Tulamben: Coral Garden, Drop-Off, Alamanda, Melasti and Seraya Dive Sites
Scuba Diving Tulamben Macro Muck Sites Photography Gallery
Read more about the USAT Liberty, Bali's Tulamben most famous dive site.
Type:
Coastal reef, deep drop-off, headland and the world-famous USAT Liberty Shipwreck.
Access:
60 minutes by car from Padang Bai.
Dives to the USAT Liberty Wreck, Drop-Off, Coral Garden and Seraya dive sites start directly from the beach. The USAT Liberty Wreck lies less than 50m from shore!
Add 5 to 10 minutes by traditional boat (jukung) to go to Alamanda, Batu Kelebit and Emerald dive sites.
Coral Reef State:
Good variety of hard and soft corals, wreck completely covered, huge barrel sponges and large sea fans at the Drop-off.
The Coral Garden dive site is very interesting from a naturalist point of view, since the coral reef here gets battered by storms at times and gets destroyed before rebuilding itself relentlessly. This means that a large variety of species of corals are constantly competing to colonise this area and explains why this site is so rich in macro life!
Gigantic sponge formations and Gorgonian Seafans at Alamanda and Emerald dive sites.
Fish Species:
High density, over 400 species live at Tulamben's USAT Liberty wreck! Surgeon rabbit fish welcome divers as they unfortunately used to be attracted by fish feeding. Big potato groupers live at the wreck. Garden eels have colonised the shallow parts. A gigantic swirl of jackfish can usually be seen on top of the Liberty shipwreck. King barracudas are also often seen here along with a wealth of macro life, like frogfish, ornate ghost pipefish, nudibranches or pygmy seahorse. Despite this diversity, the USAT Liberty shipwreck remains best known for the school of bumphead parrotfish that sleep inside its hull at night.
Coral Garden, Drop-off and Seraya are mostly macro dive sites, where one can see two-spotted lionfish, moray eels, ribbon eels, rock groupers at cleaning stations, nudibranches, pygmy seahorse and sometimes even harlequin shrimps. Reef sharks like blacktips or whitetips can also be spotted here.
The jukung dive sites, like Alamanda, Batu Kelebit and Emerald offer a bit of everything and many large species are often attracted here by the fact that few divers come here. Napoleons and bumpheads, mantas and eagle rays, thresher and hammerhead sharks, and even whale sharks have all been spotted here!
Current:
None or very mild, easy dive sites, perfect conditions for beginners.
Visibility:
25m+. Good all year round!
Note:
Tulamben's USAT Liberty Shipwreck is Bali's most popular dive site. Arriving here early is paramount to having a good first dive in the high season (July-October). We leave the Geko Dive shop at 8:00AM sharp in order to avoid the crowds of divers from Sanur and Nusa Dua.
Highlights:
School of bumphead parrotfish sleeping on the wreck at night and the gloomy atmosphere are unforgettable memories!
Some of the very best macro dive sites in the world.
