Diving Tulamben: Shipwrecks, Coral Walls, and Family Joy

Daughter 3 diving in Tulamben

I tell you what—I am crazy about my wife. She’s amazing. Strong, funny, and that smile? I could spend my whole life trying to make her smile and not consider a second of it wasted.

But...

Give me a moment here...

The day she told me that she doesn’t like scuba diving, the world kind of tilted off its axis. I mean, what do you do with that? The most magical thing on Earth—strapping on some gear and flying through an underwater fantasyland—and she just wasn’t into it?

There was weeping. There was mourning. There may have been some dramatic sighing into a dive mask.

But love, real love, means accepting the whole person. Even the parts that don’t understand that hovering weightless over a coral reef is basically like living inside a dream.

Still, when our first daughter came along, I dared to hope. Maybe she would be my dive buddy—just the two of us out searching for sea turtles and dancing with parrotfish. But alas, diving wasn’t her thing.

Our second daughter? Same story.

By the time our third was born, I’d stopped hoping. Some dreams just aren’t meant to be.

And then—plot twist! We moved to Hawaii, and my youngest daughter turned into a sea creature. She snorkeled like she had gills. I could barely keep up with her.

So when we planned a month in Indonesia, and I knew I’d be diving at Komodo (too intense for a beginner), we made a plan. She would fly out and meet us in Bali during the last two weeks of the trip. We’d hike. We’d surf. And—finally—we’d dive together.

And for that, we headed to Tulamben.

Diving Tulamben: USAT Liberty

I first heard about the Liberty, and started dreaming about diving on it, years before I even got my dive certification. Before I had daughters. Heck, before I married my wife!

There’s just something legendary about it. A World War II-era U.S. Army cargo ship, the USAT Liberty was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine in 1942 while transporting supplies from Australia to the Philippines. Badly damaged, it was towed toward the port at Singaraja, but it never made it. The crew intentionally beached the ship at Tulamben so the cargo could be salvaged.

And there it sat—high and dry—for two decades. Then in 1963, Bali’s Mount Agung erupted violently, shaking the earth and sending lava and ash across the region. The tremors were so strong, they dislodged the Liberty from the beach and rolled it into the sea, where it settled on its side in shallow water just off the coast.

Thus began one of the world’s most famous shore dives.

You don’t need a boat. You don’t need to descend into some dark, hidden abyss. You simply gear up, wade in from the beach, and within moments you're hovering over one of the most photogenic shipwrecks on the planet. Coral now grows across every inch of her hull. Schools of jack and sweetlips swirl around the remains. Barracuda lurk in the shadows. Occasionally, bumphead parrotfish cruise through the scene like armored tanks. And the wreck is big—over 120 meters long—with cavernous swim-throughs and rusted-out chambers that invite exploration.

The USAT Liberty

The depth ranges from about 5 to 30 meters, so it’s accessible to everyone from brand-new Open Water divers to seasoned techies. You can dive the Liberty again and again and never see it the same way twice. Sunlight pierces the water at different angles throughout the day, lighting new textures and casting eerie shadows through the skeletal remains.

But the best part of diving the Liberty wasn’t the wreck itself—it was that, for the first time, I explored an underwater world with a member of my family. You should have seen my daughter. She had just earned her Open Water certification, but she moved through the water with calm, practiced ease. Her buoyancy was spot on. Her movements were graceful, deliberate, and in control.

It was just the two of us and our guide. Before the dive, he’d told me he wouldn’t take us deep inside the wreck unless my daughter showed real ability—skills well beyond what you usually see in a beginner. He watched her for about ten minutes, then gave a quick nod and changed direction.

And just like that, we were swimming into the heart of the ship.

The dive was unforgettable. A maze of rusted beams and coral-covered walls. Shafts of light slicing through open hatches. We ended the dive gliding over a patch of garden eels, their slender bodies swaying like sea grass on the sandy slope back to shore.

But what I’ll remember most is who I was with. My daughter. Underwater. At my side.

