peanut
Registered
For those of you who want to know, here is a quick trip report.
Flew direct from Atlanta to Provo, hooked up with 13 other people who were on the boat from Idaho at the Atlanta airport. Jen (the operations manager) was at the airport to meet us. The government has decided that you have to use one of the island taxis to get from the airport to wherever you are going instead of using transportation provided by hotels and liveaboards. Jen arranged to two taxis to take our group plus luggage to the inlet where they send the inflatable to take you out to the boat. She drove ahead and was waiting to help with logistics. We went immediately from the airport to the boat. Take shorts to change into because you have to wade to the inflatable. Once on board luggage was delivered to rooms and after unpacked stored away.
The staff
There was captain JF, purser and operation manager (instructor) Jen, cook Stan, engineer/divemaster Joe (I think), divermaster and training captain John, divemasters Randy and Steve (sunshine).
The boat
While not the prettiest or youngest belle at the ball, it was in fairly good shape. We were in one of the two VIP rooms and did not see the regular rooms but from what I understand they weren't that much smaller than ours. Our room had a queen bed, a small desk, separate bathroom with shower, toilet and sink area, a good sized closet, a chest with shelves that the tv/dvd player set on and drawers under the bed. The dive deck and lounge area are on the main floor, VIP rooms and sundeck on floor up, up one more set of stairs is a shaded sitting area for smokers and the bar b q is there. The dive deck wasn't very croweded for us, there was a total of 17 passengers so I imagine with a full boat it could get a bit crowded.
The diving operation
Unlike other liveaboards I've been on, you only dive when they tell you you can. No the pools open from 8 to 12 and have at it. Usually there was breakfast from 7 to 8, dive deck open at 8:30 for first dive. Dive deck open at 10:30 or 11 (can't remember) for second dive. Lunch Dive deck open at 1:30 for 3rd dive, dive deck open around 4:30 for 4th dive, dinner around 6:30 and dive deck open about 1 to 1/2 hours after dinner for night dive. There was always a dive master available to lead dives if anyone wanted. One person on dive platform helping people in and out, one person on dive deck marking people in and out. They mark you out when you go in and when you come back you have to give them your tank pressure and deepest depth. Two showers on the dive platform. Easy ladder system to get back on the boat. The boat does swing on it's line so you have to really pay attention when coming back to find it. You can hear the ladders bumping so it's not much of a problem. There are two lines with weights on the bottom hanging so if you want, you can catch one below 15 feet and ride the swing on your safety stop. We found it much easier to spot the boat, ascend to our 15 feet spotting something on the bottom and do our stop free hanging then catch the boat on its next swing around.
The diving
Vis was never better than 60 feet, sometimes around 40 feet. Water temp. was around 81 according to our computers. I get cold so I wore a 3 mil plus a 3/5 hooded vest and gloves and would get a little chilled by the 4th dive. There was a wall at each location with reef on top and either patchy reef or sand below the boat. We saw reef sharks on almost every dive, stingrays, a few turtles, the usual carrabean suspects. Only a couple of eels and we only saw one spotted eagle ray although we heard there were more. Biggest porcupine fish we've ever seen, lots of flamingo tongues and huge lobsters. The walls didn't have much actvity on them, but in most cases the tops were pretty busy. Coral was in pretty good shape. We got to West Caicos, NW Caicos and French Cay.
All and all a decent trip. Not our favorite place but not the worse either. The crew and operation were great and we are thinking about the SABA-St. Kitts trip with them in the future.
Flew direct from Atlanta to Provo, hooked up with 13 other people who were on the boat from Idaho at the Atlanta airport. Jen (the operations manager) was at the airport to meet us. The government has decided that you have to use one of the island taxis to get from the airport to wherever you are going instead of using transportation provided by hotels and liveaboards. Jen arranged to two taxis to take our group plus luggage to the inlet where they send the inflatable to take you out to the boat. She drove ahead and was waiting to help with logistics. We went immediately from the airport to the boat. Take shorts to change into because you have to wade to the inflatable. Once on board luggage was delivered to rooms and after unpacked stored away.
The staff
There was captain JF, purser and operation manager (instructor) Jen, cook Stan, engineer/divemaster Joe (I think), divermaster and training captain John, divemasters Randy and Steve (sunshine).
The boat
While not the prettiest or youngest belle at the ball, it was in fairly good shape. We were in one of the two VIP rooms and did not see the regular rooms but from what I understand they weren't that much smaller than ours. Our room had a queen bed, a small desk, separate bathroom with shower, toilet and sink area, a good sized closet, a chest with shelves that the tv/dvd player set on and drawers under the bed. The dive deck and lounge area are on the main floor, VIP rooms and sundeck on floor up, up one more set of stairs is a shaded sitting area for smokers and the bar b q is there. The dive deck wasn't very croweded for us, there was a total of 17 passengers so I imagine with a full boat it could get a bit crowded.
The diving operation
Unlike other liveaboards I've been on, you only dive when they tell you you can. No the pools open from 8 to 12 and have at it. Usually there was breakfast from 7 to 8, dive deck open at 8:30 for first dive. Dive deck open at 10:30 or 11 (can't remember) for second dive. Lunch Dive deck open at 1:30 for 3rd dive, dive deck open around 4:30 for 4th dive, dinner around 6:30 and dive deck open about 1 to 1/2 hours after dinner for night dive. There was always a dive master available to lead dives if anyone wanted. One person on dive platform helping people in and out, one person on dive deck marking people in and out. They mark you out when you go in and when you come back you have to give them your tank pressure and deepest depth. Two showers on the dive platform. Easy ladder system to get back on the boat. The boat does swing on it's line so you have to really pay attention when coming back to find it. You can hear the ladders bumping so it's not much of a problem. There are two lines with weights on the bottom hanging so if you want, you can catch one below 15 feet and ride the swing on your safety stop. We found it much easier to spot the boat, ascend to our 15 feet spotting something on the bottom and do our stop free hanging then catch the boat on its next swing around.
The diving
Vis was never better than 60 feet, sometimes around 40 feet. Water temp. was around 81 according to our computers. I get cold so I wore a 3 mil plus a 3/5 hooded vest and gloves and would get a little chilled by the 4th dive. There was a wall at each location with reef on top and either patchy reef or sand below the boat. We saw reef sharks on almost every dive, stingrays, a few turtles, the usual carrabean suspects. Only a couple of eels and we only saw one spotted eagle ray although we heard there were more. Biggest porcupine fish we've ever seen, lots of flamingo tongues and huge lobsters. The walls didn't have much actvity on them, but in most cases the tops were pretty busy. Coral was in pretty good shape. We got to West Caicos, NW Caicos and French Cay.
All and all a decent trip. Not our favorite place but not the worse either. The crew and operation were great and we are thinking about the SABA-St. Kitts trip with them in the future.
