Best Caribbean location for Diving

[dwavey]

Sorry for not chiming in sooner. I've been to every Sandals except the Grande St Lucia (but I have dived with their dive crew), Curacao, and the new one on St Vincent, many of them more than once. The first thing to know about diving at Sandals is that it's a vacation with diving and not a dive vacation. You do what the experienced divers call "Sandals diving" - by and large laid-back guided tours scaled to keep the inexperienced resort course open water divers safe (from themselves mostly), unless there's a large enough number of master divers/instructors for the DM's to take on a slightly more challenging (but still laid back) group tour. Divers aren't allowed to go off on their own dive plan, and a lost buddy will surface the whole group. While the risk aversion frustrates some experienced divers, having taken individuals out on Discover Scuba dives, I have to marvel at the DMs watching over a group of 6 or 7 divers of varying levels - herding cats, underwater. Sandals has good dive teams who, for the most part, are easy to get to know, and will work hard to make your dive experience as enjoyable as they can.

While the hype is "unlimited diving", the truth is that generally you can do two dives a day (either a 2 tank or a 1 + 1), although at some have a third afternoon dive, usually for the resort course divers, that they sometimes allow non-course divers to tag along on. Some Sandals offer early morning deep dives and night dives, at extra cost, if there's enough interest.

The other limiting factor is the locations of the resorts and dive sites available. Grenada and Curacao have some pretty good dive sites but many have reported being unable to get a seat on the boat (Sandals Elite Diver members are supposed to be guaranteed a seat but even they have reported getting only as close as the standby list). St Lucia has some great sites, although if you're at the Grande St Lucia at the top of the island it's a long boat ride to the best sites to the south, while from La Toc you have to shuttle through town to and from the marina where you're joined by divers from Halcyon. Wrecks and turtles in Barbados but it's another shuttle through town to and from the marina and the morning traffic there is brutal. Long boat rides in Antigua as well. At the Royal Bahamian in Nassau the Caribbean reef sharks, seemingly acclimated to humans by the daily shark dives, are always in sight, but winter's north winds can keep Sandals' boat from reaching the dock, meaning that unless they bring it around to the south side and shuttle divers and gear over, the only diving that day is to the bottom of the pina colada glass. Jamaica's North shore has some deep wall diving but overfishing has taken it's toll on marine life. Same overfishing thing at Negril and South Coast.

All that said, I've done hundreds of dives with Sandals and enjoyed all but maybe two. My spouse sees me off on the boat then heads over to either some scheduled activity or relaxes on the beach or by the pool until the boat returns. Then it's lunch and if I'm not diving again, it's more relaxing, maybe a massage, a late afternoon workout if I didn't do a morning run, dinner, evening entertainment, and bed by 2200 so we can do it all again at 0600 the next day.

Seeing as your free trip includes Beaches, you might consider Turks and Caicos. Yes, it has children. But a lot of people who swear by the adults only Sandals say it's worth going because of the diving. And it seems like Beaches T&C runs a tad more expensive than many Sandals resorts, so you might feel like you're getting a bigger bang. And there seems to be no shortage of dive operators there that can give you whatever isn't available from the resort.

 

[noserider]

never been to barbadoes but some family members have and they said it was pretty awesome. not sure about the diving though

There are two different sandals in Barbados both next to each other, one is supposed to be a lot better than the other.

Barbados diving is pretty good, lots of wrecks, decent Caribbean reefs and drifts, loads of turtles, some sharks and great marine parks full of fish. However what makes it great is the topside is probably better than most caribean islands, that combined with decent diving / surfing make it a winner for me and an island we see returning to.

My only concern would be with all the great restaurants and food and bar options, I would hate to do an all inclusive hotel

 

[drrich2]

Interesting thread. If were in your shoes and had no kid, my thinking might go something like this:

1.) Since you have to pick a Sandals and they have a rep. for restrictive diving, considering picking a destination with good diving that you otherwise might never pick for a dedicated dive trip. St. Lucia and Barbados come to mind. I've had 2 cruise stops in St. Lucia and Barbados; St. Lucia is mountainous with lush rainforest topside, beautiful. I did 2 dives with Scuba Steve's (Superman's Flight and Fairy Land) and enjoyed it; Fairly Land had dramatic vertical structure part of the dive).

2.) Pay attention to the topside offerings. That might help sway you.

3.) A big question is how important sharks are to you. If you're fairly early in your diving, I'm guessing you're interested in seeing Caribbean reef sharks, which granted, the Bahamas are known for.

4.) Turks & Caicos was mentioned. The boat trips to/from the reef there tend to be long, and the diving tends to average deeper than some places because the reef wall starts deep. If you're not good on air, or just don't like long boat rides, something to think about. A number of people consider liveaboards the preferred way to do Turks & Caicos.