This trip in April/May 1999 marks my fourth trip on the Tiata and my fourth trip to Milne Bay Papua New Guinea. My first trip to Milne Bay was on the Telita and my first trip on the Tiata was to Kavieng. The Tiata changes locations to maximize seasonal weather and provide the best diving for that particular season/location. Kavieng is more oriented towards pelagics whereas Milne Bay is more of a rare critter location. While the boat itself has not changed at all since my first trip on it, the crew has evolved somewhat. Kevin Baldwin, the owner of the Tiata, is now the skipper as well. Kevin, like Dave Miller before him, loves to dive and is extremely adept at finding the unusual and rare critters endemic to Milne Bay. Marti, the cook on all of my trips remains and her desserts are getting even better if such is possible. Ella remains as chief steward but Steve and Dan are now the dive team instead of Jonathan.
The boat is GORGEOUS and is extremely well maintained with nice touches abounding.
While not roomy, at sixty six feet, it is adequate and exceptionally well laid
out with scuba divers in mind. Every inch is used maximally for crew storage
and/or diver comfort. Supplies are stored under the seats in the lounge, under
the dive deck and in other locations which would otherwise be dead space. Even
the bathrooms are designed to maximize usable space. The dive deck is not as
spacious as the Telita, Paradise Sport, or especially the Bilikiki; with ten
divers preparing to go in the water simultaneously things can get crowded such
that divers must be "processed" serially rather than concurrently.
There is an outdoor table for meals that will barely accommodate all ten divers
and this is often used for camera maintenance in between dives. There are 12
small camera cubicles indoors, each with a charging outlet but there is no camera
table due to lack of room; cameras are stored on the floor outside the lounge
around the outside eating area; this does not present a problem. On this trip
we had 23 cameras for 10 divers and all were accommodated easily. Tanks are
steel rather than aluminum which meant that many of us did not use or have the
need for weight belts. Both 90 and 100 cubic foot tanks are available. Air fills
are 3000 psi+ and refills are promptly accommodated even for back to back dives
in shallow areas. We had some divers who spent 8+ hours underwater on some days.
At 66 feet, the Tiata has 5 double cabins for guests, additional cabins for the captain and for the cook, and one below deck for the crew of three. The cabins are small but comfortable and are laid out well. The boat has two desalinators so fresh water is plentiful with unlimited showers on the dive deck and in the two heads which are internal to the boat and are used by the guests; there are an additional two heads for use of the crew. As there was rarely any kind of wait for the heads, this seemed quite adequate. The boat also has stabilizers which can be beneficial in seas that are less than calm. On our trip, the weather was nice and the seas were very calm except for one evening storm.
Meals on the Tiata were sensational! Martina is a trained gourmet chef and she is able to create amazing fare from a galley that is almost microscopic. Her desserts and snacks are often killers; she knows how to use chocolate in sinful ways with "Death by Chocolate" being the ultimate dessert served on the final evening.
There is a video monitor available for viewing video and good E6 processing available at a cost of $10/roll whenever there are five rolls in the jar.
Water temperature was a warm 82 degrees for most dives and most people wore little or no thermal protection but protection from stings is recommended. Some dives had very strong currents but most had mild or no current at all. In some cases current lines were desirable and available. Visibility on the reef dives was exceptional approaching 100 feet horizontally.
Passages were often done at night (at a cost of sleep if you are unable to sleep during passages but no passage was exceptionally long) so there were always five or even more dives available including a night dive on most nights. In some locations due to the shallow depth, dives were 2 hours plus.
The diving on our trip could be characterized as approximately 60% reef diving and 40% muck diving. With the excellent visibility there were many opportunities for excellent wide angle. The muck diving occasionally had visibility as low as 40 feet.
The day starts out with an early breakfast followed by a 8:00 AM dive. After a suitable surface interval (remember you are a LONG way from a chamber) the second morning dive is followed shortly by lunch. The first afternoon dive is at 1:30 and the second afternoon dive is about 4:00 PM. My only complaint is that dinner was not until 7:30 or sometimes later which made night diving start a tad late for my taste. There were plenty of snacks available at all times.
We were fortunate to find many rare critters but some of the rare critters found the preceding year were not in attendance. Some of the critters included: Mimic Octopus, cuttlefish, squid, Ghost Pipefish (less than previously), Pigmy Seahorses, Rhinopias in four colors, Caledonian Stingers, Cockatoo Waspfish, and a variety of nudibranchs but less than on prior years. There were also various and sundry shrimp, eels, etc.
To say that Chris and Deda are personable is to greatly understate their charm, sense of humor, and warm personalities. It is obvious that they really care about whether their guests have a good time and they do everything in their power to make sure the trip runs smoothly and that each person feels included. Chris produced two slide shows that illustrate the elements of composition with some of his own slides.
If you are curious about what Chris and Deda shoot, as I was, I will share that information with you. In prior years, for macro, Chris used a modified Ikelite housing (modified for attaching TLC arms) and two Ikelite SS50 using a 100 or 200 mm lens on a Canon body. For wide angle, both used an Aquatica housing with two Ikelite SS200.
However, both Chris and Deda have changed cameras! They have moved to use the new Subeye camera and have four of them, two for macro, and two for wide angle. This trip, in effect was the beta test for these cameras. While some bugs were found, the manufacturer seemed quite willing to fix these bugs and as such, despite their shortcomings, these cameras have amazing potential. First of all, using an adapter, they take all of the RS lenses. For those shooting with the Nikonos RS, a body which has been discontinued, this protects their sizable investment in lenses. For those lucky enough to have the new German made 18 mm rectilinear lens, this means SLR water contact optics for wide angle. But the real advantage is that the Subeye allows shooting extreme (!) macro at 2:1, 3:1 or even greater magnification. This is done using a Nikon 105 mm or 200 mm lens coupled with either extension tubes or tele-converters and then coupled with closeup lens diopters. For more information about this camera, contact Chris and Deda at Rainbowed Sea Tours.
Ok, so would I go back? I would dive Milne Bay again in a heartbeat and I would repeat diving with Chris and Deda at every opportunity!!