Dan Johnson - MV Oceania Liveaboard - Part 1

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Matt Waters: Hey, there dive buddies and welcome to season

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four of the Scuba co Podcast. I'm excited to kick it off with

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Dan Johnson, co owner and captain of the MV for Brina,

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which is based in Papua New Guinea. Dan explores the vast

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Scuba diving playground which is known for its incredible diving

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opportunities and unique marine life based out of well Lindy

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resort, New Britain. And today, he shares his insights and

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experiences from captaining the MV for breonna. And diving in

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such a beautiful location, his professional journey that brings

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him to PNG, and what He has planned for the future of the MV

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for Brina. Get ready for an adventure filled season of the

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Scuba go podcast.

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Dan Johnson: I followed you on Scuba go with the Oceania

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webpage, page Facebook page, I actually got admin to it. So I'm

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now a fully updated admin administrator of the Oceania

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Facebook page which is fairly scary because I have absolutely

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no idea how to use Facebook. Now petrified I'm gonna press a

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button and delete everything that everybody has ever done on

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it. So that's fun.

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Matt Waters: Maybe I wouldn't even try getting down that

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rabbit hole. It's I've got like, I've got Facebook for nomadic

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Scuba, and obviously for Scuba goat. And then I've got the

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Instagram and Meta everything. And it's nothing short of a

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fucking nightmare, quite frankly.

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Dan Johnson: Living in Papua New Guinea you might as well live in

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a cave technology. You know if you can get into net worth Oh,

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yeah, depends on how cloudy it is and what's going on in the

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world at the time. Yeah, how many earthquakes I've had

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recently. That's a good one.

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Matt Waters: Mate when we when we were when I was living it to

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fee the cell tower that was the only cell tower and yours was

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diesel generator and so the local diesel and thought Fuck

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it. I need a bit of fuel. I got Nick it and that's it. No

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internet.

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Dan Johnson: Yeah, no, no, no, we completely understand that

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the bloke next door to the resort who had the tower on his

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property would sell the diesel for the tower to the local PMV

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cars coming up and down the road. They don't be there to his

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place. And then they'd be there. Fill them up with the Digi cell

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fuel and they'd bugger off and then we'd lose or phone

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reception for a week. Got a special Hi, is real special. So

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what were you doing over in two? Three? You weren't manager one

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thing?

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Matt Waters: No, no, there was the resort manager and his wife.

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And then I was running the dive operations and both side of

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things.

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Dan Johnson: Oh, yes. What was the name of the resort manager

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at the time? Wasn't Simon was it?

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Matt Waters: No, no, Simon was long gone. I know. Yeah, that's

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what I had. Yeah, yeah. I had Tony honeys. Brother was in

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looking after the place when I got there. And then Brian. Brian

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came in with with Roya a couple of weeks after I got there. And

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he he took over as the manager of the resort.

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Dan Johnson: Okay, yeah. And I've not met them. Yeah.

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Matt Waters: Yeah, good. Good. Giggle classic kalasha read and

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Dan Johnson: doesn't everybody doesn't always a year the

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morning. Yeah. Yeah. Awesome. Okay. Yeah. So how long were you

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there for?

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Matt Waters: I thought it would the visa was for a year. But

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because of all the political faff and getting the paperwork.

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I think I was 10 and a half months. I just shot a velopment

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Yeah, I felt like a year though. Yeah. Yeah, it was awesome. To

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be honest, it was really really good. But you know, at that time

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was a single bloke and there was only one bar which was the

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resort resort bar and if there was no guests in everyone a

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bugger off home. So you know, six, seven o'clock at night is

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sitting around with the thumb up your ass and not lots of no

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Dan Johnson: no internet. Yeah. I know the feeling.

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Matt Waters: Yes. Yeah. But it was on the on the professional

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side of things. It was absolutely fucking awesome

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because The owner, Tony, you know, when he first told me on,

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I was keen as mustard to get out there and have a look for new

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reefs. And that's exactly what he said, you know, if there's no

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one around or if you get the opportunity to slow down and

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find some more, spread the word get as much as you can. Yeah, so

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we, me in the local DMS we went out and explored another 12

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reefs and, you know, it was it was quite nice to map it out

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with the boys and get all the coordinates done, but also to

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put their the local family names on the reefs. Okay. was quite a

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quite a big deal for the boys. It was nice. I really enjoyed

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it. Yeah, awesome. Yeah. Okay, cool. Have you been there yet?

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Dan Johnson: Yes, I have been there. Unfortunately. I heard

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what they've dredged the dredge the harbour. To me, I was there

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before they dredged it and I still reckon that is one of the

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top MCQ dives anywhere in the world. Definitely. In Papua New

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Guinea I was blown away by trench.

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Matt Waters: Trench the harbour. You mean the where the where the

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dive shop is?

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Dan Johnson: Yeah, so you got the little dive shop down at the

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bottom of the wall there. You had the P PT boat down at 50

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metres whatever, had all of those old drums from the Second

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World War or the 44 gallon drums Land Cruiser or the Jeep

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whatever it was up in the shallows all the mandarinfish

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there and everything that entire area has been dredged.

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Matt Waters: When was that then?

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Dan Johnson: Two Three years ago apparently.

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Matt Waters: Second, sorry, two or three years

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Dan Johnson: ago, apparently.

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Matt Waters: Really? Fuck. Yeah. And I used I used to jump in

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there. And in fact, there's a very very good photographer from

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Singapore. Shout out Catherine Lowe. She would jump in though

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she was there for a week and every single night she'd be in

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underneath the wharf and it'd be down for our two hours just

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getting all the macro time macro absolutely

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Dan Johnson: unbelievable dive and they Yeah, they dredged it

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Matt Waters: Yeah, it broke my T boat actually. I think the PT

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boat that actually disappeared into the into the sands. I went

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down to take Kevin green the captain of attacker jumped in

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there to take him down to see it in 2019 and it was it was gone.

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So it was already you know the only photos I got a bit were of

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the of the ribs and the skeleton with it. With the gun. The gun

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on the time.

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Dan Johnson: Yeah. Yeah, but that's Oh, wow. Okay.

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Matt Waters: Yeah. Well, that's a shocker dredging it,

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Dan Johnson: but yeah, hell yeah. Apparently they addressed

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it. This is all secondhand information. I've not had the

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opportunity to jump back in there in the last few years. I

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think the last time I visited to fi was back in. Or Blimey? 2012

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or so? So about a decade ago? Yeah.

