Yap 2026 trip report

YAP TRIP REPORT - March 11-22, 2026
(Click here to see some pictures from this trip plus links to the SmugMug slideshow.)

I need to start with a disclaimer. I’ve been to Yap roughly sixteen times and have had many, many good experiences. So it’s reasonable to think when we’re getting ready to go again, that that will be the case once more. We assume there will be a dozen manta rays at each of the cleaning stations, that there will be dozens and dozens of sharks at the shark feed, and that flocks of Eagle Rays will wave at us as they go by. The point being, sometimes we set the expectation bar too high. It’s like someone who routinely dives in 100-foot viz complaining that the viz was “only” 60 feet. That being said . . .

It was a good trip, but it wasn’t the trip we’d hoped for due to some things out of our control.

This was our 16^th trip (as best I can tell) to visit the island of Yap, part of the Federated Sates of Micronesia which also includes Pohnpei, Kosrae, and Chuuk/Truk (but not Palau, which is an independent nation its own right). I wouldn’t keep going back if it wasn’t good. I love coming here (duh!!) and not just because of the diving.

The island has a distinctly “we’re not in Kansas anymore” feel to it but everyone speaks English and everyone’s amazingly friendly so you don’t feel totally out of place. I love the entire operation of Manta Ray Bay Resort and Yap Divers (MRBR) which I’ve often described as one of the nicest dive-dedicated resorts I’ve stayed at. They not only take terrific care of us but the dive operation is a generally well-oiled machine and their on-site restaurant – the Mnuw - is housed within a three deck Indonesian schooner which gives it a unique touch.

And I’ve got a great relationship with MRBR founder Bill Acker, now officially retired and spending much of his time living in the Philippines but he still keeps an eye on everything with his daughter Numie assuming the role of resort manager. Bill, along with wife Patricia, let me know that they would be making a special trip back to Yap for the 11 days we’d be there just so Bill could dive with our group.

Speaking of which . . .

We were an eclectic group of 16. At the core was the Colorado contingent led by Audrey & Marlow Anderson, Laurie Clauss & Doug Schrepel, Maria Matthews, and Ron Culp. All of them are close friends and have traveled and dove together before, including trips with Reef Seekers. Then there was the California crew which included me (Ken Kurtis), Tom & Katy Burns (from the Bay area), Henry Gittler & Lisette Lieberman, John Lumb, Tony Hanna, and Don Banas. All of these folks have been mainstays of Reef Seekers trips. This was all rounded out by Carol Behrman (Baton Rouge) and Annette Lohmann (Maui), both of whom have also travelled with us previously. So it was a group of people who have all been with us before and many of whom knew each other from previous Reef Seekers trips. In Yap, we generally dove as two groups: Colorado+Annette and California+Carol, with Bill and me alternating between groups. It sounds a bit more complicated that it was.

But as I mentioned initially, the trip wasn’t what I’d hoped for and envisioned when I put it together. The biggest factor in all of that was wind, which was unusual for this time of the year in Yap. When we got there on March 11, there was a huge weather system around Japan and there was another huge weather system bearing down on Hawaii. That meant we got residual wind from the west as well as from the east due to these storm systems. And that affected a lot of the diving in terms of what sites we could go to and what the conditions were once we got there.

Along with the fairly constant strong breezes, we got generally sunny to partly cloudy days, a bit of rain (but not too much), air temps were in the low to mid 80s, and water temps read a consistent 84-85 degrees on my gauge. Viz was variable, ranging from 20-100 feet.

When we dive Yap, one of the phrases you’ll hear the DMs and boat captains say is “Looking for clean water.” 100-foot visibility is not at all uncommon at many of the sites. By the same token, due to reef structure, tides, and weather, you can also get green water and 20-foot visibility. We got some of each.

Except for two days, we did three dives each day. That meant an 8:30AM departure, snacks (tea, water, banana bread, fruit) between dives 1 & 2, lunch (no extra charge – order off a menu the night before) after dive 2, and generally back at MRBR anywhere from 3:30-5:00PM depending on where the last dive was.

The weather affected the mantas. Our manta encounters over the years happen at the three cleaning stations. This time of the year, the winds generally come from the east, so the mantas move to the west and are spotted at either Stammtisch (great shallow reef - only 20 feet deep – where they glide right over your head) or in Mi’l Channel which is a great dive with or without mantas. When the wind comes from the west, the mantas head to the east side of Yap and are usually found in Goofnuw Channel, also a great dive in and of itself, with or without mantas.

But when the wind blows from both directions – and we generally had wind speeds of 10-15mph with gusts up to 20mph, and it shifted daily – the mantas tend to move offshore and ride out the weather disturbance. So we didn’t get the types of manta encounters we’ve had regularly in the past and for which Yap is known.

That doesn’t mean we got totally skunked. Our best day was our first full dive day on March 12 when the CO+Annette group did Stammtisch while the CA+Carol group did Mi’l. CO+Annette had three or four mantas at the station for the entire hourlong dive making close passes over the heads of the divers and taking as good a look at us as we did at them. BUT . . . the visibility was around 20-30 feet and the water was greenish. Not ideal.

The CA+Carol group did the second dive at Stammtisch and had a similar experience with two mantas. But they also reported that their Mi’l Channel dive was in a ripping current with 20-foot visibility (and no mantas). In fact, that current stayed at Mi’l for the entire time we were in Yap – we checked a number of times as we went to other sites – and we were never able to dive Mi’l again during the trip.

And the disappointing part of this is those two encounters, thankfully early on, were the best and somewhat only manta encounters we had during the trip. Each group made two more attempts and got skunked each time. We even had one day where the water was fairly clear – maybe 40-50 viz of relatively clean water – but nary a manta in sight.

The only silver lining here is that the manta-less drought we were enduring was also shared by other divers at MRBR who went on days when we were elsewhere. We’d check every day when the boats came back and everyone was getting skunked except for one group on the last dive day and even then, the encounter was brief and the water was green.

Overall, this is not typical for Yap and certainly not ideal. I’ve seen mantas in plenty of places around the world – Cocos, Socorro, Sea of Cortez, Maldives, Hawaii, Palau – but the Yap experience is usually the best and the most plentiful. And since close-up Manta Ray encounters are a big selling point and highlight for a trip like this, not getting that experience can put a damper on things.

The other thing that affected our diving was mechanical boat issues. The MRBR fleet consists of five smaller (generally 18-28 feet) dual-outboard fast boats that are perfect for eight divers. They also have a larger (38 feet) and slower boat, Popou, which holds 16 divers. Because of the size of our group and my long-standing relationship with MRBR, we were given two of the smaller boats for each day. That was great until the third day when the engine on one of the boats overheated, which severely limited the range of the boat (because it could only run on one engine). No worries they said, we’ll have it fixed overnight. Nope. The “fixed” engine had the same problem the next day after running for about ten minutes. Once again, that limited where that boat could go.

Popou wasn’t an option either as it also had mechanical problems and the part that was sent down from Guam was the wrong part so that delayed on making that boat operational. More on that later on.

While they assured me that THIS time the fix on the smaller boat would hold, I told them they needed to do a boat swap for us because I couldn’t have a boat limping along for three days in a row. They agreed and we then had two boats both running on two engines.

That meant that the southern reefs of Yap which are about eleven miles from MRBR came into play. In my opinion, these are the beef reefs in Yap. They’re generally wall or wall-ish dives and are fairly fishy. They also offer a chance at seeing Eagle Rays, sharks, turtles, and more (all of which we saw at one point or another) along with dolphins riding the boat’s bow wake on the way down.

When I set these trips up, they generally have ten dive days. On day #5, I like to schedule a half-day motor coach land tour which shows off some World War 2 sites and artifacts as well as a couple of stone money “banks,” so no diving during the day. But we cap it off with a single Mandarinfish dive, a dusk dive that leaves MRBR at 5:45PM.

