Munda & Ghizo by Dan Kessler

Munda & Ghizo, Western Solomons, 1999
Author: Dan Kessler

My flight on Qantas/American Airlines from JFK started at 8:00 A.M., arriving 5-1/2 hours later at Los Angeles at 10:30 A.M. Thence on to Sydney at l:00 P.M., on a non-stop Qantas flight that is a ‘day trip' as opposed to an overnight one. With this flight, you avoid to some degree, the excessive jet lag you would otherwise experience on a overnight flight. Arrival in Sydney after 14-1/2 hours allows one the option of a night's rest at a hotel before proceeding on to a dive destination and more reasonable and cost effective access to destinations such as the Solomon Islands. The road into Sydney's Kings Cross Area was full of detours. Sydney is getting a make-over with a lot of tunneling and road work in advance of the 2000 Olympics.

After a 2-day stopover in Sydney, I headed North to Brisbane to board my flight to Honiara. The Solomon Airlines/Qantas flight allows for a thrice weekly access to the Solomon Islands. Most of my travel was on friendly frequent flyer air miles, a 26,000 mile jaunt which holds out the possibility of a free flight in the not too distant future.

Unfortunately, the Thursday flight to Honiara is a late evening one, arriving after 1:00 A.M. On the other hand, the Tuesday and Saturday flights are morning departures which allow residents of Brisbane, Sydney or Melbourne the luxury of flying to the Solomons in the morning, arriving at the resort and diving the reefs the next day. In my case, I prefer access to the Solomons via Sydney/Brisbane rather than through Nadi, Fiji.

At check-in at Brisbane, I am overweight at 70 kilos when only 20 are allowed with my scuba gear, 3 u/w cameras and 2 strobes. However, an early afternoon check-in at Brisbane allowed me to avoid excessive baggage charges, thanks to a kindly minded check-in counter attendant. Just about everyone checking in later that evening was hammered with overweight charges. It sometimes pays to check in very, very early.

In Honiara, at l AM, I found my way to the hotel King Solomon who forgot to send their courtesy van but did pay the cab driver for the fare. My outgoing flight to Munda was at 7:00 AM and the hotel restaurant was still ‘dark' when I left on an empty stomach. It was irritating to pay $90 for your basic hotel/motel room in Honiara but there are few hotels in Honiara and the ones that exist cater to the business traveler, not backpackers or scuba divers. The Mandana in Honiara is badly in need of refurbishing so the King Solomon is probably the better choice.

My twin Otter flight to Munda was a 19-seat affair and wasn't filled. My excess baggage charge was $35 [Solomon dollars, about $8 in U.S. Dollars] although the clerk had insisted on twice that amount. I noted from my prior 3 trips to the Solomons that the clerks tend to ask for double what they think they can get.

I have often found it odd that American divers prefer a dedicated dive resort, such as Uepi and tend to shun those dive destinations that are not of that type. Munda is a small town located around a dirt air strip. The Agnes Hotel is just across the street from the air terminal but faces the water where the dive boats depart. The rooms are small cottages raised off the ground. No a/c and the Solomons can be a hot place. I was grateful for the cloud cover which kept temperatures down.

Prior my departure, a glance at the world weather seemed to show a permanent ‘low pressure' over the Solomons. This pattern continued during my visit. Many of the Solomon Islanders in both Munda and Ghizo had running noses and complained that the weather was ‘too cold' for them and was making them ‘sick'.

At the Agnes Lodge, I was met by David Cooke of Solomon Divers. Dave is from the UK and he runs a very competent dive operation. Fortunately, my early arrival allowed me to join the late departing morning dive which leaves ‘island time', i.e., about 9:30 A.M. I dropped my camera gear, donned my scuba gear and headed for the reefs of Munda and managed two dives on my arrival day of my 3-dive days at Agnes Lodge. As it turned out, 3 diving days is adequate to sample the diving in Munda.

