Diving Saba!

[DIVENH]

i can definiately see why you and heather bought the cottage! Where do I start. The cottage is just enough room. Perfect for us. Only a short walk down the hill to town, views of the ocean to the left and right, looking down into the village. I must confess I did a little shopping in your yard too. I am a sucker for good lime juice and your trees were bursting with fruit...so all week I was drinking limeade. I was really wishing I could find good tequila for margaritas....

The food was amazing. We at BBQ at Swining Doors, Dinner at Scouts (service was a little slow but food was good), Dinner at Willards (interesting place...great food, but we all agreed that we liked the atmosphere of the cottage better.) and the Ecolodge was awesome (we hiked up and took a cab down..it started pouring)...we ate lunch every day at In Two Deep down at the docks. Breakfast we had at the cottage.I could not believe that Eddie's BBQ was only $10..rob and I ate a great dinner for $28 including beers.

Becuase we were so delayed in getting in we only did 9 dives over 3 days. It was definitately not enough. I have not seen reefs, animal life and scenery like that in years. I loved the Diamond Rock dive. It was killing me that my buddies were not as good on air as I. We could hear whales on every dive. We saw turtles every day. Sharks, rays. Nothing was afraid of us.

The flowers and such and the topography was great. I had never learned so much as I did this past week. Our cab driver would stop and tell us all about the trees, the history of the island, everything you could imagine. He also talked about what local recipes there was for all the fruits and such in the trees. I had soursop ice cream while I was there. Jack fruit too. The goats and sheep were really cool. The iguanas were cool. Your little buddy is still in the bathroom. The talk at the Ecolodge was really cool too. Unfortuantely we ran out of time before we could get up Mt. Scenery. We will defionately do it on the next trip.

We almost came home with another puppy. They found a little while I was there and they were really cute. I am such a sucker for island dogs. If it was not that we are attempting to build a house this month I think I would have had a new little one.

The dive shop was great. Big Mike was hilarious. He was full of old stories and adventures. Steve was our dive master and he did a great job. Little Mike and Saba Deep were fabulous. You were so right. Mike made sure we got to the island when were delayed. Made sure we had can rides when necessary and even our dinner plands. I have not seen service from a dive shop like this in Years! The food at the dive shop restaurant was great too.

The art on the island was great too! Courtney and I walked to Booby Hill one afternoon and caught up with JoBean and she gave us a full show with her glass blowing. I also really enjoyed the Peanut Gallery (bought a watercolor of one of the cottages. My living room is decorated with my travels). I also purchased a mola and some molitas. I am going to make a quilt out of the molitas.

What truly blew me away about the island. I felt like I was home. In the short amount of time I was there I learned all the locals names and they knew me. The never passed by without saying hello and asking us how we were enjoying paradise.
We stopped into the Saba Day Spa too. Sally does a great job!

I have run a dive shop for over 14 years now. This island is a must see!

 

[donnad]

wow! i was excited to see you post, cause hubby and i are going there in june!!!! we're staying four nights on saba(plan to hike up the mountain the first day and then dive for a couple of days) and four on st. maarten(to relax on the beach, etc.). tell some more details about how you enjoyed the diving please! we are very excited about this trip and Saba seems like such a neat place.

 

[Tim Ingersoll]

I was there in January. Truly an awesome place to visit. You will love it. I've been all over the Caribbean and never have I been to such a unique and friendly place.

 

[Tim Ingersoll]

i can definiately see why you and heather bought the cottage! Where do I start. The cottage is just enough room. Perfect for us.

That wasn't Iris House was it? We stayed there and it was verrry nice.

 

[peanut]