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Matt Waters: Yeah. I love it. I mean, we'd Yeah, well, well, I

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got told about the Lucy Lucy stick Hammerhead you know the

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rumours of Yeah, I was always kept dry. Cut you show some

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video footage

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Dan Johnson: Awesome. Nice one.

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Matt Waters: Very cool. And it's not just not just one animal

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either. I counted for individuals which is amazing.

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Dan Johnson: Very, very cool. Did you did you get yourself

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over to the Jacob?

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Matt Waters: I did yeah. Brian and Brian and I went and

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dived it yeah, probably about midway through my term. Just to

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get some some footage and lo and behold, you know, we go down

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with a camera and both cameras go tits up. So unfortunately, it

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was experience only but it was an is an exceptional wreck. And

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it's one that I want to revisit and and get some proper data

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because some prepper footage done. So one day, but that was

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it was because of the you know where it lies to everyone who's

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listening to the SS Jacob was a merchant ship in the war that

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sank and it's huge. And it lies offshore away from all the rave

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so it's just on sand. And the I think the I think the seabed is

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at around about 5758 metres something like this maybe even a

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little bit deeper. But because it's out on the sand on its own,

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the the quantity of fish that it attracts is insane. I couldn't

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believe it. Huge schools have literally everything you could

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think of. Pop from the ticking the bucket list items like Whale

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sharks and mantas and stuff but huge, huge barracudas and, you

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know, massive shoals of reef fish. Absolutely awesome. Have

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you had the opportunity to dive it as well?

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Dan Johnson: Now? Unfortunately, not. That is one of the dives

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I've been trying to try and work out in my schedule of the way of

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just skimming past this and the problem is, as you said, it's

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5860 metres to the sand there. As a recreational dive there, so

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we're all diving on night drops, 32%. Say and I head down to you

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for two metres. Yeah, sort of pushing your boundaries as it is

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so Yeah, unfortunately not. But I imagine it's going to be on

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the same par as yongala. Except bigger and better. Yeah, I

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hospital manner.

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Matt Waters: It's huge, ridiculously huge. I loved it.

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But even you know, recreational depths, I can remember, you

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know, slowly coming back up and around 30. You can still see the

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entire ship which is fantastic. Yeah, what about the what about

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the blackjack? Have you managed to do the blackjack?

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Dan Johnson: Yes, I took me down to the blackjack when I was

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there. It's a very long boat ride to freeze. The main thing I

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remember about it. But it's a long ride from anywhere it seems

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to be. It's right in the middle of to Ali and Sophie, isn't it?

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So you know, you've got a long ride either direction. The

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funniest thing was during COVID, the Oceania went there. Of

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course, I wasn't on the boat. And they all went down there.

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They've done several dives on it. So my dive guides, of course

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know better than I do. These dives down to 1015 minutes. As

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they came back, and then of course, my bloody boat goes down

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there. And everyone jumps in and has a epic time on it. So yeah,

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okay needs to be revisited. Don Silcock has been trying to

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convince me to take the boat there. I might, I might swing

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past it. Because we're doing a one way from Milan Bay, which

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dawns on Milan Bay ground to rebel. And so it's a very good

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chance. I'm going to throw that in. It's one of the early

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morning dives type of thing and give everyone 28% Something like

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that to just make it a bit more accessible to the divers. Yeah.

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Yeah. Got some fun.

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Matt Waters: Well, you know, if you need an expert dive guide

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for that. I'm more than willing to come back up. They the owner

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of the best video footage that there's currently out there for

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the blackjack.

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Dan Johnson: Okay, yeah. All right. Yeah, no, there's half

00:13:25
traffic at Don's friends. He's doing all he's doing all the

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summer cinematography of it doing all 3d exposures and

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everything. Have you seen any of the shots Don's recently been

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doing with his friend? His name escapes,

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Matt Waters: not that. Yeah, not the not the 3d stuff. But I am

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catching up with Don next week over a few beers. So East he did

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tell me he's got a lot to talk about. So our show that's

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filling me in on all that kind of stuff.

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Dan Johnson: It's amazing. It truly is. I'm trying to get him

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up for a charter to do the Rex and rebel. And because for what

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they're doing, you know, obviously they want a highlight

00:14:06
if they're going to charter the boat and so are we gonna go down

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to the black jackets like have a look at rebel? We've got the

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twin tanks. There's plane wrecks every way. You know, you go down

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to the back deck, you have the one wreck and that's just the

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blank Jack and yes, it's an awesome wreck. But then we have

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a dozen class wrecks in Rebel which we can easily access and I

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think would be absolutely awesome for doing.

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Matt Waters: Yeah. Yeah, there's another good mate of mine Miko

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party. He's based out in Thailand and was part of the

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Thai cave rescue. And we were talking about coming up. Or he

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was asking me about doing the blackjack some years ago just

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before COVID actually. And that's all 3d. Was the was the

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front He's for the photography I should note by now, I've had

00:15:07
so many people on the podcast talking about it.

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I'll find it. I'll find it. Yeah. But he was he was asking

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me about it because that's exactly what he does. And he is

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he's doing a lot of deep rec exploration and rec finding. And

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this is the stuff that they do they go down and do all of this

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photography so that they can get the 3d element of what it's

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actually looking like. Yeah, flat image.

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Dan Johnson: And then they do all the layers and I know

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they've, they were up doing the mini sub, the top of new island.

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Some of the images I've got from it. Just enrollment

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Matt Waters: that's what yeah, that's what he was. He was just

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at the recently doing that, isn't it? Yeah.

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Dan Johnson: Yeah. Literally before it came over. So May at

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the end, or in the middle of December. So we've been there

00:16:03
beginning of December doing it.

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Matt Waters: And let's, let's take it back a little bit how

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you you know, took all these steps through to where you are

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now. So you say was it 2015 You became an instructor

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Dan Johnson: 2004 or became an instructor? Yep. 15 years. Now,

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is it something 16 Sending is instructor not very good at

00:16:30
that. I need fingers

00:16:36
Matt Waters: so where were you or where did you learn actually

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work? Right ticket right back to the start? Where did you first

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jump into water and give it a go?

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Dan Johnson: I was a very so my first time or Scuba was in a

00:16:49
swimming pool in England. Many many years ago just as I don't

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even think I was a teenager at the time. But I did all my open

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water training my advanced all in Thailand before it became

00:17:03
popular. That was yeah as CO coping. Yeah. Copan Yang? Yeah.

