Seulako Drift

The boat runs fifteen minutes from the beach and the group goes in together, because this is a drift and the water decides the route. The descent is onto a rocky, sloping reef rather than a coral shelf, and the dive settles at an average of 20 to 30 m along the slope, with the reef on one shoulder and open water on the other the whole way.

What you are there for is the traffic. Devil rays come through in schools, and reef sharks and trevally work the same ground, a slope carrying hard corals and fields of soft leather coral. The current is strong at times and it is not a site to swim against: you stay with it, keep the group together and let the reef go past rather than trying to hold position on it.

Ending the dive means leaving the slope into open water rather than climbing back to a shallow reef top, so the ascent is planned before you start it: send a surface marker up while you are still moving, then hold the safety stop drifting with the group rather than trying to hang on a fixed feature. The boat follows the marker and picks the group up wherever the current has carried it.