The major types of visiting and cruising around the various islands are day boats that drop you off each night to your hotel and the more expensive tour where you sleep on the boats at night. With the latter the advantage is obvious in that you cover more area of water and journey through the night awakening to new scenery and landing areas each day. The tours all start with morning flights from the major island and end with mid to late afternoon flights on your final exit day.

It is a good idea to check the itineraries of the boat you select before booking as the quality will vary from boat to boat. You must also make a full analysis on the size of boat you wish for spaciousness versus accessibility as some landing areas don't allow larger boats to land due to the fragility levels of nature that exists on certain islands. Generally larger vessels will travel further distances than the smaller ones.

Also note that you are not permitted to bring any food onto the islands so breakfast and lunch will always be taken on the vessel before disembarking.

All craft are given pre-schedules for specific time allocations to the various islands prior to embarking on their routes on specific days which is duly marshaled by the National Park.

As previously mentioned the smaller inexpensive crafts although providing greater flexibility to fragile islands are not as fast as the larger crafts involving more travel time with fewer bilingual guides.

In contrast the more costly larger crafts afford you more time to view the remoter islands and distant ones and are fitted out with private baths, videos, VHF radios in addition to more physical comfort and space.

As a guide economy class is approximately US $70 daily, Tourist class is around US $85, while first class tour boats run around US $120 daily. Luxury crafts for the more affluent begin at around $220 and up affording much higher levels of cuisine and personal attention.

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