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coping. Yeah, that was it. There was only three dive centres on

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the island. When I learned to dive there. I think it's now

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more dive centres and people. From what I understand. I've not

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been back as long

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Matt Waters: as you thought it was Copan Yang arcotel

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Dan Johnson: kotel as coetail copay. Yeah, Costa Marie is the

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party Island.

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Matt Waters: Nope. Costa Mesa Koh Samui is the one that's all

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built up with all the modern stuff. And you've got Copan

00:17:45
Yang, which is where you go for the full Moon Party, and

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everyone gets fucked up. Yeah. Koh Tao, which is where everyone

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goes to go dive in and get fucked up.

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Dan Johnson: Thank you. That was me. That the latter option?

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Yeah. Coachella. Thank you. Hey, guys. It was a long time ago. I

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was on my honeymoon. Actually. My first honeymoon already.

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Yeah. And it was very, my ex my first wife was very, very kind.

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And let me go and do my dive course. Unfortunately, she was a

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non swimming asthmatic. And probably that's probably what

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pushed me to become a full time instructor was I knew that after

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I broke up with her, it's the last place I'd ever meet her.

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Yeah, so far, it's worked pretty well.

00:18:40
Do you remember which? Dive Shop you were at? Big Blue? No. Yep.

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Seriously? Yeah. There was you had a bit of you big blue. And

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then there was one on the opposite side of the island,

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which can't remember the name of but I was big blue actually had

00:19:00
a picture of me many many years ago with all of the guys in the

00:19:06
background and the shop. Was there one second? Let me see if

00:19:11
I can find it.

00:19:13
Matt Waters: I've lost a video stream at the moment anyway.

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Dan Johnson: That's cool. That's okay. This is

00:19:20
Matt Waters: Yes, big big blue is a big part of my heart. I was

00:19:23
I was permanent staff there

00:19:25
Dan Johnson: are true. Okay. Yeah. Hey guy. Can you see

00:19:31
anybody there in the picture?

00:19:35
Matt Waters: I've lost the video feed me Ah, fantastic.

00:19:38
Dan Johnson: That's that's terrible shame. Okay, so that

00:19:41
was a I think is Swedish from memory Stefan or something. And

00:19:48
okay. So, do you recognise anyone there?

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Matt Waters: It's a bit blurry. I can't make it out is that tall

00:20:00
dark fellow in the middle at the back, isn't it?

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Dan Johnson: The tall good looking one with the bleached

00:20:04
hair. That's me. The one with the red hair. That's my first

00:20:12
wife. And that fella there. He was, I believe was the owner or

00:20:22
manager of the shop at the time. This would have been going back.

00:20:30
Blimey, I don't know how many years ago was this? First train

00:20:38
up. When I first got married it would have been like late

00:20:45
90s 1998 Maybe 97. Around there. Yeah.

00:20:53
Matt Waters: Well, the guy that the main owner of Big Blue.

00:20:59
Michael. He's a Swedish guy. And he apparently apparently what he

00:21:07
did was he visited Koh Tao fell in love that would place like a

00:21:12
small. Yeah, like they got a small loan and went straight

00:21:16
back to Kotel and opened up big blue. So he was I'm not entirely

00:21:21
sure if it was second or third, but they were in the first three

00:21:25
of the dive shops.

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Dan Johnson: Yeah, I think but if he would say first one.

00:21:30
Matt Waters: Now the other way around, or their coats out

00:21:31
divers was the original. Okay, cheers with the one that Miko

00:21:36
now owns and think I think Buddha view and big blue opened

00:21:39
up more or less. relatively the same time. Yes. But yeah, yeah.

00:21:45
So Michael, bless him. While he passed away this time last year,

00:21:49
my Oh, yeah. Lovely, lovely fellow. And he went on to be a

00:21:55
very, very successful businessman with lots of other

00:21:57
businesses. And even with the pandemic hit, and all that kind

00:22:01
of thing, the very last thing that he would allow to disappear

00:22:06
off his portfolio would be Big Blue. Its heart was always in

00:22:09
that original shop. Which,

00:22:11
Dan Johnson: yeah, yeah. That's, yeah. Yeah. So that's kind of

00:22:16
like a few years. So

00:22:18
Matt Waters: yeah, that's a very small world. You know, this,

00:22:22
this podcast bringing us together never spoken to you

00:22:24
about any kind of your diving background. And lo and behold,

00:22:27
you you learn in the place that I used to live and work and love

00:22:32
was fantastic.

00:22:33
Dan Johnson: Yeah, yeah. Okay. Go, hey, go. It's six degrees of

00:22:37
separation, isn't it?

