Accommodation: We stayed in an over the water bungalow that was very spacious with a large open air balcony with 2 chairs, a table and a hammock. 5-gallon bottle of drinking water, very comfortable beds (possibly the best I’ve experienced in the Caribbean) and great AC. Room was cleaned and tidied up each morning while out on the 2 tank morning dives. Standard hotel type bathroom with good hot water.
Dining: Meals were served buffet style at 7am, Noon and 6:30pm. The bar opened at 4pm for a Happy Hour and stayed open as late as you’d want to stay up after a full day of diving. Meals were plentiful and varied. Pretty much something for everyone and dietary restrictions were easily accommodated and very happy to do so. They had various milk substitutes, plenty of coffee and tea and water and juices.
Dive Operations and Diving: Probably the best land based set up I have every encountered. You are assigned a dive boat for the week. Adjacent to your dive boat is a very large and spacious gear up area. Each person is assigned their own locker for the week. Locker is open air and not locked with 2 shelves to put things in/on, a place to hang things and pegs to put things on. It is a very secure building and is patrolled at night by security personnel. Only things I did not leave there and would take back to my room was my camera and dive computers. Nitrox and air tanks are always available. They have aluminum 63’s, 80’s and 100’s. No extra cost for the 100’s, but the 100’s are only available with Nitrox. Nitrox cost is an extra (see below). There are numerous dedicated rinse tanks (cameras only, wetsuits and booties only and all other gear only). There are numerous outdoor showers for rinsing and additional hanging space out in the sun for quick drying. We arrived on a Saturday and departed the following Saturday. Pretty much the standard routine for most people, unless staying multiple weeks. If you have not been to Coco View before or if it has been over a year, then you must go through an orientation dive prior to any boat diving (which is a good thing). Typically, this is done on Sunday morning after breakfast. However, if you get in early enough and can be geared up and ready to go by Saturday at 3pm, you can get it done at that time, which is what we did. There is an additional direct pay, cash only, of $15 to the DM for doing it on Saturday, instead of Sunday morning. Orientation was good. DM went over how everything worked (tank acquisition, nitrox analyzing, boat diving schedule, night diving protocols and the house reef orientation), followed by a dive on the house reef, which took in both walls and the wreck of the Prince Albert. There are 4 boat dives on offer each day. The last dive day only had 2 boat dives to accommodate for no-fly time requirements. Boats go out promptly at 8:30am and 2pm. First dive of the morning and afternoon are on moored dive sites away from the resort. Dives 2 and 4 are from the boat, but are drop off dives on either of the 2 walls adjacent to the resort or the wreck. Between the boat drop off dives and my own shore diving on the house reef, by the end of the week, I had definitely seen enough of the 2 walls and the wreck and would have enjoyed more boat dives at different dive sites. That being said, it would be pretty tough to find a better house reef, anywhere. Very easy, sandy entry and exit and super varied. Both walls are very different from one another and when dived at different depths, they are like completely different dive sites. The wreck is quite large and interesting and the shallows and eel grass coming back to the resort are a completely different experience. We were there from July 28th to August 4th. Day time air temps were in the low to mid 80’s and water temps were the same. No lower than 82 and as high as 85. We had a fair amount of wind all week, which made surface conditions sporty on the outer reefs, with large swells. The wind was great from a surface standpoint—it seemed to keep the humidity down and was a welcome respite. Highlight for me during the week was finding a very huge Goliath Grouper on the Coco View Wall. He could be found for 3 days in a row in the same area in 20 feet of water. We saw only 1 shark all week- a good sized nurse shark. No one in our group of 20 saw any sharks all week. Lots of seahorse sightings on various dive sites. Lots of Eagle Rays on the house reef throughout the week. I did lots of pre-dawn dives and a grand total of 29 dives for the week, so a few more than would be available on the Roatan Aggressor for a week.
Overall Operations: The resort in all respects is a well-oiled machine. Everyone is pleasant, they have thought of basically everything to make your vacation as smooth and effortless as possible. There were various evenings of local entertainment and a very good and thorough resort orientation before dinner on the first day of arrival. It did a good job of explaining what to expect for the week and how everything functioned and operated. They had kayaks and paddleboards available for no additional charge. There is no pool or Jacuzzi.
Costs: We paid just over $1500 per person for the all-inclusive package, which included all diving, airport transfers, all food, entertainment and accommodations. Additional costs included Nitrox (weekly unlimited for $125 per person or $8 per tank). Any alcohol or soda beverages were an additional charge and added to your room bill for payment at the end of the week. Tipping is done at the end of the week and can be added to your bill and they are shared among culinary, housekeeping, bar and office staff and can be paid by credit card. Tipping of the Boat Captain and DM is done separately and by cash (envelopes provided). There is a boutique with various things on offer and a dive shop with most everything you’d find in a small to medium sized dive shop. These operate independently from the resort itself and any purchases or gear maintenance are handled directly with those entities. Our tips added an additional $500 to the week. Other than a small bar tab, we had no other expenses.
