Kimbe Bay, PNG is in the heart of the Coral triangle.

February 20, 2024

The colour and variety of small reef fish is mesmerising and there are reef sharks, schooling jacks and barracuda to give you something larger to focus on out in the blue. Image Andrew Simpson

Anna Clague

Many years ago now, we took a trip to Walindi in PNG.

The resort is family owned and surrounded by jungle on one side and the ocean on the other. The diving from Walindi did not disappoint.
Our check out dive on the home reef included Octopus, nudis, blennies and a curious Peacock Mantis shrimp. This was also the location for a very memorable night dive with lots of interactive squid.

Denise's Pygmy Seahorse in a sea fan. Image Martin Wallis

Kimbe Bay is in the heart of the Coral triangle and the reefs are a mix of shallow bays and island walls, as well as standalone pinnacles and vast underwater reefs. The variety and health of the corals is glorious, and the coral cover is immense.

Pseudanthias congregate around the immense corals and healthy reef. Image Andrew Simpson

Pinnacles covered in bright red sea whips, all kinds of sea critters and huge sea fans, as well as sand banks full of garden eels. You will find Turtles cruising over the reefs with encrusting corals as far as you can see horizontally and vertically.
The colour and variety of small reef fish is mesmerising and there are reef sharks, schooling jacks and barracuda to give you something larger to focus on out in the blue. Ahhh the blue warm water. Your time spent at the surface between dives is a view of jungle covered tropical islands for you to bird watch, or flat calm oceans with snorkeling opportunities enticing you back into the water.

Schooling Barracuda form a tunnel. Image Andrew Simpson

"a leisurely cycle of sleep, dive, eat repeat"

The dive base is very well run, and you receive thorough briefings for each aspect of the dive day.The morning routine became a slick operation once we were shown the nitrox analysis procedures,
gear loading and dive day checks. We had the dive day routine down pat by day 2 and we all fell into
a leisurely cycle of sleep, dive, eat repeat with the odd deviation to wildlife and photography sorting (Walindi has a very good library you can utilize).

A reef shark cruising by check us out. Image Andrew Simpson

When you are ready to have a rest day from diving there are tours to see plane wrecks in the jungle, or soak in the local thermal pools with a mud bath rich in beautifying minerals. A tour of the local plantation is super interesting – seeing how this exists as a standalone community within the island.We missed out on visiting the local firefly trees because that evening we had a visit to the resort by the local cultural group including some super cute kids in traditional outfits putting on a show for the resort guests.

A tiny shrimp hides amongst the coral. Image Martin Wallis

My only regret is that our inbound connecting flight was missed meaning that some of the groupwere already at the resort and diving a day before we arrived. This lucky group managed to get
buzzed by a sailfish on their safety stop, and we got to hear all about it.