00:22:39
Matt Waters: It is smaller every day. Really? So after after big

00:22:44
blue and kicking out the first wife and becoming an instructor

00:22:47
did you did you teach back over this way or

00:22:54
Dan Johnson: so I came, came to came to Australia did my dark

00:22:58
masters and instructors work for a company pretty much every

00:23:05
company in cares actually jumped between boats and always

00:23:12
having fun. But my main employer would have been deep sea divers

00:23:18
den. And that was where I was doing a lot of my teaching, I

00:23:25
went over to pro dive. And then I got into the Liveaboards. And

00:23:30
that's where I really enjoyed myself. In between that I short

00:23:35
lived to Mexico for a little bit of time. in Playa Del Carmen

00:23:39
where I did a lot of my tech diving, cave diving and

00:23:43
everything started a small dive business there. Which didn't go

00:23:47
quite to plan a couple of things in the life I've learned is

00:23:54
never trust a fat Mexican. And they're just not meant to be

00:24:00
fat. But the fact that reconcilement off never and the

00:24:03
older and the other one was like, pause 1960s porn star big

00:24:08
starch and everything. Yeah, that just went horribly wrong to

00:24:15
maybe make for quite a bit of money. And, but we struggled on

00:24:19
and I believe he's still going RIF quest divers out in Playa

00:24:29
Del Carmen. If they had ones around, or over that say good

00:24:34
eight is named Steve. Sacred eight to him for me. And yeah, I

00:24:39
sort of cracked it after about 15 months and decided to call it

00:24:45
a day it was just just a bit too hard there. Had a lot of

00:24:51
partying. Very true drinks and spring break. But all the rest

00:24:59
of it, it was it was playing up to the wrong side of my

00:25:04
personality. Let's put it that way. So I came back to Australia

00:25:08
where I met my second wife. And we ended up as working out on

00:25:18
the old game road explorer out on the Coral Sea, doing Bowgun,

00:25:22
Ville Osprey and the ribbon reefs and those runs. And then

00:25:28
I've, we've decided, you know, let's get a job together. And we

00:25:34
put our resume out in the world. And long story short, we've

00:25:43
ended up at Papua New Guinea at will Indy resort. And yeah, I

00:25:47
remember Max saying to us, it's so we went there, you know, as

00:25:53
you do when you first rock up to p&g. She arrived a week ago, the

00:25:56
males, they think they're using my passport to prop up the

00:26:00
table. So my work visa didn't come through at the same time,

00:26:04
obviously. And so I remember my first experience coming into

00:26:11
Papua New Guinea, he was, it feels very surreal to me back

00:26:15
then. Back in 2008, this would be and you know, I got off the

00:26:19
plane ride, okay, this is interesting in Hoskins, and the

00:26:26
buses come picked me up, driven us out at the airport. And as

00:26:31
we're driving down the road, I've looked out the window, I

00:26:35
kid you not, we have four or 500 metres out of the airport gates.

00:26:40
And there would have been a kid probably six, maybe seven years

00:26:43
old. And he's standing there with a bush knife, holding it

00:26:46
like it's a broad sword head, you'd imagine the old knights to

00:26:50
be in the in the mid mid century type of thing holding this bush

00:26:56
knife like this and are just going oh my god, we're not in us

00:26:59
anymore, or for Yahweh. That was my first inception impression of

00:27:07
Papua New Guinea was this child with this giant Bush knife,

00:27:13
which I would never have been allowed to play with as a kid.

00:27:16
Probably for good reasons. And that is how I ended up in Papua

00:27:22
New Guinea when there weren't for Max Benjamin at the willing

00:27:26
to resort as a diet manager for five years. And yeah, he asked,

00:27:30
he asked him like, what are you looking for? What would you want

00:27:36
from us when we got there? And I you know, a year would be good.

00:27:39
And yeah, five years later, we said goodbye and parted ways.

00:27:45
And not in a bad way. Obviously, I'm back there now. Yeah. And

00:27:49
then obviously, my career progressed, I came back to

00:27:55
Australia did all my tickets, engineering ticket, captain's

00:28:00
licence and everything else and I don't drive in the tanker. And

00:28:05
the brief boats out of cans. Taking the tie. When they sold

00:28:11
the tanker, they basically sold me with the boat. Been there for

00:28:15
two years working as the engineer. And there's a first

00:28:18
mate and they went right. We'll buy the boat. And can we have

00:28:23
him? And they basically went, Yeah, sure. So I started the

00:28:28
boat over there and spent just under two years on the tacrine

00:28:32
Solomons, which was an adventure in itself. So yeah, after coming

00:28:37
towards the end of the two years, I got the phone call from

00:28:42
Max and Alan, we've got a great idea. As like, great. What is

00:28:46
it? How would you like your own boat? As like? Ah, yeah. So this

00:28:54
is why I'm here on your show. Now, I

00:29:03
said yes, at the wrong time. It was two years before the

00:29:09
pandemic hit. So I had a year to spend a lot of money and

00:29:16
then about a year to make a little bit of money back and

00:29:20
then three years or two and a half years of

00:29:23
Matt Waters: pandemic

00:29:27
Dan Johnson: which would hurt any new business. So yeah. But

00:29:32
you know, we made it through thanks to a lot of hard work

00:29:35
from the guys in Papua New Guinea, a great team that's

00:29:39
behind the Oceania. Big thank you to all of those guys who

00:29:43
made it possible for us to still be here and operating.

00:29:47
Matt Waters: Yeah, yeah. We've got a we've also got to give a

00:29:50
big shout out picked up on there Max Benjamin, blasphemies. He's

00:29:54
passed away now as well as me. Yeah. But I think in the in the

00:29:58
diving LM into Papua New Guinea. They've got a sticking right up

00:30:02
there on the pedestal as one of the founding fathers of why

00:30:06
people go to Papua New Guinea to dive now

00:30:08
Dan Johnson: 100% unfortunately passed away about three, four

00:30:14
months into the pandemic. Nothing that COVID related or

00:30:18
anything like that. But yeah, that was a timing is everything.

00:30:29
Yeah, so he passed away. But truthfully, the marketing his he

00:30:35
wasn't just said, talking about will indie who would never talk

00:30:40
about will indie per se. He would always talk about Papa New

00:30:47
Guinea. He, he went over there, oh, God, Cecily, oh, shoot me if

00:30:54
I get these numbers wrong. Approximately 40, maybe 50 years

00:31:03
ago as a demon. So an agricultural officer. He worked

00:31:08
for New Britain Pall Mall, and him and Cecily bought a plot of

00:31:13
land, expect 200 hectares, or something like that, where they

00:31:19
will, indeed, resort now sits. And from what I understand they

00:31:24
were off diving in the Red Sea. Say, Ah, because the Red Sea was

00:31:30
the best place in the world to go diving and the pair of them

00:31:33
are there again. We've got better, better out on the reefs

00:31:38
in front of us and what they've got here. And they really did.

00:31:43
And that was when they changed everything and decided to become

00:31:49
a dive destination. And his years of hard work and promoting

00:31:56
the country, as well as promoting obviously, willing to

00:32:00
resort was, yeah, just unbelievable. A very clever man,

00:32:07
very passionate about the reefs is one of the reasons Papua New

00:32:12
Guinea has environmentally friendly moorings throughout the

00:32:16
entire country, you would have seen them yourself, maybe even

00:32:19
put a few of them in with the big drilling machine, which

00:32:23
there's two of them in the country, which goes around. And

00:32:27
if someone needs to put a few new moorings in, you take it

00:32:30
out, you drill a hole, you stick a steel pin in and fill it up

00:32:34
with cement. And so you never have to drop anchor anywhere. So

00:32:38
the entirety of the roof system is looked after and managed,

00:32:43
unlike anywhere else in the world. You know, it's a

00:32:49
fantastic system. And that is thanks to Max. The whole Papa

00:32:55
New Guinea and diver Association was founded by Max. And unlike

00:33:01
so many other countries, where you have a lot of operators who

00:33:05
sort of butt heads. Papua New Guinea is not one of those

00:33:11
places. It's given us freedom to roam. On the Liveaboards we've

00:33:17
no one. Oh, that's feedback.