Diving Tulamben: Tulamben Dropoff

Our next dive took us to the Tulamben Dropoff, and let me just say—if the Liberty wreck is all about eerie history and twisted metal, this dive is pure, living color. It starts simply enough, with a relaxed swim over shallow reef flats. But even here, the reef is alive with action. We drifted through broad anemone fields, each one bouncing with feisty little clownfish. I don’t care how seasoned a diver you are—it’s impossible not to smile when you’re swimming with Nemos.

Lionfish--don't touch!!!

Then came the lionfish. So many lionfish. I don’t know what was going on down there that day, but it felt like every lionfish in Bali had RSVP’d to the same underwater rave. They were everywhere, flowing their elaborate fins and striking poses like they were being paid by the frame. Our guide also pointed out a master of disguise: a scorpionfish so expertly camouflaged that it looked like part of the reef until you notice it has eyes. (And like lionfish, scorpionfish are not to be messed with—beautiful, yes, but definitely “look, don’t touch” material.)

The most surprising find was a gorgeous spotted moray eel, tucked into the coral, poking its head out of its den, its speckled skin catching the sunlight that filtered down from above.

But the main event here is the wall itself. The reef just suddenly drops away, and you're floating beside this sheer coral cliff that descends into blue mystery. It's a tapestry of color and life—soft corals, hard corals, feather stars, sea fans and sponges all clinging to the vertical face like a living mosaic. You can just hang there, weightless, and watch the reef pulse with life.

The Liberty may get the headlines, but the Dropoff is every bit as dazzling.

Hello, Nemo!

Diving in the Dark

If diving is mellow during the day, it can turn into an adrenaline ride after dark. Predators that glide lazily across the reef like underwater zombies by day suddenly become sleek torpedoes with a mission at night. And that mission? Dinner.

Meanwhile, your world shrinks to the beam of your dive torch, and everything outside of that tiny cone of light is just black, unknowable ocean. It’s both unnerving and exhilarating.

Naturally, I asked my daughter—who’s spent countless nights hanging out on Hawaiian beaches—if she wanted to brave a night dive on the Liberty. She didn’t hesitate.

So, just after sunset, we suited up, waddled across the rocky beach like overloaded penguins, and slipped beneath the surface into pitch-black water. What we found was a shipwreck transformed. We saw a couple of meter-long groupers in some kind of standoff, and a lone barracuda here, and trevally there darting like blazing missiles through our light beams.

Inside one of the holds, we swam through a shimmering cloud of fish, their silver scales glittering in our lights. And at the end of the dive, we settled on a patch of sand, switched off our torches plunging ourselves into perfect darkness, and waved our arms around like lunatics. In return, the water came alive with bioluminescent plankton, twinkling like stars. It was underwater stargazing, but better—because the stars were following us.

The next day we hit the Dropoff again and then made a dive at Coral Gardens. That one’s a bit more subdued, but if you’re a Nemo fan, it’s a clownfish playground. There are also underwater sculptures scattered about. So there are lots of opportunities for photos.

Tulamben might not have the raw drama of Komodo, but it’s pure, joyful diving. There’s no boat ride, no complicated logistics—just gear up and walk in. Well, “walk” might be generous. The “beach” is a field of ankle-breaking black stones that laugh at your fins and tank. But if you can survive the ten-foot stumble to the water, you’re in for some of the easiest and most rewarding diving anywhere.

And diving it with my daughter—watching her drift effortlessly through coral canyons, exchanging wide-eyed glances with me underwater—that’s the kind of memory I’ll hold onto for a long time. It’s the kind of thing that makes all the hassle worth it. The kind of thing that lingers, long after the wetsuits are dry.

And honestly? That’s why we do this—because travel gives us moments like that.

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We stayed at (and booked all our dives through Ocean Villa Dive Resort-Tulamben. We had a simple, comfortable room (right by the pool), the food was fairly good (which is important because you are not really near any kind of food scene near the water in Tulamben), and our dive guide was great.

You are never far from a volcano in Bali, including in Tulamben