Sam's Tours Palau
I have dreamed of diving in Palau for many years, and finally I managed to squeeze in 6 days of diving after a work trip. WOW! For such a small country Palau has a bit of everything - macro, big fish, drop-offs, drift dives, cave dives and the list goes on.
I had heard some good things about Sam's Tours and this was also the dive operator recommended by Bluewater Travel. I wasn't disappointed. The operation is big and popular which I generally don't like, but I was also clear at the beginning that I preferred diving with experienced divers and doing dives which depart from the norm. I was told about the Unique Dive Experience which is offered by Sams Tours in collaboration with two local marine biologists. They have studied Red Snapper and Bumphead Parrot spawning for the last few years and are now able to predict fairly well when and where they will spawn. They require divers to be a minimum Advanced OpenWater and to be comfortable diving on their own - just what I like!! The two days I did Unique dives were amazing. They are a bit on the expensive side, but otherwise the chance to see spawning Red Snapper was brilliant. This was a great start to my trip. I then joined the normal Sams Tours' dives. They do a good job of trying to keep divers together with dive guides they are comfortable with, and also other divers who are diving for more than one day. This also enables the group to not dive the same sites too often.
Lunch is provided which is pretty good. Dive briefings were sometimes a little brief, and I had one boat without an auto bilge pump on a day with rough weather, but other than that the operation was great.
Sams Tours has a wall dive right next to the shop which is a great place to see Mandarin Fish and just across from the shop is Chandelier cave which was just wonderful. They also come and pick you up from your hotel every morning and always have a driver waiting to take you back.
There is a bar at Sams and always a few people hanging around to share dive tales. The atmosphere was great.
I am just looking for another excuse to go back...