00:33:23
Matt Waters: Is that, can you hear that? Yeah. Yeah,

00:33:27
Dan Johnson: I can hear that. Yeah.

00:33:29
Matt Waters: Okay, well, we sought out that annoying

00:33:31
background noise, let me just proudly announce that the Scuba

00:33:33
goat podcast has been ranked among the top 3% of podcasts on

00:33:37
listener notes, a platform that hosts over 3 million shows. This

00:33:43
is a huge accomplishment and a reflection of the hard work and

00:33:46
dedication that goes into producing the show, and of

00:33:49
course, the support of all of our listeners. So I want to

00:33:52
express my gratitude to all of you who tune in, share our

00:33:55
episodes and leave us with ratings and reviews. Quite

00:33:59
honestly, we couldn't do this or I couldn't do this without

00:34:02
knowing that people want to listen to the content we

00:34:04
produce. So thank you to all of our guests and more importantly,

00:34:08
all of you listeners out there you absolute Bloody Legends.

00:34:13
Dan Johnson: We're talking about the late departed Max fee.

00:34:15
Matt Waters: Yeah, bless him. Bless him. I never found a

00:34:18
legend in his own lunch break. Unfortunately, I never had the

00:34:21
opportunity to meet him. But I've certainly done a fair bit

00:34:25
of chatting with with the staff at will nd with sending

00:34:30
customers up there. Through my little travel company, but yeah,

00:34:37
yeah, it's a shame I would have loved to have met him.

00:34:40
Dan Johnson: He was a very passionate man and a very

00:34:43
intelligent man to be said. He. Yeah. And it was all very much

00:34:50
about Papua New Guinea and the diving that we have there. The

00:34:54
one thing you could always upset him with. If you ever mentioned

00:34:58
the no word withdraws, bleaching, he would go

00:35:03
completely nuts. And it used to drive him mad that No, I would

00:35:11
always put up a GRR mass bleaching event. And we never

00:35:14
had any bleaching. We had few signs of stress is here, and

00:35:18
they're completely natural. But no one took into account that

00:35:22
the ocean rat. The Bismarck sees a warm mist ocean in the world.

00:35:27
It runs on average between 27 and 33 degrees, you know, as a

00:35:34
year round temperature. So yeah, he's struggling. That's a

00:35:41
strange fact about Mr. B. Was that he was actually a

00:35:48
honourable Mr. B. He was, I think, I think he was knighted

00:35:54
or something. For an order of Papua New Guinea, really? For?

00:36:00
Yeah, he never, never mentioned it. You know, he was those. But

00:36:06
that was Max all round who was never one to blow his own

00:36:11
trumpet.

00:36:12
Matt Waters: I think that's what, that's where you find the

00:36:14
best people. People with humility. High levels of

00:36:17
humility are the ones that are the best people to be around.

00:36:21
Dan Johnson: Oh, 100%, where I just humiliate myself? Is that

00:36:30
the same sort of thing? Yeah, pretty much, pretty much.

00:36:38
Matt Waters: Well, let's, let's catch up from Yeah, talking

00:36:40
about. So, Mr. B, he got in touch with you. And about mvrc

00:36:46
on it.

00:36:48
Dan Johnson: Yeah, well, at the time it was. So Maxim, Allen,

00:36:53
the my other business partner decided that they wanted to run

00:36:59
a, they believe the market was strong enough for a second bezel

00:37:03
to go into the marketplace in Papua New Guinea. They tried

00:37:09
once before with the star dancer, and being a franchise

00:37:13
and everything else that that entails. ran into trouble with

00:37:17
that. So I got the phone call. And they said, you know, we'd

00:37:26
like like you to come over and be a partner in starting a new

00:37:30
dive. Venture? And, yes, that's how the Oceania came about.

00:37:38
Yeah, they weren't interested in doing it with anybody else. So

00:37:42
that was fantastic. They said I had the right qualifications and

00:37:47
was just mad enough to actually possibly accept an opportunity

00:37:51
like this. You know, basically, I think my sort of

00:37:57
qualifications were, I went into business, or I would go into

00:38:00
business with the two matters people I've ever met in my life.

00:38:04
I could die I could build and I could drive both.

00:38:07
Matt Waters: Myself. So it all goes together.

00:38:12
Dan Johnson: Yes, there is definitely a degree of madness

00:38:16
to work in a place like puff, and you can is you know,

00:38:19
yourself. If you are mad, but when you go there, you will be

00:38:22
met by the time you leave. Yeah.

00:38:24
Matt Waters: Yeah. I mean, it's got to be said that Papua New

00:38:26
Guinea is very much an emerging country still. And there's a lot

00:38:30
of people that want to try and escalate or, or accelerate that

00:38:36
modernisation of the country, and I am massively against it. I

00:38:40
think that the beauty not only the physical beauty of the

00:38:43
country, but the beauty of being in Papua New Guinea is that it's

00:38:47
decades behind where we are now, which gives it that charisma,

00:38:52
and its unique qualities. I absolutely fucking love it. And

00:38:56
I don't want it to change.

00:38:57
Dan Johnson: I, I agree. To me being there every day presents

00:39:03
its own challenges. Nothing is boring. You don't get up at

00:39:07
night and come home at five doing the same stuff. You You

00:39:11
get up when you get up and go to bed when it's all done. And it

00:39:18
could be something which is so simple to achieve in Australia,

00:39:24
but you don't have the resources. You don't have the

00:39:28
technology. You don't necessarily have the training in

00:39:32
place to make these things doable. So you make it work. And

00:39:39
I love that challenge about it. It's yeah, as I said, it's

00:39:47
awesome. And it's very challenging. Logistically

00:39:52
running a business in Papua New Guinea is a nightmare.

00:40:04
Everybody thinks, Okay, it's probably New Guinea where a

00:40:08
developing country thinks should be a lot cheaper. Except Papua

00:40:13
New Guinea doesn't make anything, they make billions and

00:40:16
grow beetle nut, and oil palm.

