Diving the ABC island from cruise ship

[DazedAndConfuzed]

Hi,

Will be hitting the ABC islands via cruise ship in the upcoming weeks. Haven't finalized my dives yet. I've stayed in Bonaire/Curacao before. I have some questions.

In Aruba, is the Antilla wreck all what they say? That is because one of the diveops I was considering, Dive Aruba, has a set dive schedule and would not be going to the Antilla on the day I am there. If I don't dive the Antilla, would the reef dives be just another lackluster set of dives? They said they would go to Finger/Masbango or Blonker reef on that day.

In Curacao, most seem to offer guided shore dives via truck. Are their shore dives like Bonaire, with the Iron shore? I did mostly boat dives or shore dives off a pier while I was there.
Is the mushroom forest all it's cracked up to be? That was the hype of the special trip they were offering when we were staying there. Some diveops like curious2dive offers diving in the west for extra (and that's not even a gurantee). If its not that big a deal, I thought of using thediveshop-curacao.com

In Bonaire, I was going to do a combination of guided dive and afternoon/night shore dives on the house reef of the shop. Due to the constant back and forth, we thought somewhere close is the best, so we decided on either Tucan Diving or Divi Flamingo. None are definite on whether they can take us on a one tank dive. But worse case, we dive the house reef on our own. I'm just wondering how the house reef of Divi Flamingo is compared to Tucan's. I've done many dives on Tucan's house reef Eighteen Palms, but the night dives I did, the reef was eerily empty of life, maybe it was due to the giant tarpons that were constantly roaming the reef and following us.

 

[jonhall]

Dove with Dive Aruba in 2009. Dove 3 wrecks: Debbie, Antilla, and Jane Sea Freighter. Also dove Finger Reef which was a 95' max depth dive. Out of 8 dives, only 1 had no significant current. The others were slight to medium, so all drift dives.

Can't say the Antilla was anything spectacular looking back at notes in my log. You could drop into the wreck but it wasn't a swim through (same for the Debbie) There are plenty of morays around and in each wreck. The Antilla was a 60 minute dive at max of 50' (the Debbie was a 70' dive for 50 minutes and had Blue Reef as part of the dive.) The Jane Sea Freighter was a 48 minute dive at 95'. It was by far the more impressive of the wrecks due to its size - huge! Lots of snorkels above and we just swam around it. The Finger Reef, as well as the other reefs we did were nothing spectacular other than to occasionally spot something like a large nurse shark or different colors of eels.

FYI - I'm surprised Dive Aruba has a set schedule. Clive was the owner, boat captain, crew, and DM all rolled into one. Everyday he would pick us, up as well as new divers (everyday), and take us to his house so paperwork could be filled out for the newbies. Then he drove us all to the pier to his boat. As we pretty much dove our air on every dive, we never new what time we were going to get back to the pier let alone our hotel (could have been anytime from 1:30 -2:30.) The only thing that cut some time off was when my buddy's and my wife met us at the pier one day to pick us up.

On dives, Clive would go down and lead us for about 20 minutes, then leave us to go back to the boat and pick us up where he thought we were going to come up. On one dive, my buddy and I were the only 2 divers in about 30' viz with a medium current. That was a great experience for what was then my 23 dive. The Jane Sea Freighter was the only dive Clive stayed with us for the whole dive. I point this out as my buddy wouldn't dive with Clive again but I would. Clive may be set in his ways - he may snap at you if you get in his way as he's doing captain and crew things on the boat (don't try to help him) - but he really is a nice guy, goes through the dive plan, and is pretty knowledgeable about the diving in Aruba. If you are on a cruise and diving with Dive Aruba, just be aware of the time element if you were planning any other activities on the island.

 

[diversteve]

I'm pretty sure the Divi Flamingo won't take walk-ins - at least for boat dives. Which is surprising considering how close it is to the cruise pier. A lot of cruisers use the Dive Friends shop in town since you can easily walk there. They do boat dives from there plus have a house reef.

We booked a boat dive to Mushroom Forest once but the DM talked us out of going there. He said the fkatbess if the corals makes it hard for smaller fish to hide from predators so it's a pretty sparse dive unless you like the coral shapes. Also somebody recently posted that it's deteriorated a lot in the last decade or so.

A couple other Curacao options might be Bas Harts Diving or Atlantis Diving - both offer cruise options afaik. I believe you could boat dive with Goby Dive also - they're at the resort west of the Megapier - the Holiday Beach.

I don't believe there'd be a shore dive there though since there's a breakwater - the reef there is a longer way out since it becomes Piscadera Bay by the Hilton so I'd consider going another mile or two west to Blue Bay where you can shore dive the wall there. I don't believe (but do not know) the Blue Bay operator offers boat dives though.

Most Curacao shore dives are beach entries. Picture of some of them can be seen in the site photos here:
Scuba Shore Diving Site Listing for: Curacao, ABC Islands Many of them also have on-site dive operations for tanks/weights/lockers/food etc. http://www.shorediving.com/Earth/ABC/Curacao/index.htm

 

[Nivek Llekots]

When in Aruba I would forget the Antilla wreck, and instead try to arrange to dive the "Jane Sea" it's a deeper and therefore shorter dive but a far better dive, in fact in my opinion it is one of the best wreck dives I've done. One of my favourite reef dive on Aruba is "Harbour Reef" which is pretty much in front of town. I used S.E.Aruba Fly ‘n Dive (Daily Diving Trips) when I lived in Aruba and they do both these sites. Other nice sites on Aruba are "Tyre Reef" and the "Airplane Wrecks", if you contact the shop early they will try to do the sites you want assuming the conditions are OK and the other divers are OK with it!

