Bamboo Reef Scuba Diving Centers - Bamboo Reef Scuba Diving Centers

Harley: Indonesia, here we come. – checked in at San Francisco International Airport (SFO) - International Terminal. August 17 at 1:14pm via mobile

Our Santika, Indonesia trip starts in San Francisco.  26 guests including our fearless leaders
Keith McNutt all arrived on time at San Francisco Airport for the first leg of our trip to Korea.  In Korea we make a short stop to refuel and for our next hop to Singapore.

Harley: Arrived in Seoul. Shortly departing on to Singapore - at Inchon Airport South Korea - August 18 at 2:50am via mobile

We arrived in Singapore a little after 2am in the morning and we have an almost 8 hour delay between sites.  For most on the trip it’s an opportunity to check into one of the airports Travel Hotels for a 6 hour period and get some rest and save the energy for the coming day of diving.

Our 3 and ½ hour flight from Singapore to Manado, the main city in Santika was soon over. After disembarking we passed through Immigration, collected our luggage and were soon through customs.

On the other side we were met by several Santika Resort representatives who loaded our luggage and all of us into several waiting vans for the 40 minute ride over to the resort.

Harley: We arrived safe and sound. Will eat dinner soon. at Santika Hotel - August 19 at 3:35am via mobile

Upon arriving at the resort we each received a refresh coconut with straws making the refreshing drink quickly consumable.  It didn’t take long before we each were in our rooms with luggage delivered.

After refreshing, we all met down at the dive shop to check in and prepare all our equipment for our diving starting the next day.  We immediately began to appreciate the personalized service – “Just drop off your dive equipment and we will do the rest.”  Each diver received a plastic crate where with the assistance of the staff each piece of our equipment was tagged with our names and placed in the crate.

Once our equipment was ready, it was time for our briefing. We eagerly listened as Simone Gerritsen (the dive shop manager, originally from Holland), told us about the islands and the various dive sites we would soon visit.  A large map on the wall listed all the sites and was used for reference in detailing all the cool critters that we might see at each of the locations.

All that was left to do – eat, sleep and show up on the dock at 8am.

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