00:40:24
Matt Waters: And there's also, there's also that major factor

00:40:28
of logistics of getting all the shit that you want. So you've

00:40:32
got your customers that want Wi Fi, and they want long distance

00:40:34
range on your boat, where's the fuel coming from? Where's the

00:40:37
connectivity coming from it all, just that simple litre of fuel,

00:40:42
it could be $1, or two over here is four or $5 Over there,

00:40:45
because it's got to be flowing in all boats

00:40:48
Dan Johnson: shipped up there. You know, the even O rings for

00:40:53
the dive tanks, you know, here they are five, six cents each.

00:40:58
For me to get them to then get them shipped up to Papua New

00:41:02
Guinea, cleared customs or the rest of it, they double triple

00:41:08
in price just for a simple wiring, which will burn through

00:41:11
so many in a day, you know. That's the simplest thing I

00:41:19
could actually think I could pick, you then go on to

00:41:22
maintaining a vessel to a high standard and to make sure that

00:41:26
everything is always working, carrying all the spares and the

00:41:31
entire work, basically entire engine room in her forward

00:41:36
cabin. Because I can't just come back to port and expect there to

00:41:42
be a row of fleet engineers from different companies who will

00:41:46
jump home with all the right bits to fix the boat. When I

00:41:53
finished the the boat show in Germany, I'm going back up

00:41:58
there, backup to Papa New Guinea, beginning of February

00:42:03
and relocating the vessel from Kimby Bay, which is where we're

00:42:08
based out of for about 60 70% of the year, down to Milan Bay for

00:42:14
two months. And that on its own presents a whole new set of

00:42:20
challenges because I lose the small support infrastructure

00:42:24
that I have at will end with logistics, my vehicle, the

00:42:31
workshop, guys who know everything works on the boat to

00:42:37
a place where I'm away from home for the next two and a half

00:42:40
months with no support. It's fantastic. I've been madly

00:42:52
planning this, we've madly planned this trip. And we've got

00:42:57
new generator going in all sorts. And the hope is that

00:43:01
everything holds together for the next two months without any

00:43:04
problems. If not, then it's trying to get skilled labour in

00:43:11
and trying to find people who can actually do the job for you

00:43:15
in a completely different parts of the country, which doesn't

00:43:19
necessarily have the skill set you're chasing. Or the trade

00:43:23
people embracing. Yeah,

00:43:25
Matt Waters: and yeah. For people that don't know Papua New

00:43:29
Guinea, the point A to point B that you're talking about isn't

00:43:32
just down the road. Is it was it

00:43:35
Dan Johnson: two hours? I think it's gonna take me just a quick

00:43:41
overnighter. Yeah, yeah, so it's, I've got to run up from

00:43:49
Kimby Bay run up to rebel, which is 24 hours, which is the next

00:43:54
town closest to can be where I'll be swapping out my life

00:44:00
rafts. And then from there, I'd like 70 Maybe 60 to our six year

00:44:10
run down to Milan Bay. And yet to arrive there, hopefully with

00:44:18
a day before the charter start so that we can then prep the

00:44:23
boat and do a bit of food shopping and outs that were

00:44:26
there. have checked with the local landowners and and

00:44:33
everything else that we have to do to get the boat ready and to

00:44:36
make sure that things run smoothly for everybody involved.

00:44:40
And the last time I was down there. I had to cancel one trip,

00:44:46
which was the return trip from Milan Bay to rebel because of

00:44:51
COVID. And yeah, that was my very last trip

00:44:55
down there. So although I have great memories of Milan Bay The

00:44:58
whole process being down there, it's still man, marred by the

00:45:05
Memory of the World lockdown.

00:45:15
Matt Waters: The pandemic, it's a nice way to start it back up

00:45:18
there, isn't it? From the start back up from the point where it?

00:45:21
Dan Johnson: No we started up in middle of August, August 16. We

00:45:26
started running again. So yeah, we've had some fantastic

00:45:30
charters in and around the can be Bay Area running our

00:45:35
signatory trips between father's away to Ireland's I've been

00:45:39
putting a bit of exploratory work in for my next year's

00:45:46
itinerary. Is it next year or the year after actually might be

00:45:51
2024? We're pretty booked this year. Yes, 2024. I've put a

00:45:56
couple of extra charters in where I want to get off into a

00:45:59
bit more exploring. We twos and beyond. There's a few islands

00:46:04
out there, and some saying Kazan's very interesting stuff

00:46:08
that I've been discovering.

00:46:12
Matt Waters: But tell you what, I'll tell you what, before we

00:46:14
get on to it, because I want to ask you about your little

00:46:16
discoveries and what you got planned. For, again, people who

00:46:20
are listening to this podcast may have not visited Papua New

00:46:23
Guinea yet. So let's give him a little bit more of an audible

00:46:27
kind of picture of of what we're talking about. Now. If I can

00:46:32
start on that, I'll say that to get to Papua New Guinea, most

00:46:36
people or all people are gonna have to fly into Port Moresby,

00:46:39
which is the main city and then there's no roads that lead out

00:46:42
of Port Moresby. So you've got to fly. Again to Yeah, so any

00:46:49
other dive resorts you want to go to? You're gonna have to fly

00:46:51
again internally. Now, there's a number of ways of doing that.

00:46:55
But we don't need to go into that. It's simple. It's a

00:46:57
flight, but to where Dan has the vessel and will end resorts you

00:47:05
have to fly from Port Moresby to New Britain, which is if you

00:47:09
look on the Atlas, you'll see a larger islands directly well,

00:47:12
more or less directly north of Port Moresby, would you say

00:47:16
that's fair?

00:47:17
Dan Johnson: Slightly northeast, yeah, no offence to Port Moresby.

00:47:22
Matt Waters: All right, Captain guy it's probably about

00:47:30
Dan Johnson: two degrees south southeast a little bit more than

00:47:34
that. Yeah.

00:47:38
Matt Waters: Yeah, so do you want to take it from there, Dan?

00:47:40
You know if if guests fly into hot skins Hoskins? Sorry. Made

00:47:47
up you guys.

00:47:49
Dan Johnson: Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So obviously picked up the

00:47:52
airport, run out to the resort. Spend a night or two in the

00:47:57
resort. Check out what they've got going on. I believe you've

00:47:59
been too willing to yourself.

00:48:01
Matt Waters: I've now you know, it's one that drew I've tried.

00:48:04
I've tried to go so many times. But for whatever reason, there's

00:48:07
always been something that's got in the way as a blocker. It's

00:48:09
been a fucking nightmare. And I'm determined to get there. And

00:48:12
I will. Well, I in fact, I spoke to Liz Cotterell so many times.