With regards to Curacao the actual diving is very similar to Bonaire, however getting in and out of the water is in most cases much easier as most of the sites are accessed from a sandy beach. Some people rave about the sites up west, and in truth they may be a little more lush with coral than some of the sites closer to Willemstad but you have to travel further, and some of the sites closer to the Cruise ship dock are just as good in their own way. If you are going to go up west and can find someone to take you then it will take up most of your day, and I would skip "Mushroom Forrest" which is a boat dive anyway, and concentrate on a couple of good shore dives either at one site or two, if you have the time and inclination to move sites.
Up west my recommendations would be "Alice in Wonderland" and "Playa Grandi", or if you don't want to go that far then "Cas Abou" and "Porto Marie". If you choose to stay closer to town, which will mean you will probably have a few hours left after diving to explore Willemstad and have a beer or two, then I would recommend "Pierbaai reef" at "Marie Pompoen" followed by the "Tug Boat" near Caracasbaai. "Pierbaai reef" is a more traditional reef and is in quite a healthy state, whilst the "Tug Boat" as well of course having the tugboat wreck also has a wall and some great muck diving under the pier!

In Bonaire "Dive Friends Bonaire", (Bonaire Shore Diving - Dive Friends Bonaire) offer a wide range of both boat and shore diving from a variety of locations close to town, however I would avoid their house reef at the "Dive Inn" site as this is not the greatest.

Hope this helps!

 

[DazedAndConfuzed]

Thanks, all these information was very helpful.

Our port time i 8AM-10PM for all 3 islands, so we are not worried about getting back. Just that the timing is too tight for us to make some of the offered morning boat dives.

Clive have a dive schedule on his website. I guess that's for the people who dives the whole week, they don't end up repeating the same dives over and over due to day tripper's request. His schedule for Jane Sea wreck is for the day before we arrive, so we might have to look somewhere else if we decide to dive that. He does offer Harbor Reef as an afternoon 1 tank dive. Not sure we want to do 3 tanks of diving in Aruba, or anyone does pickups for 1 tank boat dives.


Divi Flamingo told me to show up and see if someone is available for a guided dive, most likely via shore by truck. They won't commit to anyone that 3 wks into the future. Same with Toucan Diving, the last time I was there, most people did their 2 boat dives in the morning, and skipped the afternoon dive, so I guess they don't know if they are going out until enough people signed up. Dive Friends requires non hotel guests to return tanks and equipment by 5PM, so night dives there.

Bas Harts Diving or Atlantis Diving sounds like they offer more of the non-diving amenities I don't mind them, but they seem to charge alot more, which might go into the pampering of the cruise ship divers.

I kind of steered toward The Diveshop on Curacao because they mentioned their bottom time being 50-60min, small group (I think all truck based dives are small groups), a beach surface interval, and not on house reef (Dive Bus, where I've done Oswaldo's Dropoff and Carpile a few times a day during my stay at SuperClubs, which offered free daily guided dives off the house reef). Now that I know all shore dives are off beaches, it sounds like they we are just sitting around on the next divesite waiting for our hour to be up. With us leaving at 10PM, we have plenty of time to visit the Kralendijk/Willemstad/Oranjestad. Although we've already gone around
Kralendijk/Willemstad in our earlier stays.

The DiveShop mentioned these as reefs they like to go. Vearssenbay, Snakebay, Cas Abou, Porto Marie, Double Reef, Tug-Boat and Marie Pompoen. While I've dove Tugboat, Barracuda point and superior producer. I liked Tugboat wall, but don't remember Barracuda point Any of them not mentioned that are good? Of course, they are open to suggestions.

 

[diversteve]

I liked Varsenbaai - now called Trunk Bay by some. Trunk Divers is on-site there also there's supposed to be a decent restaurant now. We dove east, just off the mooring ball found seahorses, then at almost our turn point in about 80' there's a big pontoon boat wreck with a lot of stuff living under it. I was told it was one used to create the Carpile site. Also there's a 2nd carpile site there in what I was told is about 110' we looked for it briefly but didn't find it. According to someone we talked to the other Carpile site is in better shape.

As we were returning to the dock, in really shallow water (6-8') just east of the beach a turtle popped up and I found 3-4 more feeding on the grass there. The shop owner said they've been there for years. Last but not least there was squid under the dive dock.

My friends wife is a former Curacao dive guide. She told us Snake Bay was one of her favorite dives. We didn't get there.

I read here somewhere that Superior Producer is closed while they do Megapier updates - IDK when that's done.

 

[DazedAndConfuzed]

I inquired Clive whether he stays with the group or goes back to to the boat to pick up the divers. He either misunderstood my question or did not answer. I might go with him anyway since I don't see anyone going to Jane Sea. Unless I decide to go to Antilla. Given most are boat dives with plenty of other divers, most aren't too open to requests.

As for the Superior Producer, I thought of diving that again, but it is closed and due to open right after I leave port. But then, when a cruise ship is in town, that dive becomes off limits. Its the same with town pier in Bonaire. Maybe we can head toward it during a shore dive from Divi Flamingo's reef.

I'll try to dive Snake Bay, given much of Curacao's dive are shore dives, thus only 2 or 4 divers.