Carnival Cruise to Nassau,St Thom,St Maarten

[dolphinfish]

I've read a lot about diving while on a cruise. Plan to avoid the cattleboats the cruiseline sets up. However, we are very challenged in Nassau because we are there for such a short time (8:30a-2p). We will miss typical AM dive boats. I'm checking into a charter service called "Custom Aquatics". Haven't gotten a response yet, esp. regarding price. I've also emailed Stuart Cove's to see if they could accomodate us since they have so many boats. Any other advice?? Has anyone out there dove with Custom Aquatics? How much of a cattleboat op is Stuart Coves?

Already set up our dives in St. Thomas with Blue Island Divers. Based on what I've read, St. Maarten doesn't have the greatest diving to offer. I think we're going to do some snorkeling with our non-diving friends there.

:martian:

 

[UCFDiver85]

I've read a lot about diving while on a cruise. Plan to avoid the cattleboats the cruiseline sets up. However, we are very challenged in Nassau because we are there for such a short time (8:30a-2p). We will miss typical AM dive boats. I'm checking into a charter service called "Custom Aquatics". Haven't gotten a response yet, esp. regarding price. I've also emailed Stuart Cove's to see if they could accomodate us since they have so many boats. Any other advice?? Has anyone out there dove with Custom Aquatics? How much of a cattleboat op is Stuart Coves?

Already set up our dives in St. Thomas with Blue Island Divers. Based on what I've read, St. Maarten doesn't have the greatest diving to offer. I think we're going to do some snorkeling with our non-diving friends there.

:martian:

Dolphin,
What ship are you going on and when? I am doing that identical itenerary in late June on the Carnival Pride, I believe. I'm still debating which spot I want to dive. I've heard the Bahamas are great, not sure about St. Thomas. We'll see I guess!

 

[mtiffee]

St. Thomas has some good diving. I did 27 dives there in the last few weeks on both the south side and the east side. I dove with Chris Sawyer and Blue Island Divers.

One of my favorite dives was Cow Rock, but it's on the edge of Blue Island's dive sites. Lots of swim throughs, tunnels, walls, etc. Went there twice, was fun.

If you can't get there, see if they'll take you to a wreck, the south side is where all the wrecks are. Then do your second dive at Spratt Point reef, some decent swimthroughs and trenches there.. saw a turtle and spotted eagle ray there.

 

[dolphinfish]

Dolphin,
What ship are you going on and when? I am doing that identical itenerary in late June on the Carnival Pride, I believe. I'm still debating which spot I want to dive. I've heard the Bahamas are great, not sure about St. Thomas. We'll see I guess!

We're on the Carnival Glory. We are booked with Blue Island Divers in St. Thomas. We did two of our OW dives 2 years ago in St. Thomas while on a cruise (Princess that time). It was nice.

We are going to end up booking through the cruise line in Nassau due to the tight time schedule we're on there. No dive shop could accomodate us. One will end up doing so, however, because Carnival is offering both a one tank & two tank dive as shore excursions there. We went on a dive trip last Nov. to Bimini in the Bahamas. Great diving there. We had some high winds that prevented us from diving one day. Seems like we saw lots of big stuff there. The fish were bigger, saw 8 sharks (1 black tip, some reef & a nurse shark). Bimini is close to the Continental shelf so you get to see the bigger fish. Really loved Bimini. Beware, there is not much else to do there but dive. Big game fishing is big there in the summer. They say it's really crowded then.

We are also stopping in St. Maarten while on the cruise. Haven't heard anything good about the diving there. We plan to snorkel with some of our non-diving friends who are cruising with us. We've been there once before on a cruise. We snorkeled at Dawn Beach then. Little Bay Beach is also supposed to be good to snorkel off of. We might go there this time.

I can fill you in on the dive shop we end up with in Nassau as well as what Blue Island Divers was like in St. Thomas.

 

[laurena1]

Back in 1998 I dove with Stuarts while we were cruising with the Disney Line. Being new to the dive world, I had seen their ads and it sounded good. I'm a diver, my husband is not. I specifically contacted them about a boat where I could dive and he could snorkel. NO PROBLEM. They said I could be on a shallow dive site where I would have lots of dive time and he could snorkel. Where did they take us? To a site where there was a sunken ship at 60 feet+. He could see us sorta through the clear water, but saw no fish. To top this off, the boat when out with 2 staff from Stuarts. Like I say, I was inexperienced. This boat's concept of keeping track of us...... we anchored, 1 staff dove off the top into the water for a swim while we were gearing up and the other one pulled a hat over his eyes and took a nap. My husband helped me and my even less experienced dive buddy on with our gear. Needless to say, if I was in the area again, I think I'd be looking for another dive operator.

I've read a lot about diving while on a cruise. Plan to avoid the cattleboats the cruiseline sets up. However, we are very challenged in Nassau because we are there for such a short time (8:30a-2p). We will miss typical AM dive boats. I'm checking into a charter service called "Custom Aquatics". Haven't gotten a response yet, esp. regarding price. I've also emailed Stuart Cove's to see if they could accomodate us since they have so many boats. Any other advice?? Has anyone out there dove with Custom Aquatics? How much of a cattleboat op is Stuart Coves?

Already set up our dives in St. Thomas with Blue Island Divers. Based on what I've read, St. Maarten doesn't have the greatest diving to offer. I think we're going to do some snorkeling with our non-diving friends there.

:martian: