Samama is a small island in the Derawan Archipelago of the Celebes Sea, with eight shallow sites all accessed by boat. Terrain covers reef, seagrass, muck, artificial reef, and mangrove habitats, with maximum depths that keep all diving well within recreational limits and suit beginners through to intermediate divers. The mangrove sites function as a marine nursery and snorkelling environment, while reef sites such as Manta Run and Darma Point offer more conventional diving. Water is warm across every month of the year. Hairy frogfish, warty anglerfish, robust ghost pipefish, pygmy seahorse, common seahorse, ribbon eel, nudibranch, and bluespotted fantail ray are all recorded here.
Monthly water temperature across Samama's sites, from satellite sea-surface data corrected for depth. The band shows the site-to-site spread.
Water temperature remains consistently warm throughout the year with almost no variation month to month. Visibility can shift with tidal movement, particularly at the mangrove and channel sites, so diving earlier in the tidal cycle often gives cleaner conditions.
4 operators
Water around Samama stays near 30°C all year, based on satellite sea-temperature data for its dive sites.
With water around 29–30°C, a rash guard or 3mm shorty works in Samama year-round.
Fin maps 8 sites in Samama (7 scuba diving sites and 2 snorkelling spots, with some suited to both).
5 more sites to explore
