we had a Pleasant and confortable stay. the rooms are very nice and clean (we had standard room). the staff was very friendly and helpful, specially Lina.
the food was great, we really enjoy the breakfasts and the smoothies.
and they have a relaxing place in front of the corals :DMore
Booking.comBooking.com
Hotels.com
We started out at one of Black Marlin’s neighbors but the staff at the other hotel were abysmal, as they didn’t seem to be interested in their guests at all. Therefore, we wandered over to Black Marlin and discovered the staff were so nice and helpful, and the rooms were in much better shape with 24 hour running water. That was all we needed to move hotels....that and to experience a few smiles and nice people. WOW, what a huge difference. The staff at Black Marlin were super nice, made our children food at odd hours which is very important when visiting Togean Islands (because all of the hotels have set meal times). Lina, Siti and Unke and many of the other guys were delightful. Honestly, Togean is super laid back and you should not expect luxury or services like Bali or other high end places. If you know what you are getting yourself into, then be prepared for a slower pace and laid back staff. Don’t have high expectations and your visit should be great!
I couldn’t understand why the neighboring resort had so many guests, while Black Marlin had just a few. One of the divers told me that Lonely Planet didn’t give write a good review which made me so sad. I know that it’s not the best service, but If you need something, give it time….the staff will eventually get around to assisting you. Sometimes, you just have to be patient in these slow paced places in the world. I found the staff to be extremely capable; we were assisted with a speedboat to another island, a longtail boat for a lazy day at a nearby beach for the day. Also, upon our return to Black Marlin several days later, we did not have any airline tickets and Lina assisted us with arranging a speedboat directly to Ampana, pickup in Ampana, as well as purchasing our airline tickets for six people. We couldn’t have been happier with the service they provided.
We stayed in the VIP rooms and loved them…they have such great views! My only comment for the owner would be to tell the staff to close the generator door when it is on because otherwise the top room smells like gas.
Hi,thank you so much for the detailed review and understanding the circumstances surrounding the area and what to expect, really valuable advise. We are are always working to improve all areas from room facilities to service etc and hope it is great for the price guests are paying in such an isolated location. Our staff work really hard to make all our guests welcome and give them a memorable stay. I hope we will see you again. You comments duly noted for the generator and apologise if this disturbed your stay atall. Best wishes, Crispin
Okay so. We arrived at Friday noon. We were welcomed by a young lady, turnout a general cleaning & cooking staff. She showed us our room. After we finish unpacked, we asked her regarding out activities. Previously we already sent an email of our itinerary to the owner. The staff said that she didn't know anything about our activities and she told us to wait until the manager came. Our plan was dive course for one of my friend for that afternoon. There were only cleaning staffs at that time. No on-duty manager. We had to wait until around 4 pm then the dive instructor showed up. After we introduced ourselves, he also had no information regarding our itinerary which we already sent. So personally he sorry for the inconvenience but that wasn't his mistake after all. So that time we did nothing. Just relax and enjoy (or wasting) time. The activity started Saturday morning. The one who arranged most of it was the dive instructor, Mika. He is a great man. He is really humble and nice. The services also so so. We took the economy price. But I think we could get standard services like makeup & cleaning bedroom everyday. And also until the 2nd night there was no other guest. Only three of us. The manager was not always standby at the resort. We don't know why. The beers were not cold. So sad.
Hi and thanks for your review. I'm not sure what went wrong during your stay as rather unusual to have things happen like that. I have spoken with our manager and staff to refocus on these areas and hopefully all corrected in the future. I apologise that your stay was not completely up to your satisfaction and perhaps will have an opportunity to return again to experience the real Black marlin atmosphere and service from a family run staff that are committed to pleasing the guests.
I took open water diving course and licence last week in Black Marlin Resort. It was supposed to be a stop over waiting for my friend to be off work and go on holiday together, instead it turned out to be one of the most amazing experience I could ever have had.
Beautiful Togian islands as background, crystal clear water, beautiful reefs, amazing fauna, waves that let you fall asleep with their rhythm in the beach bungalows, making everything sound like a dream you do not want to wake up from.
Amazing Mika as diving instructor. Professional, attentive, extremely patience and coinvolgent, crazy to the right point to add a touch of fun even when there was nothing to laugh for, entertaining and funny， the kind of person you feel at ease without even without knowing each other, consequently feeling safe and comfortable underwater. In BM the perfect person for making whatever problem you may have in your stay fade away in a second.
Black Marlin should be honoured and proud to have an amazing person as Mika running the resort or at least the heart of it.
Many thanks for your review and I'm glad you enjoyed your dive course with Mika. We always chose our instructors very carefully so they will do the best job possible in introducing new divers to the underwater world. Best wishes, Crispin
Was planning to make a very negative resort
Cabin not cleaned when arriving. No help with luggage. Maintanance suboptimal. Plumbing bad.food meager and to sfor holliday resort. Bar terrible only beer and not always cold. Several days No management. Water supply not adequate
Diving however good although understaffed. Only weights not reliable, my 12 kg turned out to be
9.3
New gear well maintained. Clean aircon good boats.
