Macro Diving in Papua New Guinea

The island of New Guinea is the second-largest island in the world and home to some of the best and most remote diving on the planet. The western half of the island is part of the Indonesian archipelago, while the eastern half forms the mainland of Papua New Guinea, the home of headhunters, birds of paradise and unparalleled marine biodiversity. With plenty of pelagics to warrant schlepping your dome port halfway across the planet, Papua New Guinea (or ‘PNG’) is also the original muck diving mecca. So, make sure you save space in your luggage for your close-up lenses too, as the macro diving in Papua New Guinea will put you up close and personal with an array of minute and magical critters.

Papua New Guinea diving pioneer Bob Halstead first coined the term 'muck diving' in PNG to describe the critter-rich black-sand diving in Milne Bay, and ever since then PNG's diving has been touted as a macro photographer's dream. While the area is also world-renowned as a top whale shark diving location, you will surely kick yourself if you leave your macro lenses back home.

With epic wall dives, World War II plane wrecks and fringing reefs to complement the epic macro diving in Papua New Guinea, allow us to tailor your perfect, bespoke itinerary to ensure you take in all the highlights in this adventurer's playground. With high mountain ranges, dense jungle packed with exotic birds and reptiles, and pristine reefs below the ocean's surface, Papua New Guinea is a wonderfully wild frontier waiting for the intrepid to explore.

Milne Bay

The world's original muck diving destination, Milne Bay is the perfect place to begin to discover the magical macro diving in Papua New Guinea. Observation Point and Dinah's Beach are blessed with myriad critters to zoom in on, while the area also offers excellent drift dives, wreck dives and wall dives.

New Ireland

A two-hour flight north from Port Moresby will bring you to the island province of New Ireland. The waters surrounding the island house a healthy population of big pelagics, while the island also boasts some of the best macro diving in Papua New Guinea: leaf scorpionfish, mandarinfish and various ghostpipefish are all waiting to pose for your camera.

New Britain

With land-based and liveaboard options, New Britain is another prime location from which to discover the diverse diving of Papua New Guinea. Kimbe Bay, vaunted as the 'Coral Capital of the World', is the perfect base, allowing you to combine macro diving on the local reefs with liveaboard diving to the more remote sites to hunt for hammerheads and silvertips.

Tufi

A short flight from Port Moresby carries you over the dense jungle canopy to the pristine reefs of Oro Province. The clear, calm waters that surround Tufi are teeming with life, with the local sites in the fjords and inner reefs excellent for macro photography and the farther-away sites offering the chance to dive with hammerheads and reef sharks.

Itineraries

Best for: Couples and Solo Travellers

Ultimate Papua New Guinea

On this two-and-a-half week itinerary stay in three of the best diving destinations in Papua New Guinea, including the extraordinary reef structures...