Because of the rain and water run-off, the viz was probably not as good as it could be. I would say that it was about 60 feet. There was reasonably good fish life and healthy corals but not as prolific or as varied as at Uepi two years ago. However, both Uepi and Munda are located on opposite ends of a larger island, New Georgia. Some of Dave's walls were a bit barren or missing large gorgonians. There was an occasional eel, a shark here and there, a school of Barracuda or we might happen upon a turtle. I had an encounter with an aggressive big green trigger who must have been protecting a nest, the one some divers call "Charlie, the wrecker". The drama of having big animals such a rays or large sharks was missing. Still, Dave's biggest ‘calling card' has got to be his cave 150 foot long tunnel which is a must!

One is obliged to don scuba gear with camera in hand, step out of the boat in shallow water and walk a few meters into the bush of a dense forest separating the lagoon from the reef. A small path takes one to what looks like a well, a few steps into the growth. The mouth of the well is rather ample in proportion. At this point, you don your flippers and proceed down into the well. At about 40 feet, it widens and levels off at a less steep grade. At 95 feet you are at the threshold of several galleries. At this point, no light penetrates here and it is pitch black. For some perhaps less experienced, this would be a little scary but in my view, I thought the well looked rather inviting. Althoughthe descent into the well is in fresh water, eventually, you are in salt water. There is reasonably good ‘viz' except Dave allows only allow 4 divers at a time in the cave since there is the prospect of stirring up too much sediment. Divers are required to show their log books and only experienced divers are permitted on this dive.

Unfortunately, I was the last of 4 divers with my camera to enter the cave with my Ikelite 150 which becomes a ‘torch' when needed. I would have preferred to have been behind the guide. When we arrived at the first ‘gallery' with a cathedral-like ceiling, there were lobsters or crayfish in various nooks and crannies. The cave remains pitch black until you reach the last gallery which opens into the sea or reef wall at about 75 feet down the outside reef wall where we were joined there by the others divers who were not permitted to pass through the 150 foot long cave. I only wish that there were more gorgonians or fans to frame the cave entrance, but that is a small cavil. The cave is heaps of fun and a ‘must' for anyone even thinking of visiting the Solomon Islands and might consider themselves blase divers who've seen everything. There is another, deeper cave at 140 feet that is dead-ended and full of sediment that is only yards away. Dave will not take anyone there.

The outside reef wall was rather vertical but leveled off at about 125 feet. No inviting fans hanging off it as one might see in Palau or the Coral Sea. Again, there was scattered u/w flora which was typical of many of the Munda sites. However, Dave does has his handsome stands of green staghorn coral [Dendrophilia]. WWII buffs can also dive a Douglas Airplane in 20 feet of murky water.

The food at the Agnes Lodge was just adequate and every Friday after dinner they have disco night and the place takes on the aura of a night club for a while. While at the Agnes Lodge, there was a brief ‘outage' of electricity after I returned from the 2nd dive of the day when I was charging my strobes. Apparently, there's a new generator on the island and the hotel was mandated to ditch its own emergency generator to hook up to a new grid. Occasionally, ‘outages' occur and hopefully, the electricity will kick back on after an hour or.

My flight to Ghizo was to be at 10 AM but if the twin Otter has no one to drop off in Sege after departing Honiara, the plane could arrive early and depart Munda ahead of schedule. A last minute rush got me on the 10 minutes flight to Ghizo without excess baggage charges.

At Ghizo, one lands on an air strip that is two small islands bulldozed together and the journey to Ghizo itself is made by launch. It isn't a long strip and some enterprising Australian tried to establish an airline with some old DC-3's to run service between Cairns and Ghizo. It was a 5-hour flight but after 3 flights, the CAA of Australia ‘pulled the chord' on the King Solomon Airways which existed as an airline for about 5 minutes feeling that the Ghizo runway too short for the aircraft.

Danny Kennedy of Adventure Sports met me at the airport with his private boat. Some of you may have already heard about Danny Kennedy, an American who has been running one of the two dive operations in Ghizo for about 12 years.

