Trip Report All Star Red Sea Liveaboard Trip Report Sept 2022

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jlcnuke

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I've recently returned from my 2 week trip to the Red Sea/Egypt, which included the Red Sea Liveaboard from All Star Liveaboards. Here's my report on the liveaboard portion of the trip (Red Sea South itinerary).
The boat - Originally, it was the Scuba Scene. That boat had a fire and was lost earlier this year however. We were later informed that we would be on the Sea Legend as a replacement of equal/better quality. When we arrived, however, we were put on the Tranquility. This was apparently changed in the last couple weeks before the trip but wasn't communicated to our group (9 of us). The boat was very nice and probably nicer than the Sea Legend. Safety briefing included pretty much every concern I'd have asked about in the wake of the Conception etc., including night watch, redundant exits, fire alarms/detectors, muster points, etc.
Two of us were diving rebreathers for most of the trip, which we had discussed with our contact at All Star prior to the trip to arrange what we needed, however those conversations apparently didn't carry over to the new boat as they were unaware/unprepared. They were able to get what we needed prior to departure however after we brought it up the night we boarded. If we'd have left that first night, I'm not sure if they would have been able to get our O2 tanks/supplies in time however. Fortunately that wasn't an issue.

Accommodations/food - the food was excellent. Breakfast was a buffet style with omelet station every morning, lunch was buffet style, and dinner was a multi-course sit-down meal each evening. As is typical of all the All Star liveaboards I've been on, the food was excellent. The only exception was that a number of items were overcooked (shrimp, lamb, and something else I can't recall off the top of my head were very overdone). The accommodations were excellent, except the common complaint from everyone in the group was that the beds were exceptionally stiff/hard. Most of us ended up sleeping on a comforter on top of the mattress for a bit of padding since the mattresses were just really, really hard. Air conditioning was in all the cabins and interior areas, though it struggled to keep up with the September heat and it was not unusual for someone to be found sweating some in the main cabin, despite the A/C being on continually.

Crew and guides - The crew mostly spoke Arabic, though the guides were fluent in English and some crew had a bit of understanding of English as well. Both guides were very knowledgeable on the larger sea life and the dive sites.

Diving discussed in next reply...
 
As for the diving - The bad part was there was very limited diving for the amount of time we were there. There were only 17 dives total on a trip spanning Monday evening (arrive) to the following Monday morning (depart) utilizing nitrox. That is in contrast to typically getting 19 dives on a Blackbeards trip that goes from Saturday afternoon (arrive) to Friday morning (depart) with just air on board (I believe it's around 24 dives using nitrox for the same time period on Aqua Cat). Granted, most days a night dive wasn't permitted due to local laws for the locations were were diving, but only getting 3 dives in throughout the day gave us a LOT of free time between dives (typically a 3 or so hour surface interval between dives). 1 dive before breakfast with briefing around 6:30am, next dive before lunch with briefing around 10:30am, and final dive in the after noon with briefing around 2:30pm. More than a couple of us felt we could have easily managed to get 4 dives in during the day if they would have allowed that.

Diving was a mixture of diving off the back of the boat and diving off the RIBs (rigid inflatable boats), and with the exception of the first couple dives and the last days of diving was mostly wall dives. The RIBs were not favored by most of the divers, and the drivers might have been part of that since they seemed to a couple times "have fun" racing with each other at the expense of the divers having a difficult time staying comfortable through the waves, though the conditions and it being the first RIB dives for most of the divers in my group definitely didn't help their comfort levels.

Currents did not allow for diving the wrecks at Big Brother island unfortunately, so no wreck dives at all on this trip. Typically the dives on Brothers/Daedelus/Elphinstone all went pretty much the same - get in the water -> go into "the blue" a little bit and look for pelagics (sharks/rays/etc.) for a while, then keep doing that or go back to the islands and enjoy the coral and tons of juvenile fish to be found there (the coral was exceptionally healthy). We had pretty bad luck imo at most of the sites with 1 group sighting (barely) a scalloped hammerhead (not my group :( ), 1 small group barely getting a look at a silky (I did get to be part of that) and a few manta sightings (those were quite nice, but we were primarily hoping for the pelagic sharks). The sharks just weren't coming around for most of it. However, at Elphinstone we did get some time with 3 different Oceanic White Tips (for which our guide Eska had a wonderful presentation on how to dive safely with them and all the other sharks).

The inland sites we dove had excellent reefs with an abundance of life. These sites, unlike the islands further out, had both juveniles and a healthy population of mature fish as well, while the islands tended to have very little evidence of grown fish population but tons of juveniles.