Hi Peter,
Many thanks for the review and happy that you enjoyed diving with us. All the rooms have been redecorated since your stay so think most of you issues now corrected. I hope you can visit us again in the future and experience the improvements first hand. Best wishes, Crispin
We came to Black Marlin after phoning with the owner - seemed like a friendly guy. The pickup in Wakai went perfect. The nature was amazing - white beaches, a beautiful riff right infront and the bungalows seemed ok from the outside (no connection and water & electricity only sometimes, but that‘s no suprise and if you want to visit such an island & nature you have to take this into account).
But shortly after our arrival the resort showed it‘s true colours! The bungalows paintings were broken, the curtains and rooms were dirty and our toilet was broken as well. The mosquitonet had around 15(!) holes in it - we asked the staff to restore them, but nothing happened. This is not acceptable in a spot where malaria can acure. Also, there was no toilet paper for three days and the staff didn’t get us some, although they went to Wakai several times and told us somebody would get it „sometime“. There was no room cleaning during our whole stay, no fresh towels, nothing. The owner was never there, his wife rarely. In general there was nobody there to talk to, nor someone who could help us organizing some trips to explore the environment, which was, of course, our main reason for visiting the Togean Islands. We basically got stuck at the resort and its beach (which wasn't too bad the first few days, but after it got really annoying because we wanted to explore the islands). The staff was friendly, but it’s language skills werent good enough to help us in any way. All in all, there is NO leadership or organization at this place. We had to ask several times to get at least one trip to the jellyfish lake... on day No. 4! It’s really sad, because we would have loved seeing more. But we were reliant on boats (and guides) to leave the bay - swimming/walking to different spots was no option.
Further, a boat collapsed on open water(!) while we were there, the group stranded on a island. The Black Marlin boats are anything but safe or intact anymore. Another guest fell through a brittle board on the veranda and hurt himself badly (similar accident happened three weeks before, but the staff - again - obviously didn't care about it and didn’t restore it or warned the guests). Also the snorkling equipment was broken and had fungus and spiders inside! According to this, the resort isn’t only shabby and unorganized, its actually dangerous, especially as there is no good clinic nearby, no connection and nobody to talk to if something happened.
As i said, rare water & electricity at fixed times is no problem, but they never followed their own schedule... For 700‘000 a night (we changed to the deluxe room, wasn't better, now you couldn’t even open the doors at night without the dogs, rats etc. getting in... and it got really hot without the fan and closed doors) you should be able to get a clean room and minimal service.
There is a staff of like 10 persons, only one was actually working, the others hung around. After what we heard, the payment they get is ridiculously low, so their lack of motivation was no suprise.
At least the food was good and the dive instructor was a nice guy. In the end, we left a few days earlier than planned (almost didn’t get on the speedboat to Ampana, because they didn’t reserve us the tickets and didn't tell us about its necessarity when asked, so we ended up in an awfully crowded boat, paying double the amount) and were very disappointed, cause the nature there is something you can rarely find. But this so called resort is so neglected that we couldn’t stand it anymore, which is extremely sad, especially after the long trip to even get there.
As i saw, most of the owners answers are bad excuses about the island and it‘s rare resources. This is NOT the problem. If the resort would be leaded with a bit of love, motivation, competence and effort, it could be a much more beautiful and less neglected place.
Lucas, thank you for your feed back but are frankly surprised and saddened as during your stay always responded that were happy with everything after we had upgraded you from a standard to a deluxe room. Only on being presented your bill did you start to make all the protests and threatening a bad review on Tripadvisor. My staff even gave a further discount after these unreasonable threats, but you still made this inaccurate review in violation of Tripadvisors policy over threats to get unwarranted discounts but due toTripadvisor's weak enforcement of this so we are subjected to the undeserved humiliation. In the interests of accuracy I will correct various points aswell:
You were staying at he beginning of February which is the stormy season in the Togeans so unfortunately this limits the activities we can provide on the ocean in the interests of safety. During your stay we did not arrange any snorkeling trips (these are sub contracted to local fishermen and not as stated on Black Marlin boats). The trip you refer to hat had problem was not arranged by us but by a different resort as we considered it still to rough to be safe. Guests are always free to join any snorkeling trips arranged by other resorts.
We apologise if the resort dog bothered you in your room at anytime and understand it can get warm in the rooms at night for some guests. We hope to start to run our generators at night from high season this year to alleviate this and have finally got confirmation that the government will connect us to 24 electricity in 2019 thus allowing us to offer many more amenities and services to guests
I don't really understand you complaint about taking the return boat to Ampana as any request to reserve a seat is handled immediately and not sure which boat you ended up taking if full.
We thank you for any relevant and truthful feedback that we can act on, but are deeply saddened by your threatening behavior to our staff on being presented you bill when at no time during your stay had these points been raised with the manager for action to be taken if necessary, as was the case when we upgraded you to a deluxe room with no questions on your initial dissatisfaction with the standard room you had.