:blinking: Long. I can't say enough good things about the trip. We were there from Sun. 4/1 through Sun. 4/8. Went for my 50th birthday. Stayed in Hummingbird House and dove with Sea Saba. From the moment we stepped off the plane and Gervais was waiting for us until the moment we got back on the plane to leave it was just one pleasant experience after another. We arranged the trip with Beth, the official travel agent for Sea Saba. We were able to fly direct from Atl. to St. Marteen on Delta then the short hop to Saba on Winair. Delta booked our luggage all the way through, we had no problems with weight restrictions. We have a small scale for weighing luggage which we travel with and all three of our checked bags (there were 3 of us) came in just under 50 lbs. We each had a backpack carryon. We arrived on the island around 5:30 Sun. afternoon and Gervais took us to the house where the agent (I can't spell her name but we will call her Marilynn) was there putting flowers and wine out. She gave us a quick tour of the house and lift to town to Sea Saba's office so we could check in with them. We did three dives a day for 5 days. Be aware if you do this you will have to arrange for lunch between the 2nd and 3rd dives. I'm told Sea Saba will arrange for a boxed lunch for you but we had them put a few stables in the cottage before we arrived, went by the grocery after the 3rd dive on Monday and took sandwiches every day. Each morning Gervais would pick us up at the top of our driveway around 8:45, diving started around 9:30. We were usually back at the villla by 4:30 or so. We would stop by the dive shop each morning for Lynn to check and make sure everyone was in the van and to check if anyone needed dinner reservations or anything else. After the 3rd dive Peddy would stop by the dive shop on the way back to Lynn to check and make sure everything was o.k. and see who wanted to dive the next day. Sea Saba does such a great job, only 10 or 11 people on the boats which would hold 20. A divemaster in the water if you wanted to follow but we went on our own most of the time. The diving was pretty good, not the best we have ever done (we have been to Palau after all) but for the carribean definately better than most. Saba is one of three places we would repeat and we have been just about everywhere in the Carribean. The other two are Palau (like we could afford that again) and Belize (which we have done twice and will probably do again this fall). We dove a pinnacle just about every morning for the first dive, which was sort of like a wall dive in the round, a medium depth (around 80 ft) for the second dive and usually a little shallower for the 3rd. We even got to dive a few sights on the windward side since two days were dead calm. If you get to do that, you must ask for the hole in the corner. By far one of the best dives we've done. Windward side has natural reefs where the other side of the island is make up of reefs from lava flow. There were some dives with some current but not too much to handle and most days the worst vis was around 50 feet with the average around 80 feet. Water temps were probably around 79 to 80 degrees. Saw all the usual tropical fish, small turtles, black tip sharks on Shark Shoals Pinnacle, a sea horse on man o war shoals but no frog fish. I would highly recommend Saba and most definately recommend Sea Saba. My only complaint would be that because there is no water source on the island everyone has cisterns to catch rain water and that is your fresh water for the villas. You are asked to conserve water, which is no big deal, but are also asked not to flush the toilets every time you go. I'm telling you when I got home I ran around the house flushing all our toilets just because I could. We were lucky in that Hummingbird House has two cisterns so there was not much chance we would have run out of water but we were very careful none the less. They do have a fresh water hose on the boat but only fill their tank with about 5 gal. each morning so you are asked to only use it to rinse off your camera at the end of the day and they use it to squirt down your gear each day. They keep a salt water bucket for cameras on the boat just to keep them wet.

 

[donnad]

glad to read your report!!!! nine more weeks til we go to saba!!

 

[blindref757]

glad to read your report!!!! nine more weeks til we go to saba!!

Sounds like we will be there at the same time. I'm going with my LDS--out of Tyler. My countdown timer is at 62 days, 10 hours!!!

 

[DIVENH]

A lot of people have been asking where we stayed and who we dived with...Daphne's Cottage is awesome. Two bedrooms little sitting area out front, fruit treats in the back yard...it is great! Joel is the owner and really easy to work with.

We used Saba Deep. The are awesome! Mike, Big MIke, and Steve run the show. After runinng dive trips through my shop for 13+ years they still surprised me with their service. The took us to our many requests, took care of our gear and made sure we all saw what we wanted too! Excellent service! Very personable and very interactive. THe other operations on the island were Sea Saba bigger commercial operation and Scouts. Saba Deep is cook because they take you diving even if there is only 1 person on the boat and they do not like crowds.

Food is another trick to the island. THere is kind of a circuit. You will have to ask the days but,....One night is chicken dinner at Scout, another night is BBQ at Swinging Doors with Eddy, another night is at Brigadoom. Dinner is about $10 and there is plenty of it. You do have to make reservations early in the week for the special dinners nights. Plenty of good food. THe other restaurants are open too....

Had dinner at Willard's..not bad

Ecolodge on Wednesday (i think) is a must. They put on a little slide show about the island that is very infomative...dinner was out of this world...you can either hike up or drive

Vincent is an awesome cab driver...

If you are into some art type stuff when you are high and dry. There is an awesome glass blower in Booby Hill named Jo Bean that loves to teach her craft and give classes or if you stop by she is always willing to demonstrate...The Mola's are really neat Indian art that could make a cool quilt or other project, general the artist go off painting on Saturdays and the Peanut Gallery is the place to get more info...

If you want to go hiking you can stop by the hut in Windwardside and get more info and I believe the guys name is Jim (kinda like crocadile dundee of saba) will lead you...

If you are into island music and collecting different sounds make sure not to miss Saba's own "rock star"...I guess you would call it island country

 

[pilot fish]

Do not plan a hike on your dive day, either just before, or right after. The hills are very steep and can be exhasting. You will love the island. It's very clean, safe and has good diving.

wow! i was excited to see you post, cause hubby and i are going there in june!!!! we're staying four nights on saba(plan to hike up the mountain the first day and then dive for a couple of days) and four on st. maarten(to relax on the beach, etc.). tell some more details about how you enjoyed the diving please! we are very excited about this trip and Saba seems like such a neat place.

 

[donnad]

thanks for the info! we're planning to hike up mt. scenery on our first day, and then start diving the day afterwards. can't wait!!