In July, 2026, Manta Ray Bay Resort and Yap Divers celebrate a milestone forty years in the making. What began as a small, harbor-side dive center founded by a young Peace Corps volunteer has grown into one of the world’s longest-running, family-owned dive resorts. To mark this anniversary, we invite divers, underwater photographers, adventurers, and long-time friends of Yap to join us for a year filled with special offerings, island experiences, and a weeklong celebration honoring four decades of diving with purpose, passion, and family stewardship.
Whether you have visited us many times or are discovering Yap for the first time, 2026 is the perfect year to experience everything that makes Manta Ray Bay Resort unique – our manta-filled channels, our warm island hospitality, our commitment to Yapese culture, and the diver-focused approach that has guided us from the beginning.
For four decades, Manta Ray Bay Resort and Yap Divers have stood among the world’s longest-running, family-operated dive centers and resorts. Founded in 1986 by Bill Acker and still guided by the Acker family today, the resort joins a select group of pioneering, privately run dive operations whose histories stretch back into the 1960s and 1970s, including Small Hope Bay Lodge in the Bahamas, Anthony’s Key Resort in Roatán, Blue Lagoon in Chuuk, and Fish ’n Fins in Palau. These longstanding operations helped define modern dive tourism, each shaped by a founder’s vision and a lifetime of stewardship.
Manta Ray Bay Resort is proudly part of this lineage – a rare example of a diver-built, diver-run resort that has remained true to its purpose for forty years.
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