Tufi sits at the edge of some of Papua New Guinea's most dramatic coastal lansdscapes, where cliff-like hills drop sharply to narrow bays, the vista like a Scandanavian fjord. At the top of one of these fjords is Tufi.
The pier at Tufi Dive Resort is a classic muck site – there are old crates with coke bottles, rubber tyres, boxes and all sorts of decades-old rubbish vying for space with tiny sponges and small corals. Divemasters lead the new diver tours and within moments will point out critters like mandarinfish, ornate ghost pipefish and toad fish. Even pairs of harlequin shrimp are often spotted consuming starfish legs for dinner.
During World War II, Tufi acted as a base for American patrols and at the bottom of the bay are the remains of a torpedo tube, with the torpedo still in it, a 50mm gun and an intact Land Rover.
There's plenty of pretty reef diving too. Just an hour's sail away are a group of oval sea mounds that drop off to over fifty metres. These are a haven for an incredibly diverse array of marine species including barracuda, Spanish mackerel, schooling jacks, damsels, angels and fairy basslets. Cruising the walls, there are grey reef sharks and off in the blue, glimpses of mantas, tuna, spanish mackerel and small turtles.