bahamas vx. jamaica for diving

[mike_s]

There are 5 or 6 Sandals in Jamacia.

Ocho Rios is about a 2.5 hour drive from the Mo Bay airport. Negril is about an hour or 1.5 hour depending on whether they have ever finished the road construction.

I've been to Ocho Rios, Mo Bay, and Negril. We didn't dive in Ocho Rios or Mo Bay. The water in Ocho Rios was just murky and you could barely see your feet.

Negril the water was as clear as tap water all the way down to 100 feet. I've always been told that the diving in Jamacia was bad though. I did a weeks worth of diving in Negril and was suprised that it wasn't that bad. While the reefs weren't perfect and the fish could was low (overfishing I guess), it wasn't that bad.

Though it's not a pristine dive location like Bonaire, etc, it wasn't as bad as everyone had said it was. (at leat in Negril).

I've dove the bahamas several times also. I'd have to say it doesn't have the best reefs either, but wasn't bad.

For honeymoon choices, neither is bad. Jamacia is a little further behind on its infrastructure (roads, etc) though. But it's more of what you make of it.(your trip).

 

[kcjones01]

We've been to Jamaica seveal times and my wife and I really enjoy the island. You do have to be aware of your surroundings. Even at some of the resorts where they are " walled off" from the general public you will have locals yelling at you to try and get you to leave the resort to buy things from them. They will sell you anything from drugs to wood carvings. My favorite spot is a hotel on Bloody Bay near Negril Very private and secluded. We have walked the entire 7 mile beach without problems during the day. Night is different . Be careful if your going to leave the property at night!! Go with other couples and get a taxi to wait for you at your destination.

As far as my experience diving in Jamaica. The negril area is really an ideal place for new divers to practice their skills. Great vis. no surf/surge and I've only run into a strong current one time. The reefs and fish are not that great so don't be surprised. But the conditions are ideal for practice. The dive ops are ok. You have to know your stuff as the are not the safety oriented places you'll find in the states or other islands.

 

[cfelliot]

Went to Sandals Negril this April. This was our 5th time there - first in '95. This was our first time diving there.

See: http://www.chuckelliot.com/jamaica06.htm

* Great DMs and boat people
* Overcrowded boat at times 20 divers of mixed abilities
* Lots of smaller fish and cool sponges
* Saw 2 dolphins on last dive
* Short dives even when shallow - 30 min at 30'?

Even though it’s all inclusive, covert small tips get you better service.

 

[gurumasta]

huge help everybody. thanks alot. its quite a bit of dough to switch plans to bahamas and it will be my first time warm water diving so maybe i will stick with the original plan. im sure ill love it either way. thanks a lot!!!!

 

[Damselfish]

We enjoyed our 2 trips to Jamaica, though it was a long time ago and we did not dive there. One was to Couples near Ocho Rios, and the other to someplace in Montego Bay. It's a perfectly fine place to go hole up in a nice all-inclusive and relax, and of course popular for great package deals. It's not where I would choose to go now for a variety of reasons, but I certainly don't regret going and seeing a little of Jamaica (we did go off property a fair amount.) It's possible to have good and bad trips almost anyplace. Jamaica is like most places, you'll have the best trip if you do your research so it's not too out of line with your expectations.

Yes, if you were outside a resort people wanted to sell you stuff and it can be a nuisance, but we found that acknowledging people with a nice hello and a few words of chat, while making it clear you weren't interested, worked much better than just trying to ignore people.

 

[cfelliot]

...but we found that acknowledging people with a nice hello and a few words of chat, while making it clear you weren't interested, worked much better than just trying to ignore people...

Ditto!

These are warm, wonderful people and a large part is extremely poor. They’re just trying to make a living. If you make your no firm, you can continue past and have some interesting conversations.

 

[Damselfish]

yeah, the people were great. I don't know if the people doing this understand how bothered visitors are by the sales tactics and that they might do better otherwise, perhaps just a cultural difference. But it seems like they just want to know you saw them or be acknowledged instead of treated as invisible (not that it would be possible to miss them, but whatever.) At straw market type places, just popping into a few stalls to look at stuff, even if you didn't find something to buy there, made people happy that you gave them a chance.

 

[Chaseh]

Ditto!

These are warm, wonderful people and a large part is extremely poor. They’re just trying to make a living. If you make your no firm, you can continue past and have some interesting conversations.

Yeah, but ten minutes into your walk and 30 of these interesting conversations later, it becomes tiring.

And there are many that do not immediately take no for an answer.

Your can skewer me for giving what I believe to be an accurate response, but traveling the world, Jamaica was the edge of the line I don't want to cross. Haiti being the next step over that line.

There have been numerous mentions in this thread of ignoring or treating the hucksters as invisible being inappropriate, but I don't see where anyone suggested that was a solution.

My solution is to going to a less populated island in the caribbean, and one that has less elaborate of a history of violence to tourists.

Let the skewering begin:

 

[Damselfish]

There have been numerous mentions in this thread of ignoring or treating the hucksters as invisible being inappropriate, but I don't see where anyone suggested that was a solution.

It's true, no one did suggest that. I don't think people generally make a concious decision on this "if I ignore them, they'll leave me alone" - I just think it's the instinctive response for many people. (It is for me, anyway.) If you're there anyway, I'm just suggesting something that might work better.

 

[ChristineH]

I am sure either location will be great, I am heading to Bahamas this summer, when I dove in Jamaica, Montego Bay I was dissapointed that there were no fish!!! I have heard Negril is great so...go and enjoy!