Blue Manta

Blue Manta is a 46-metre steel liveaboard that works the eastern half of Indonesia all year round. The operator is White Manta Diving, a Singapore company whose fleet also includes the New White Manta and the Manta X — easy to mix up on the water. Blue Manta is the one with the blue hull, white superstructure and the script “KM Blue Manta” on the side; her port of registry is Batam.

The hull was built for crossings, not for looks. Heavy steel, a 10-metre beam, around 580 tonnes displacement, twin 450 hp Cummins engines, three gensets, two watermakers producing 10 tonnes of fresh water a day each and a 3,000-nautical-mile range. Hence the geography: she crosses the Banda Sea and the Ring of Fire, runs Sorong to Kaimana and Alor to Ambon — the legs wooden phinisis do not do. Cruising speed is 10 knots.

There are fourteen cabins, all en-suite, all with individually controlled air conditioning and all around 20 sqm — generous by liveaboard standards. Six sit on the upper deck with proper windows (C1–C4 with a 1.8 × 2.0 m double bed, C5–C6 with two singles), four on the main deck also with windows (C7–C8 twins, C9–C10 with a 1.5 × 2.0 m queen plus a single) and four on the lower deck with portholes (C11–C14, twins). Beds are fixed in wooden frames and cannot be moved. Up to 22 places are sold, and a full charter is the same 22.

The crew numbers 20: three captains and deck officers, three engineers, five dive guides, three chefs, a masseuse, two hostesses, a cruise leader with an instructor rating and two tender drivers. There are four tenders of 5.8 m with 60 hp outboards, so groups go in small batches. Photographers get a dedicated set-up: an enclosed air-conditioned camera room, a wide outdoor work table, blow-dry stations and a personal rinse tank for every diver — rare even on expensive boats. The ratio on a group is four photographers to one guide.

Meals come five times a day: a light breakfast before the first dive, a full one after, lunch, an afternoon snack and dinner. Bread is baked on board, the kitchen is Western and Indonesian, buffets and plated dinners both. Starlink satellite Wi-Fi runs around the clock but is paid — $35 for a 10 GB card. There is massage, laundry and a satellite phone.

About money, know this in advance: the trip price excludes two compulsory payments the operator collects before departure — the marine park and harbour fee, and the fuel surcharge. Together they run $400 to $620 per person and depend on the itinerary: Komodo and Triton Bay are cheapest, the Raja Ampat to Triton Bay crossings the most expensive. The operator states plainly that the rates are dynamic and can change. Two more compulsory items are dive insurance and travel insurance: without both you are not taken on board. Nitrox, gear rental, alcohol, massage and internet are settled on board at the end of the trip.

The operator describes the experience level the same way for all its itineraries — intermediate to advanced — and publishes no formal minimum number of logged dives. The rules are strict elsewhere, though: a dive computer is compulsory for every diver, the boat runs a no-decompression policy, maximum depth is 35 m, and guests are asked to stay at 20–25 m and always shallower than their guide. In the Banda Sea it is three dives a day rather than four — deeper dives, longer passages. Anyone treated for decompression illness in the past twelve months, or with a condition affecting fitness to dive, needs a doctor’s clearance letter before boarding. The nearest recompression chambers are on Bali, in Kalimantan, Makassar, Manado, Waisai and Jakarta, and from much of the route that is a long way.

The vessel takes long yard periods and announces them well ahead: 6 to 29 January 2027, 4 May to 27 August 2027 (nearly four months) and 6 to 21 January 2028. No trips run in those windows. Single occupancy costs 20% on top of the trip price; on Blue Manta no more than two twin cabins on the upper and main decks are sold single, and any further single occupancy goes to the lower deck. Non-divers get a 10% discount.