00:48:19
About about coming up there but never had the opportunity

00:48:22
Dan Johnson: yet. Well, you know, someone who's up there,

00:48:26
works up there now. So you still keep in contact. I'm sure we can

00:48:29
make something happen.

00:48:31
Matt Waters: Hell yeah. I want to run some expeditions up

00:48:33
there, mate. That's the thing. I'm gonna be bringing people up

00:48:36
there. I did it successfully in 2018. We got like 23 guests came

00:48:42
to two feet with me. For lending. Yeah, yeah. So we'll

00:48:47
make that happen. Well, the

00:48:49
Dan Johnson: Oceania hold 16 guests. So if you can make that

00:48:52
happen, you're more than welcome to click on and say G'day. Yeah,

00:48:59
yeah, as I said, we we, we do a little bit of this share this

00:49:03
little bit of the same diving, but the result does, but We by

00:49:07
no means get out to all of their sites by any stretch of the

00:49:10
imagination said they have. I think there's over 14 mooring

00:49:17
pins out there. And again, when things change over time, and

00:49:24
they always have their sort of favourites, set ones that big

00:49:29
pinnacles that they have there with huge amounts of fish around

00:49:34
are always a crowd pleaser. The rest of Ireland if the

00:49:39
visibility's good, there is phenomenal. year so we do a

00:49:46
couple of those but realistically for ourselves on

00:49:50
the Oceania we'll be heading out to the Father's wreaths which is

00:49:58
South out Lindy we head over to where there's a large volcano,

00:50:06
Alou becomes that right? There's volcano everywhere they throw a

00:50:13
stick and hits a volcano is a ring of fire for a reason. And I

00:50:21
do believe that what we're actually diving on is the edge

00:50:24
of a very large volcano. from many years ago, there's just see

00:50:29
Pinnacle's coming out from 1500 metres of water, or 500 metres

00:50:36
of water in places up to within four or five metres at the

00:50:39
surface. And that's what we're diving on. And the pinnacle sea

00:50:46
mounds, whatever you want to call them. And we get a lot of a

00:50:51
lot of schools of barracudas sharks good action out there.

00:50:56
And then we'll spend a few days then we head over to the wheat

00:51:02
two islands. And that is again another extinct volcano. And

00:51:07
that is northwest of will indie. Or north northwest of will indie

00:51:19
head out there and the diving changes completely again, where

00:51:24
we get a huge amount of diversity we do the Kretser

00:51:28
diving which is sometimes phrased as MK diving paper

00:51:33
always strive to do that term. So I tried to call it Chris the

00:51:37
diving more than Mark diving because you were not jumping in

00:51:40
a muddy puddle is as the terminology of Mark diving.

00:51:45
bring to people's imagination. We're jumping in there and we're

00:51:49
going down checking out for frog fish and the associated

00:51:54
critters, which live in the in the area.

00:51:59
Matt Waters: And that's two islands. That's where the black

00:52:01
sand is, isn't it? Black Sand dive sites.

00:52:04
Dan Johnson: Yeah, that sounds like a sand volcanic sand areas.

00:52:09
Yeah, we get some fantastic diving there. Ribbon eels. Manta

00:52:15
shrimps packers stick everywhere you find them. A lot of frog

00:52:19
fish and other bits and pieces depending on what time of year

00:52:21
it is. And of course, we dive the llama shows which was named

00:52:26
by Jacques Cousteau which is which we call by a different

00:52:32
name. I'm not sure I'm allowed to mention that the name of it

00:52:35
on a podcast but I'll go for it. You can always edit that. It's

00:52:38
called cracker fat. Listening.

00:52:46
Matt Waters: You're gonna have to explain that.

00:52:50
Dan Johnson: Well, so Alan didn't like the name llama shows

00:52:55
and he jumped in. He has a look at Eddie came back. And he said

00:53:01
Blimey, even the jelly fish ABS defeats any Americans listening

00:53:11
you might go by the name of Popper, chubby, I think, because

00:53:15
I got translated into the other day for a couple of the guests.

00:53:21
So yeah, and that slide is just magical. And there's lots more

00:53:30
sites like that. So I generally do we only run four dives on the

00:53:35
boat a day. That way, we get plenty of surface interval. But

00:53:39
the 70 Minute dives. You know, for diver 70 minutes, we give

00:53:45
good two to three hour surface interval between each dive. And

00:53:50
we've obviously we feed you in between every dive what dive

00:53:54
boat doesn't. And, yeah, it's a good experience. We like the way

00:54:02
it runs. So we'll do a couple of big fish dives in the morning.

00:54:06
And then onto our critter diving in the afternoon, where we may

00:54:12
open up the dive deck, depending on how people feel and just say

00:54:15
Yeah, go for it. We'll see you back for dinner.

00:54:19
Matt Waters: Yeah, well, it makes sense. I mean, if you're

00:54:21
going to be doing the pelagic dive in and out in the morning,

00:54:24
and then people are going to be really low on details for the

00:54:26
afternoon. Kind of get the credit diving done. And then

00:54:29
those people who don't like the creditors can start their JNT

00:54:31
while the sun's going down early.

00:54:33
Dan Johnson: Yeah, pretty much and we get a fantastic sunset

00:54:36
there too. So

00:54:38
Matt Waters: so it's nice. I can only imagine. Yeah. So let's

00:54:44
have a little bit more about the boat. What where she come from?