I checked into the Gizo Hotel. Kindly note that the island is ‘Ghizo' while the town is spelled ‘Gizo. Danny wanted to know if I wanted a morning dive which I did. He asked that I be ready in 40 minutes and I was, including my camera and headed off with one of his assistants to a nearby reef since the other dive boat was just concluding the day's first dive and I was to join them for the in between dive break. The break between dives occasions the laying out of several cans of tuna and fresh bread. A small jar of mayonnaise I left behind in my refrigerator would have been welcome.

After my 2nd dive, it was evident that Danny Kennedy's reefs had a lot more life on them than did Dave Cooke's reefs in Munda. There are some impressive gorgonians, an occasional banded sea snake, groupers, puffer fish, triggers, King Angels, many butterfly fish plus the ever present Moorish Idol and Sweet Lips and anemones with clown fish of many different colors, the so-called Tomato one and the coral colored one with a white strip among others. At a couple of dive sites, there was a Napoleon wrasse weaving in and out of view. Danny even has a dive site where the illusive cuttlefish can frequently be seen. I was puzzled not to notice of clown triggers and distressed to see small reef fish for sale in the town market. The rain run-off and the occasional cloud cover dampened the viz at reef level which might have hampered shooting wide angle pictures and a macro rig would have been a better choice since there were ample opportunities among the coral rubble to find interesting subjects, nudibranchs, worms, etc.

On the 2nd day I dove the Toa Maru, a Japanese wreck which did not impress in spite of its 400 foot length. I suppose that once you've had 4 different trips to the SS Coolidge in nearby Vanuatu, not much comes up to that level. There was no aura of the ship as with the Coolidge, like the Phantom of the Opera. It is a rather bare wreck but in spite of its limitation, divers appear eager to visit it. As for myself, I was relieved not to repeat this dive.

Danny promised me a great variety of sites over 6-days and he delivered. I racked in 12 dives in Ghizo. His reefs have good fish life although some fish looked a little ‘spooked' but diving here is definitely a step up from Fiji at its best but not quite the glory that can be found in a place like Walindi [Papua New Guinea] which is the next country since the island of Bougainville is not really that far away when you are this far afield in the Western Solomons. One must remember that the British allowed or re-located Gilbertese here and they have the reputation of destroying everything on the reef they can get their hands on. For this reason, diving locations in Kiribati, must suffer terribly.

The Truk Aggressor is due in Ghizo shortly with Danny Kennedy in some way involved in this upcoming venture where the Agressor will alternate between Truk and Ghizo. There will be 7-day excursions to nearby reefs ranging up to the island of Vella LaVella where Danny claims there is good and exciting diving even though the Agressor may ‘drift' as far Southeast as the Marova lagoon. Apparently, the Shortland Islands which ‘abut' the large island of Bougainville do not show much promise as prospective dive sites. Some of the larger islands have river run-off problems that do not allow good dive sites while smaller islands don't have good reefs. After 4 trips to the Solomon Islands, my sense is that the prospects for good diving vary considerably.

One of the best reefs I visited had an endless patch of large stands of green elephant's ear of which I've never seen the equal. Again, there were clusters of impressive Turbanarium [large cabbage looking coral] as well as Dendrophilia [green staghorn coral], mushroom corals, raspberry corals, countless other hard corals including soft corals such as leather and velvet corals of many varieties as well as occasional banded sea snake. All of the corals were in excellent condition as if a flipper had never been near them. To my mind, this is why traveling 10,000 miles makes sense when one can dive the glorious reefs of the far Western Pacific where warm tropical seas guarantee the possibility of viewing 400-600 corals.

The room at the Gizo Hotel had a/c and caused me to have a running battle with a head cold. These individual a/c units in developing countries are often exceedingly noisy, they don't dehumidify the air, they just blast moist cold air into the room. It is enough to kill you. I had to resort to cold tables and decongestants to keep on diving. Again, all the natives in Ghizo were down with colds and the dusty road in front of the hotel afforded the germs to the opportunity to attach themselves to the dust as a conveyor to transmit the germs to your lungs. I didn't take the Malaria prophylactic even though I foolishly went to dinner in Munda with shorts and suffered mosquito bites at dusk at a time when Malaria infested mosquitos are thought to prowl. It pays to bring along some insect spray. Although there have been some recent incidents of Malaria in Honiara or its environs, there were no reported outbreaks of Malaria in either Munda or Ghizo. This is my 4th trip to the Solomons so maybe I'm getting careless. So far, no Malaria!

