Menjangan & West Bali, the area around Bat Cave

Menjangan & West Bali · Indonesia · Wall

Bat Cave

A face to 60 m, pocked with gaps that fish shelter in

Area photo: Bernard DUPONT · CC BY-SA 4.0

A wall at the south end of Menjangan whose face reaches 60 m, broken all the way down by large gaps and recesses that fish shelter in. The bottom is well past recreational limits and most divers never see it, so the dive is a shallower pass along a very deep face, worked opening by opening rather than by depth.

Also known as Menjangan - Bat Cave.

Where it is and how deep

Depth profile of Bat Cave: typical dive to 60 m (to 197 ft) 18 m · Open Water30 m · Advanced40 m · Recreational limit60 mtypical dive
Depths on a shared scale to 70 m (230 ft); dashed lines mark common certification limits.

8.0947° S, 114.5285° EPublished position for this site.

The dive

You drop onto the top of the reef and go over the lip onto a face that keeps going down to 60 m. Nothing about the wall marks where recreational diving stops, so the plan does: pick a depth, get there early, and hold it while the wall does the rest. What makes the site is the structure of the rock — the face is full of large gaps and openings, and they carry fish that use them as shelter.

The dive is run as a single pass with the wall on one shoulder, stopping at the openings rather than covering distance, then a slow return along the shallower part of the same face. Ascending along the rock keeps a reference the whole way up, which matters more here than on the island's shallower walls, and the safety stop is spent over the top of the reef where the wall begins.

Marine life and season

The sources we used don't single out particular species here.

Month-by-month season rating for Bat Cave
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
GoodGoodGoodPrimePrimePrimePrimePrimePrimePrimeGoodGood

Season follows Menjangan & West Bali: Divable all year thanks to the lee of Java; Apr–Nov is driest, and the wet season only affects surface conditions.

Know before you go

  • The wall runs to 60 m with no bottom in view, and there is no visual cue at recreational limits — set a hard maximum before the descent and watch the gauge along the face.

Sources

  1. Menjangan - Bat Cave — Scubago

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