Cruise Trip Report - January 2010

[mitsuguy]

glad you all had fun at Cane Bay... I am an instructor along side Demeritt... did he tell you about someone stealing his fin at the end of your second dive??? That would have been me... I think there were only two people still in the water then, so not sure if it was you all or not...

Either way, again, glad you enjoyed it here, we all absolutely love the diving out front, and all around St. Croix!

 

[CT Sean]

Nice dive report! I was on the exact same cruise back in November but only did the dive excursions offered by the ship, St Thomas and Dominica. ahhh memories

 

[Desert_Diver]

Yikes! Is this the standard for trip reports?

:worship:

Jax, we'll cut you a little slack on your dive reports since the only thing in southern Arizona are those stock tanks out on the desert.

Art

PS Good report.

 

[nirtak]

Thanks so much for the great trip report. My husband and I are cruising on the Serenade of the Seas and diving at every port we can. I can see by the reports that you definitely like Cane Bay in St. Croix.

For the Cane Bay trip, how the heck did you get back in the boat? Also, was the ride a bumpy one in that small boat? I have back problems from time to time and I'm not sure I could handle the small inflated boat. Did Cane Bay have other boats that were bigger?

If given the chance, would you use the other operators in the other ports again?

Last time I was in Dominica, we dove with Dive Dominica also. I will be using them again on our cruise in March.

 

[parzdiver]

Thanks so much for the great trip report. My husband and I are cruising on the Serenade of the Seas and diving at every port we can. I can see by the reports that you definitely like Cane Bay in St. Croix.

For the Cane Bay trip, how the heck did you get back in the boat? Also, was the ride a bumpy one in that small boat? I have back problems from time to time and I'm not sure I could handle the small inflated boat. Did Cane Bay have other boats that were bigger?

If given the chance, would you use the other operators in the other ports again?

Last time I was in Dominica, we dove with Dive Dominica also. I will be using them again on our cruise in March.

To get back into the boat, you'd swim up into the hole, take off your BC and the boat captain took it up. It was then a "flop" onto the deck.

We had very flat seas, so there wasn't any bumping on the boat ride. They do have larger boat and also offer shore dives. The reefs and the edge of the wall are a fairly easy swim from the shore. The trips out to the sites were only 5-10 minutes, so you don't spend much time in the boat. Send them an e-mail or give them a call, the coordinator Suzanne was great in responding to questions.

I would use the other operators, unfortunately I didn't bring my own buddy so had to deal with a couple insta-buddy issues. In St. Thomas only seven of us were booked from the cruise with Underwater Safari and there were two dive masters, so the groups were very small. The other folks from SB on the cruise dove with Admiralty in St. Thomas and had great dives. I don't recall what dive op they used in Barbados, I had to spend at least one day with my wife.

Enjoy the cruise and the dives!

 

[nirtak]

Thanks for the quick response ParzDiver. I'm going to book all my dives with independent operators.

 

[StanleyCup]

Thanks for the report. I was thinking about doing a cruise sometime and diving in every port. We've got friends who are cruise junkies but they don't dive, so it might be nice to go on a cruise together and hang out at nights with them, then avoid the dreaded "shore excursion" scene.

Any issue with bringing your equipment back on the boat each time (i.e. everything goes through x-ray, right?)

 

[parzdiver]

Thanks for the report. I was thinking about doing a cruise sometime and diving in every port. We've got friends who are cruise junkies but they don't dive, so it might be nice to go on a cruise together and hang out at nights with them, then avoid the dreaded "shore excursion" scene.

Any issue with bringing your equipment back on the boat each time (i.e. everything goes through x-ray, right?)

No problems, but I had removed anything (knife, shears, tools) from my bag that might alert. If you must have you dive knife, you can check it in and out with security at each port.