Dive Into Lembeh Resort is a one hour drive from Manado Airport on the Bitung side of Lembeh Strait. We received a warm welcome by owner Miranda and team with a delicious mango juice on a sultry night scented with tropical flowers while we completed our registration. I loved everything about the resort, the beautiful gardens and level setting over looking the pool and the Strait, especially the personal hot tubs on your bungalow deck heated for you just before returning from your afternoon dive.

The Indonesian style bungalows with AC were huge, thoughtfully decorated with a king bed, a single day bed and a long shelf desk with plenty of charging points. There was a filtered drinking water dispenser, fridge and tea and coffee in the room. There are also TV's in the room and wifi available throughout the resort.

The hospitality team were attentive, well trained and their English was very good. There was a full bar and lounge in the common area where delicious meals were served buffet style with plenty of variety. Self serve tea, coffee and cookies were available all day.

The resort sits on a fine black sand beach typical of Lembeh Strait. There is a large dive centre, individual gear hanging stalls and bins, a huge camera work room, with good lights, charging outlets, rinse pool bins and drying guns.

The diving was organised between 3 boats that were well set up for photographers. The dive guide ratio was 1:2 with some guests requesting a private guide, so they have a very large dive team including a photo pro. Most of the dive sites were within 20 minutes of the resort and they dived both sides of the Strait.

Lembeh is known for its' marvellous macro critters and their guides are excellent spotters. They also used slates and thoughtfully kept a written record of each creature spotted and photographed, so you could take a photo record of that list at the end of your dive. They offered Nitrox so 70 minute dives were the norm, sometimes even longer when you are totally absorbed photographing an adorable coconut octopus.

The muck diving capital of Indonesia attracts the curious diver and macro underwater photographers. This type of diving rewards the patient, slow moving diver having near perfect buoyancy and good air consumption with amazing critters and their habitat on a black sand or silty bottom. Good buoyancy control and etiquette is essential for good visibility and diver harmony to take care not to stir up the bottom with your fins.

Most of us depend on dive guides that know the sites well and have a super-power for spotting the sometimes miniscule, well camouflaged and unusual bottom dwelling creatures.

My favourites seen are the velvet Rhinopias, hairy frog fish, well any frog fish really, ghost pipe fish, seahorses and coconut octopus as they are all a good size for my camera set-up. The blue-ring octopus and mimic octopus are amazing to watch and so much smaller than one expects.

Most dive sites seem to be a special hangout for a particular species. You may spend 20-30 minutes searching before it is found by your guides. So meanwhile you mooch around until your own eyes become accustomed to the black sands and the small bits of fluff that hide their special jewels, just like a treasure hunt really.