I didn't take my meals at the hotel Gizo restaurant. Instead, all of the divers seem to gravitate to the PT 109 restaurant located across from Danny's dive shop where a 3-course meal cost only $9 [U.S.], an extraordinary bargain, by any measure. Soup, main course and dessert for $37 [Solomon dollars] which is a 4-to one exchange rate. I have never eaten so well for so little. One night they served Spaghetti with Bolognese meat sauce. Fortunately, I had brought along a small plastic container of freshly grated Parmesan cheese from Italy which came in handy. The PT109 restaurant takes its name from the boat commanded by John F. Kennedy during WWII. There is a so-called ‘Kennedy Island' where we took several dive breaks which is the island where JFK spent a couple of days after his boat was broken up by a Japanese ship on a foggy night.

Speaking of bringing along food, I also brought along Miso paste, dried tuna flakes and dried seaweed and with the hot water kettle which is standard in hotel rooms in the Western Pacific, made a very acceptable Miso soup. Those familiar with the ‘Japanese kitchen' know that Miso soup is an energizer and a good ‘pick-up'.. Miso, as we know, is made from fermented grains and is a great source of energy replacement. After a pickup bowl of Miso soup, I was ready to head for the reefs.

Ghizo is an attractive island and is more mountainous than Munda. Ghizo is in between a large volcano island of Kolambagara and Vella LaVella. The volcano is split down the middle and is about 5,000 feet high and the island is covered with thick forests. The volcano is climbed by hikers accompanied by a guide and spend the night on the mountain and return the next day. Apparently, the summit affords wonderful views on a clear day for islands as far away as Bougainville. Scientist estimate that the volcano has been quiet for the past 400 years.

Danny Kennedy runs a very good operation and arranges to transport guests from hotels to his shop. I do believe that 6-days of diving was just fine for Ghizo. The dive boats had cover from the sun and Danny's staff was very efficient and helpful. There were sharks, turtles and pygmy mantas flying in formation to be seen on many of the dives and a Hell Cat fighter if you fancy downed WWII aircraft. Both Munda and Ghizo feature more or less shallow reefs. Dave Cooke's reefs are more vertical than are Danny Kennedy's. No dramatic drop-offs into the abyss at either.

All in all, it was 9 days of diving. Two years ago at Uepi, they tried to deny me my last dive, saying I must observe their 24 rule before flights. I did get Danny Kennedy to modify this to something closer to the customary 12 hour requirement which allowed me the 2nd dive on my last day in Ghizo on a shallow reef. Incidentally, the Australian couple who ran Uepi Resort have left and have been replaced by Jim [forgot his last name] who was already working on the premises two years ago. I was pleased to speak with Jim briefly at the Sege field when our Twin Otter stopped there on the way back to Honiara. Uepi has been able to sell itself to the diving public as an adjunct to a stay on the Bilikiki, a live-aboard plying the waters of the Florida Islands, the Russells and an edge of the Morava Lagoon. It is a pity that both Munda and Ghizo do not seem to attract this crowd or those who are marketing Uepi. This may change when the Agressor opens up new and more exciting possibilities with its projected operations out of Ghizo and Dave Cooke'e ‘cave' in Munda may suddenly appear on the radar screen of every diver who feels they've been here and done that!

On Sunday I left Ghizo on a series of connecting flights--Honiara, Brisbane, Sydney, LAX, JFK that got me home after 23 hours of flying, an exhaustive endeavor that left me with residual jet lag for a week.

In summary, the cost of the trip was around $3,500 over 14 days--about $250 per day or with 18 dives, $194 per dive. Still, $3,500 could also be a fancier trip aboard a live-aboard in the Caribbean where one must be content with varieties of 26 corals instead of the 400-600 range afforded in the Western Pacific. Still, in August, wouldn't you rather be in the South Seas during the Austral Winter? Even at 8 degrees south of the Equator?