In 1999, Miners started his own dive liveaboard business in Indonesia on his 60 ft wooden ketch Felidae. Fluent in Bahasa Indonesia, he’s sailed and dived the across the entire 5,000 km length of Indonesia. After a decade’s worth of peregrinations from the blustery north of England to the wild hinterlands of West Papua, Miners now calls Raja Ampat home.

Mark Pearce, aka Cherry - Manager of MER and the Misool Conservation Centre

Cherry grew up with Andrew in the small seaside town of Perranporth in Cornwall, England. Surrounded by the ocean, diving friends and a diving family, it was no surprise that Cherry found himself drawn to the call of the seas. In 1996 he became BSAC assistant instructor, a few years later a PADI divemaster.

He first ventured to Asia while still a teenager, and has spent nine years here, walking across the Himalayas, trekking through Tibet, studying Chinese and Kung Fu in China, and of course diving throughout SE Asia. He has spent five years in Indonesia, diving, sailing, surfing, and learning to speak Indonesian.

When in England, he specialised in supporting people with Autism, managing several homes in Cornwall. He also spent eight months in Kuala Lumpur, establishing the first Autism specific school in Malaysia. During his last spell in England, Cherry qualified as a Yachtmaster in near-hurricane conditions, and recently completed a six month sail, traversing 4000 miles around the Sumatran Coast.

Cherry joined the dive liveaboard Shakti as the Dive Cruise Coordinator with Andy in 2002, and Raja Ampat became home for nearly two years. Cherry is very happy to back in Raja Ampat as the Manager of MER and the Misool Conservation Centre.

Thorben Niemann - Foreman of Construction

Thorben grew up in a little village southwest of Hamburg, Germany. His first foray into building was a three and a half year apprenticeship as a central heating and ventilation technician. He spent a year with the German Armed Forces, and then in 1995 started his second apprenticeship as a carpenter with a company specializing in reinforced concrete works.

In 1998 Thorben left home to join the venerated tradition of ‘Zimmerman auf Wanderschaft,’ or Journeyman Carpenter. According to the old custom, journeyman are to seek out master craftsmen, offering their labor in exchange for only hospitality and invaluable experience. The journeymen are required to wear the traditional costume of guild and vow not to venture within 50 km of their hometown, leaving all personal possessions behind.

Thorben spent four years criss-crossing the globe in this fashion. His travels eventually took him to Asia, where he worked with craftsmen in Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand. One of his favorite projects was working with a very welcoming Chinese family, renovating their house and building new windows and doors for them.

Two and a half years into his journey, Thorben arrived on Koh Tao. While he was doing some carpentry work on Big Bubble’s Dive Shop and boat, owner Micha Gorgen talked him into taking an open water course, which was followed shortly thereafter by an Advanced Course, Nitrox Course, and a few live aboard trips through the Andaman Sea.

After another stint of carpentry work in Germany, Thorben returned to Koh Tao to complete his Rescue Diver and Divemaster training. He had been working as a divemaster at Big Bubble when his path crossed Andrew’s. Misool Eco Resort sounded like a dream project to Thorben, combining his passion for adventure diving with his wealth of experience in carpentry.

Team Bati

Nearly all of our construction crew is from Yellu, the local village from which we've leased Batbitim.