Kimbe Bay

Diving here is shore-based and short-range: boats run from jetties on the bay's southern shore, and a normal day is two or three dives with the surface interval taken on board or back at the resort. Inshore reefs are a quick run out; the offshore shoals take longer and usually get the first slot of the morning. Crews pick the running order on the day, by wind and sea state rather than by a fixed rotation. Liveaboards provision in the same bay before working further along the New Britain coast, so many visitors combine the two.

The bay is deep and volcanic, backed by cone-shaped hills, and that shape sets up two different kinds of dive. Along the shoreline, fringing slopes and shallow bommies sit in calm water on easy profiles. Offshore, isolated seamounts rise out of blue water and crest well within recreational depth; those are the sites that catch current and hold the fish schools. Heavy rain on the hinterland can push runoff into the inshore water and soften visibility for a day or two.

The draw is coral density at close range. Bommie tops carry soft coral and anemone carpets with their resident clownfish, sea fans and whip corals stand out into the flow on the pinnacle walls, and the water above them stays busy with anthias and fusiliers. It is wide-angle diving first, though guides also work the sand and rubble between coral heads for nudibranchs and smaller subjects when the light goes flat or the sea is up.

Conditions are forgiving — warm water, gentle current on most sites — so mixed-ability groups do well, helped by reefs that offer a shallow top and a deeper slope off the same descent line. Remoteness is the real constraint: bring spares for anything you cannot dive without, since resupply means a flight, and treat evacuation as a multi-leg journey when you plan profiles and insurance. Divers whose priority is wrecks or big-animal encounters should set expectations before booking.