Bali liveaboard?

Having just found out that July '06 charter of Kararu's Sea Safari III that
I had been planning on going on has been canceled due to lack of interest, I
now have plane tickets sending me to Bali for two weeks with no place to go.

morgand...

Greg, i dont know if this will help you but..........when we were in Bali
we dived with "aquamarine", they were at the recent "Dive 05" show at the
NEC in Birmingham uk, and Annabelle who runs the operation in Bali has
said.............
"

Greg Mossman...

Thanks. I had looked into Pelagian's schedule and found out they were now
based in Wakatobi, but I still have my heart set on diving Komodo on an
11-night itinerary. I do have a confirmation with Kararu's Voyager, but
getting them a deposit to hold it has been troublesome since their fax
machine isn't picking up (or when it does, it makes a very faint attempt at
"handshaking" which my loud-talking American fax machine ignores). Out of
frustration, I've decided to give a travel agent a chance: Island Dreams,
listed as one of Kararu's local agents. Normally I like to do it myself,
but I figure an agency who books often with them will have more clout than
an individual, in case the boat wants to do something funny like bump me at
the last minute to secure an full-boat charter. I'll let the agency deal
with the money and paperwork and if I have problems I can pick up the phone
and talk to someone during my normal waking hours whose first language is
English. We'll see . . .

morgand...

OK, you should give Annabelle a call, she just might be able to help, you
have nothing to loose. She is English but has been in Bali for some time
and understands the indonesian way of doing things........

Greg Mossman...

After some e-mailing back and forth with Indonesia, we finally got my boat
reservations transferred to the travel agent's capable hands. Instead of
the rigamarole of having to fax all this paperwork to a broken fax machine
in Indonesia, complete with copies of both sides of the credit card,
passport, etc., I simply gave the travel agent my credit card number over
the phone and it's done. I'm now booked and confirmed. Komodo here I come.

I'll do Wakatobi some time in the future, I'm sure. But I'm already flying
three legs to get to Bali, a total of 18 hours in the air plus airport time
in between and an overnight at LAX, so I can't imagine wanting to do any
more traveling other than climbing into the back of a taxi, until our bags
are aboard and the boat leaves the dock. Plus infernal Continental hasn't
upgraded us yet on the HNL-GUM legs even though I bought the plane tix and
got on the upgrade waiting list at the earliest point possible. If I get
stuck spending 7.5 hours in coach with my "big bones", even though we did
score our own row of two together in bulkhead, I definitely won't be in the
mood to cram myself onto a puddle jumper. (It's not all fat. My skeleton
measures 24.5" wide from shoulder-to-shoulder. Economy-class seats on
Continental's 767-400 are 17.9" wide. Where do I stick the other 6.6"?
Usually it hangs into the aisle, unless I'm unlucky enough not to get an
aisle seat. Then I get smacked by passengers heading to the head, and
flight attendants with their heavy metal carts and politically correct large
derriers. Sleep is entirely out of the question.)

morgand...

Pay the extra and get the "B I G" seats.........;^) i have a smile on my
face now, i have just received two minutes ago our tickets out to
Singapore for our trip to Sulawesi......happy times........

Dave Morgan @ Work in the UK

Dave Morgan @ Work in the UK

morgand...

Dave Morgan @ Work in the UK

morgand...

Now that your in Bali, your in Indonesia, one of the really great places
for diving, your only a short distance from Sipadan and Mabul and flights
are cheap out there........you get a cheap hop to loads of
places.....Malaysia, Borneo, Philipines, Sulawesi.....even Oz....

Dave Morgan @ Work in the UK

Does anyone have any recent experience with Kararu or with the Komodo Dancer
(providing there's still space available)?

I've read some positive and some less positive reviews on the Dancer from
Undercurrent's publicly accessible reviews, and slightly more positive
reviews about the Sea Safari III. The problem is that Kararu is obtaining a
new boat, the Voyager, to be put into service in February. The itinerary
for our planned charter, now canceled, has apparently been moved onto the
new boat, an as-yet unknown quantity. So my choice is (a) trying to get on
the Dancer instead, (b) sticking with Kararu if they can book me direct, but
planning on going out on a boat that's still in the process of being
converted to a dive boat, or (c) finding yet another liveaboard. I suppose
I could monkey around with the plane tickets, but that will not only cost me
money but also lose me my place in the upgrade wait-list on the HNL-GUM legs
of the trip. Since I've already planned on those weeks off, and it's
supposedly the best time of the year to go, I'd rather stick with the
itinerary I have.

The Dancer is smaller and has some reports of leaky cabins (from rain). On
the other hand, it's a bit cheaper (especially with free booze figured in)
and I'm going in the dryest month of the year so leaks shouldn't be an
issue. I have booking requests into both their websites and hope to hear
back early this week as to what options I truly have available to me, but if
anyone has a preference, please let me know it and why.