to stand the entire flight, as the seat in front of me was too close.



MANADO / BUNAKEN ISLAND, IN NORTH SULAWESI



MANADO / BUNAKEN ISLAND, IN NORTH SULAWESI




MANADO / BUNAKEN ISLAND, IN NORTH SULAWESI




MANADO / BUNAKEN ISLAND, IN NORTH SULAWESI


Location: Bunaken, North Sulawesi, Indonesia

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