Recreational limits were stated as the max allowed for the dives, which I wasn't expecting since the trip offers tech diving training, so I had assumed we'd be permitted to dive to our personal limits, but the dive briefings didn't give that option. I don't know if I'd have pushed that if they'd have allowed deco/deeper diving or not, as I didn't bother with it this trip as I was mainly wanting to enjoy my first dives in the Red Sea and get some hours on my new rebreather (which I used for 12 of the 17 dives).

Overall impression - I can't blame the crew/boat/guides for the lack of sharks etc. showing up on the dives, and most of the trip was excellent, but the beds and the limited number of dives makes me give this trip a 4/5 stars. For the price, a pretty good value, but I'd probably look into the schedule a bit more carefully before booking in the future to maybe find a trip with more diving in the same time period and hopefully significantly more comfortable mattresses. Our primary contact with All Star was on vacation shortly before the trip, so I chalk up the communication issues on swapping boats to a fluke from people not knowing what had/had not been communicated to who, and everything worked out anyway.
 
Oh, we also had a bit of a "celebrity" guest on the boat with us. Diving with some of his friends was Ahmed Gabr (really nice guy btw, so was Ahmed Kalan from TDI who was also with us).
 
When we arrived, however, we were put on the Tranquility. This was apparently changed in the last couple weeks before the trip but wasn't communicated to our group (9 of us). The boat was very nice and probably nicer than the Sea Legend.
I wonder whether that's the boat they'll use going forward, or whether future divers will get one that's perhaps not as nice?
Two of us were diving rebreathers for most of the trip,

Recreational limits were stated as the max allowed for the dives, which I wasn't expecting since the trip offers tech diving training, so I had assumed we'd be permitted to dive to our personal limits, but the dive briefings didn't give that option.
So, did you guy use rebreathers for dives you could've done on standard open circuit gear, basically getting experience with your rebreathers? Other than the option to do that, and perhaps get in some technical training (in which case wonder how deep they take people), is there any reason to bring technical diving equipment? Which also raises the question whether this is typical of Red Sea liveaboards?
As for the diving - The bad part was there was very limited diving for the amount of time we were there. There were only 17 dives total on a trip spanning Monday evening (arrive) to the following Monday morning (depart) utilizing nitrox. That is in contrast to typically getting 19 dives on a Blackbeards trip that goes from Saturday afternoon (arrive) to Friday morning (depart) with just air on board

More than a couple of us felt we could have easily managed to get 4 dives in during the day if they would have allowed that.
I've read that the Maldives liveaboard tend towards 3 dives/day due to depth, but I don't recall reading that about Red Sea liveaboards. Anybody know what's a typical number of dives/day for one?
 
I wonder whether that's the boat they'll use going forward, or whether future divers will get one that's perhaps not as nice?
They are building a new boat currently. We saw some plans/pictures of it and it looks to be really nice.
So, did you guy use rebreathers for dives you could've done on standard open circuit gear, basically getting experience with your rebreathers? Other than the option to do that, and perhaps get in some technical training (in which case wonder how deep they take people), is there any reason to bring technical diving equipment? Which also raises the question whether this is typical of Red Sea liveaboards?
The dives we did could have been done on OC, but we wanted to get experience in on the rebreathers since we just got certified on them. Some of the sites are very much able to be tech dives (such as the wrecks on Big Brother which drop to 60-80m). All Star offers tech 40, 45, and 50 from what I'd read before on the trips, but I'm not sure if those offerings are available while they are still using other outfit's boats until their next one is ready.
I've read that the Maldives liveaboard tend towards 3 dives/day due to depth, but I don't recall reading that about Red Sea liveaboards. Anybody know what's a typical number of dives/day for one?
 
Thanks for taking the time to post a trip report up. I am on Sea Legend next week, doing a slight variation on the normal BDE route. I was on one of the cheapest/smallest Red Sea liveaboards in August and that was a great trip, so looking forward to the comparison.

I have done the BDE route a couple of times, for the 3 days spent at Brothers and Deadalus 3 dives a day is the normal routine. First day out of port is normally 3 dives as well. Last full day at Elphinstone should be 4 dives, and then 2 dives on the last day on the way back to port. So a total of 18 dives should be expected. In comparison the northern Wrecks & Reefs route and the St Johns routes can have 21 dives as night dives are possible each day.
 
When I did the BDE route on Blue Horizon last year 3 dives a day was typical and the online itinerary even says 18 dives. Night diving isn't allowed in the marine park and the other days the boat is in transit in the evening/night. I'm not sure how more dives could have been fit in during the itinerary. Did you have obvious times where you even could have fit in more dives?
 
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