Dive Op. Suggestions for Palm Cove

[glamourpuss]

Spending the next 6 weeks in Palm Cove. We're working during the week, but hoping to get in some diving on the weekends. Can anyone recommend a good shop who picks up in Palm Cove? Preferably one with smaller groups and reasonable bottom time (ie. more than 40mins).

We'll probably only make it out 2 or 3 times due to the cost... but thinking 2 day trips and possibly one of the cheaper 3d/2n trips. (While I'd love to do a Mike Ball live aboard it's unfortunately not in our budget plus my boyfriend refuses to get in a small plane).

We're also spending a week in Port Douglas over Christmas with some friends who want to do a day trip. If we could find a shop that we could use both in Palm Cove and Port Douglas that would be great.

Do any shops give discounts if you book more than one trip?

Thanks, GP!

 

[mattoau]

Divers Den in Cairns may do pick ups if you're on a course or going on one of their liveaboards, Taka or Ocean Quest. For day trips there will be a charge.

 

[Aquapro Dive Services]

Hmmm. You are in the middle of Cairns and Port Douglas, so none of the operators will pick up for free.

If you are looking at Port then Poseidon will do bus transfer for $25 and Silversonic for $17. Personally Poseidon is my favourite out of there. No overnight boats from Port.

On the Cairns side of things Silverswift transfers are $20 and Tusa $15. ReefQuest don’t do pickups.

These would be a good starting point and are great trips. Have added links so you can have a look at the trips themselves.

If you are doing overnight trip then Kangaroo Explorer is the budget trip and charge $10 for transfers from Palm Cove. Ocean Quest charge $15. Both stay on the Reef and have daily transfer vessels go out, so you can go any day for 2 or 3 days.

Tusa doing 3 dives for price of 2 and Kangaroo Explorer also got very good specials at moment.

 

[glamourpuss]

Thanks for the replies. We ended up going with Poseidon last weekend.

 

[paschen]

How did you find Poseidon? I heard it is a bit unstable - which is why I went with the SilverSonic on Boxing Day. Day ended up being dead flat so probably didn't matter. Dives wise, we did 3 each of 50mins bottom time - the divers were put together as per experience, so we were down for max bottom time, coming up with air, but still there was a schedule to keep.
Throw in some snorkelling and lunch and it was a jam packed day. I found the vis pretty good and took stacks of pics - we weren't racing around so plenty of time for photos. We did 2 drift dives as well - so lusciously lazy good diving. If you get the opportunity to go again, I would recommend the SS.