Average Diver Looking for a Dive Vacation

[charitym75]

I am in the process of planning a tropical vacation for December and am looking for some of the best diving. I'm an experienced diver with over 10 years experience but have only been diving around the US and Europe. I'm not that familiar with the tropical locals...

I will be travelling with someone that is NEW diver and not as confident so will be looking for places that can cater to both new and experience divers.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!!!!

Thanks!

 

[TSandM]

There are lots of options, and a lot of it will depend on where you are and what you can easily get to.

My first real dive trip was to Byron Bay in Australia. I had about 40 dives at the time. The diving was fantastic, with a wide variety of sea life and lots of color, and excellent visibility. It wasn't deep and there was no current, although we did have to contend with a bit of swell. We stayed in a very pleasant B&B that caters to divers, and the town had lots of good restaurants and was very pretty, located on a stunning crescent of white sand beach. It was a great trip.

We did a Red Sea liveaboard, which was wonderful, and we had two fairly inexperienced divers on the boat who did fine -- but we also had unusually peaceful conditions for diving, as I understand.

We also went to Indonesia, where the diving was colorful and fascinating, but the currents could be very strong and we were diving 600 foot walls. I wouldn't call that beginner diving at all.

Another place we've had a lot of fun was in the British Virgin Islands. We saw lots of life and lots of color, and most of the diving was relatively shallow and pretty benign.

 

[Hank49]

There are hundreds of tropical dive destinations world wide.
If you narrow down your criteria you can probably get more accurate information, like what TS&M gave.
I've dived the Philippines, Bali, West Malaysia, North Borneo and Sipadan....and Belize. All are really nice but all are different, in the water and on land.

 

[charitym75]

Thanks for the info TSandM!

I'm considering Cayman Islands, Barbados or Aruba... any suggestions for those islands would be great!