Because of the weather and the boat issues, they asked if we could do the tour and Mandarinfish on dive day #3 instead. We agreed and what a fabulous decision that was as we had one of the best Mandarinfish dives I’ve ever had in Yap.

Mandarinfish are small, insanely psychedelically-colored dragonets. The males are about the size of your index finger and the females the size of your pinky. They nestle during the day inside a tangle of shallow corals but at dusk, pretty much every day, they come out for 60-90 minutes to forage and nibble on the corals and to mate. When the male and female hook up, they go check-to-cheek, rise up above the coral, and then POOF!!! They simultaneously release sperm and eggs and then drift back down to resume their day.

There are two great Mandarinfish spots a five-minute boat ride from MRBR. Rainbow Reef – so named because the Mandarinfish have all the colors of the rainbow – is the one most-often visited by MRBR but there’s another spot called Mandarinfish Ledge that they used to dive and have recently resumed visiting. We sent one group to Rainbow and my group went to Ledge.

When I say “shallow” that’s not an exaggeration. You’re generally looking for these guys and gals in 10-15 feet of water. And we try to put you in place shortly before the fish are active. We spread the group out so each diver has their “own” coral head and then you start watching. Eventually you’ll see one of the fish nosing around so you keep your eye on that one as they go in and out of the corals. After a while, you’ll start to see more and then you’re trying to find a male who’s circling a female. If it all goes to plan, you’ll see the female give the male a peck on the cheek which is the “Let’s go” signal, they’ll rise up off the reef, and then consummate.

I don’t know if I was simply sitting on the “right” coral head or what but at one point, I probably had a dozen of these little fish weaving in and put in front of me. It gave me great photo opportunities (you'll see the shots on the SmugMug page) and a great show. I also didn’t realize that most everyone else had gone up, so my 98-minute dive made me the last one back on our boat. But what a great show it was.

Once the Mandarinfish dive was behind us, the boat issues were as well. The wind was also shifting a bit so we had to account for that each day. Two of the premier dives IMHO, with or without mantas present, are Mi’l Channel (in the NW) and Goofnuw Channel (in the NE). Neither one was diveable the entire time we were there. Mi’l had a monster current running with low viz and Goofnuw had low viz due to the wind blowing right into the length of the channel. (And when I say “low,” we’re talking probably less than 10 feet. Yikes!!!)

That all being said, we got in some very nice dives. I generally divide the Yap dive sites that are outside the fringing reef into three regions: east, west, and south. (The manta cleaning stations are all inside.) The eastern sites have very healthy and gently sloping hard coral reefs, but are usually not very fishy. The western sites have a steeper slope leading down to a wall, healthy hard and soft corals, and more fish. The southern sites – mainly Yap Caverns at the tip with Gilmaan and Yellow Wall to the west plus Lionfish Wall and Eagle’s Nest to the east – offer some of the best diving with fairly vertical walls that start in shallow water and drop straight down and are likely the fishiest. But, especially with our wind issues, conditions can easily change.

One day we dove Lionfish Wall, starting at the northern end which meant that as we headed south, we ended up in the front portion of Yap Caverns, which is one of my favorite spots. Lots of healthy coral bommies, tons of fish, lots of cleaning going on, and it’s a good place to find Flame Angels, which can be challenging to shoot but very rewarding when you get a good shot.

And we had great conditions with clear water which made it quite easy to move around and spot animals that you’d like to get a closer look at. So imagine our surprise when we went back the next day, dropped in and . . . could barely see the reef. Viz was 10-20 feet and a bit milky, there was some surge, and my first thought was “Say what???” but that just goes to show how variable the conditions could be.

Our last two dive days, because they had some other smaller groups arrived on the Wednesday flight, we moved both of our groups to the larger boat, Popou, which could accommodate all 16 of us plus guides and crew. It’s not the most ideal for a dive boat because of its size and speed but I’ve sent some thoughts to MRBR on how it could be made more efficient for diving. And while on-board, rather than dive as a group of 16, we sent the CO+Annette group off first, then 5-10 minutes later sent the remaining CA+Carol group off so that the groups had room between them and that generally worked out fine.