00:54:49
How old is she? What size is she? How many people can you

00:54:51
take how many chefs have you got on board? How many donors have

00:54:53
you got to share? Give us the gossip. Okay, well,

00:54:57
Dan Johnson: here we go. Some shameless of shameless self

00:55:00
publicity. So the boat was built in 2001 was refitted back in

00:55:08
2017 when we bought it from a private bloke marked keel as

00:55:15
sharp as in Egypt, looking at other boats to bring across and

00:55:20
then my my friend, Mark decided to sell his. So came over, have

00:55:27
a look and when we can work this, I then spent the next

00:55:31
eight months gutting it completely and turning it into

00:55:36
what she is today. So what she is today is a eight cabins

00:55:43
vessel. We have five twin twin cabins, three queen, Queen

00:55:49
cabins, the cabins are the same. They're all ensuite. I'm sure

00:55:55
you don't have to sit on the toilets take a shower, which I

00:55:57
always find advantage, everyone is oceanview. And the twins will

00:56:04
have wardrobes in and they're very comfortable and refitted

00:56:12
with individual Air Con in every cabin. So you can set it to the

00:56:19
temperature that you want to be at. And the temperature which

00:56:23
the Eskimo in the cabin wants to be

00:56:31
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that's the and that's all on the dive Deck

00:56:38
level. We then go up a level internal staircase takes you up

00:56:44
to the saloon area where we have a large saloon dining area we

00:56:52
have it's an open galley. So you can see into the galley so you

00:56:56
always know the food is prepared. And the house girls

00:57:03
are always clean. You can see how everything's being prepared,

00:57:07
and you get to chat with them. How often have you been on a

00:57:11
dive boat and the foods just come out of the dark room has

00:57:16
got no idea what's been going on behind that door. I like to be a

00:57:21
little bit more open and make sure that everyone can see

00:57:24
what's coming in and out. So yeah, we've got a toilet on the

00:57:33
upper level as well as obviously a toilet on the dive deck with

00:57:38
showers. Yeah. nitrox air on board the boat. Yeah, modern

00:57:48
facilities USB chargers in the room. International plugs

00:57:54
sockets to take everyone's different plugs so no adapters

00:57:59
required. What else have we got? We've got to dive tender, which

00:58:06
holds eight divers or 10 divers at a time. It's a 10 metre rigid

00:58:12
inflatable with twin twin outboards on the boat back of it

00:58:17
which she can go a good pace. She's great. She's great, great

00:58:24
bike to dive out of she's got a full dive ladder very easy to

00:58:27
climb in and out of the water with. It's not one of the rubber

00:58:31
inflatable ones, but you're going to try and pull yourself

00:58:34
over Oh, blimey, here we go. Where else? Outside areas we've

00:58:44
got an outside back there area and then we've got a full

00:58:47
sunroof, which takes up the entire top deck. The vessels 27

00:58:54
metres long and nine metres wide. It's a really it's a good

00:59:01
boat. It really is a boat. Yeah.

00:59:04
Matt Waters: I I do remember it coming. Or kind of advertising

00:59:09
that it was coming into Papua New Guinea. I was rather excited

00:59:13
about it. And like I say meant that COVID has. But so the

00:59:20
routes that you're doing at the moment are in and around the

00:59:26
islands and down to Milan Bay. You're planning on doing a

00:59:31
little bit of cheeky exploratory work.

00:59:36
Dan Johnson: Yeah. And so over time, everything changes

00:59:40
slightly. There is so much of Papua New Guinea which has not

00:59:43
been dived, or it may have been dive but not by me. And it's not

00:59:48
commercially run. And so, there's a couple of routes I've

00:59:54
got sort of I've got planned for the upcoming years. One of them

01:00:00
is a east coast down new violence. So there's loads of

01:00:07
little islands running down there. I'm only doing one of

01:00:10
those a year. And I want to try and explore. That's more of the

01:00:14
South Pacific side.

01:00:17
Matt Waters: Punches. Yeah, I'm just looking at a map. Now. Did

01:00:20
you say that was the east coast of New Island? New York,

01:00:23
Dan Johnson: the app? So you see live here and all of the little

01:00:28
islands down the side there? Yeah, and reef systems and all

01:00:33
bits and pieces. I believe there could be some interesting diving

01:00:37
down that side of the island.

01:00:40
Matt Waters: Definitely. I mean, look at those. I'll have to put

01:00:43
these into the podcast. And you know, so people can have a look

01:00:45
at them as well. But those, those channels that you can see

01:00:48
in the in the C beta, massive. Yep, it's kind of one. Yeah,

01:00:55
there's gonna be some good currents going through there.

01:00:58
Dan Johnson: That's it. So yeah, we'll be running down there.

01:01:02
Running from caveum. Round to rebel. Will Indy rebel is one of

01:01:08
our regular mid year itineraries to get away from the winter.

01:01:13
Cold in Australia, we run that but and where else? So many

01:01:22
bucks in arrears, it's ridiculous.

01:01:29
Oh, we can, it's all editable. So heading out to where to where

01:01:34
to and beyond. So this is my idea that, yes, diving, the

01:01:41
farmers is fantastic. But there is also great diving ash that

01:01:46
the way to Ireland and I've been sneaking out a little bit

01:01:49
further over the last couple of months to open up a couple of

01:01:55
reefs, which we've not done before. There's the island out

01:02:00
there, which is uninhabited. And there's a couple of safe

01:02:04
Anchorage is around. And so at some fish, it's in the middle of

01:02:09
nowhere. There's a large sang que, there. From the small

01:02:16
experience that we've had halfway to the island. We've

01:02:21
been jumping in cracking the plastic bottle, if you know what

01:02:26
I mean. I'm sure you've seen it done. And we've been mobbed by

01:02:31
sharks. On average, we've been getting 12 Plus grey, grey reef

01:02:37
fees swimming around and three, four Silvertips coming in and

01:02:42
investigating. At that point, I tell the guys to crack the

01:02:46
bottle some more and they just look at me like I'm an idiot and

01:02:49
and offer it to me. You bloody do it. And as we've been finding

01:02:57
some really good diving out there. I'm hoping Don's got some

01:03:01
cracking shots. He was on the last chart with us where we did

01:03:06
a couple of them. Yeah, we found one. Call it middle of nowhere.

01:03:13
And the other one is middle of nowhere. And then the other one.

01:03:17
Yeah, still trying to work out names obviously for them all.

01:03:22
And there's one which is just like the cast or it's like a

01:03:26
starts from 40 metres soft corals or all over this huge

01:03:30
Pinnacle coming up to sort of 50 metres of water. And it's a soft

01:03:35
Coral Ridge running down and this healthy, magnificent car

01:03:39
everywhere. I'm hoping that it's going to turn out to be a re

01:03:44
cleaning station. She big currents come through there and

01:03:51
they got to get clean somewhere.

01:03:54
Matt Waters: I'm gonna I'm going to mention a name out of an

01:03:57
island and I'm going to edit it out. So sorry listeners. You're

01:04:00
not going to you're not going to hear it. Dan, are you talking

01:04:04
around? That's it for part one, folks. Stay tuned for part two

01:04:10
and more exciting episodes. And don't forget, added in your

01:04:13
library so you get notified with each episode drop. Bye for now

01:04:18
is the podcast for the inquisitive diver