One thing we did run into, which surprised me, were Robust Ghost Pipefish. Not one or two, but a bunch. I actually found one of my own very early in the trip and got rather excited about it because they’re hard to spot (as you can see from the pix). They float with their head down and try to look like a piece of plant debris floating aimlessly. But amazingly, we started seeing them fairly regularly. I don’t recall this from previous Yap trips.

One thing we did see a lot of were Parrotfish. They were all over the place, munching on corals, and just generally going about their business. There were also numerous butterflyfish of various species, a fair number of clownfish, a lot of Rabbitfish, more Titan Triggerfish than I recall seeing before (especially in the southern sites), a decent number of turtles, Bird Wrasses, some Napoleons (both male and female), a number of Angelfish (though mostly Royals), and a few eels, blennies, Dartfish, and a lone Eagle Ray who did a fast fly-by.

We always save what we hope will be the best dive for the last dive of the trip. That would be the shark feed which takes place at Vertigo on Yap’s NW side, just down from Mi’l Channel. Given the wind issues we had, we weren’t sure we’d be able to do it but the weather co-operated and, even though it was a bit choppy and a little surgy underneath, it was doable. Plus, we dove it from Popou, so we had everyone on one boat, which actually was to our advantage.

The way it’s done in Yap is that they get a bunch of bait and freeze it in a large bucket around some rebar. From a boat on the surface, they take fish out of the bucket, attach a line to the rebar, there’s a float at the top of the line so it stays vertical in the water, and then it’s all lowered down and threaded through a pulley mounted on a rock so that the frozen bait floats at eye level for the group while the float above it holds the line fairly taut. And then the sharks have at it.

We had about a dozen sharks this time, mostly Blacktips and Grey Reef. There are also numerous snappers and other opportunistic fish hanging on the outskirts of the feed, hoping to snatch a stray piece of floating fish.

What’s interesting is that the sharks seem to “know” when the bait’s in position because they don’t start hitting it in earnest until it’s in place. (Conversely, they also seem to realize when all the bait is gone.) As you watch, there’s a definite pecking order as to who goes in first and who waits their turn until later. Sometimes two or three sharks will go at it at once but you never see them go after each other. Given what’s going on, it’s relatively civilized.

Once the first bait is done (takes about 15 minutes), and the sharks back off a bit, the line is pulled up, a second block of frozen bait is hooked up and lowered, and the action starts again. Although we had some logistical hiccups, the whole thing is about an hour dive start-to-finish and it gives everyone a really good chance to see sharks up close and personal, as well as to see them in action. So we were able to end the diving portion of the trip on a high note.

The following day (Saturday) is a full non-diving day so that gives everyone a chance to relax, off-gas, and dry gear so it can be packed for the long journey back home. The flight sked is rather brutal with the initial Yap-to-Guam flight leaving at 2:30AM. Fortunately, MRBR lets us stay in the rooms until we depart for the airport so people could try to get at least a few hours sleep before the flights back.

As I said at the start, a good trip, maybe even a very good trip, but it didn’t have all of the maximum highlights I’d hoped for. But then again, maybe I had the bar set too high. One thing we did notice, and maybe it was due to the winds, but it seemed to me that many of the dive sites were less fishy that usual and the fish seemed some skittish when approached. Some of our other returning veterans reported similar conclusions. I guess we’ll have to return again to see if that’s the case or not.

Despite not having the conditions and overall experience that I’d hoped for, Yap is still on my list of places I’d highly recommend to you and is a place I will go back to. For a host of reasons, I love staying at Manta Ray Bay, the dive staff does everything they can to find the best conditions for the day, the diving – even when it’s not what we expected – is still outstanding, and it’s almost always going to be the type of trip that provides a lifetime of good memories.

See the pix on the SmugMug photo page:
https://kenkurtis.smugmug.com/DIVE-TRIP-PHOTOS-ALL/2026-DIVE-TRIPS/YAP-2026-March-11-22