Grand Cayman Expertise Please, OW Referral and Diving North Shore or Rum Point

[scubamon]

Hello Scubaboard Brethren,

Thanks in advance for your help and guidance, this community is always such a great resource. I am planning to be on Grand Cayman in April and need some help with the dive plans. Since I will have my family along, this will not be a dive-centric trip, I am planning to get 6-8 tanks in for the week. We are planning to stay in either Rum Point area or near Old Man bay. Here are my questions:

1. My daughter, 12, is considering taking a Junior OW Referral on this trip. I will consult my LDS on this, they will do her classroom and confined water training, but I would love some local knowledge on this as well. Are there any dive ops in the area that you would recommend for a junior referral?
2. I am a certified diver, as I said earlier, I am looking to get in about 6-8 dives too. I would love to do a few 2 tank morning boats and maybe a Kittiwake trip. Can anyone suggest a good op in Rum Point or Old Man Bay areas? I think we will be renting a beachfront home for the week, do any of the ops in the area pickup? If not, where would I likely need to meet the dive boats for these areas?

Thank you all again!

---Wes Brasher

---------- Post Merged at 01:50 PM ---------- Previous Post was at 01:49 PM ----------

I should mention that my daughter will require rental gear as well. Thank you!

---Wes

Hello Scubaboard Brethren,

Thanks in advance for your help and guidance, this community is always such a great resource. I am planning to be on Grand Cayman in April and need some help with the dive plans. Since I will have my family along, this will not be a dive-centric trip, I am planning to get 6-8 tanks in for the week. We are planning to stay in either Rum Point area or near Old Man bay. Here are my questions:

1. My daughter, 12, is considering taking a Junior OW Referral on this trip. I will consult my LDS on this, they will do her classroom and confined water training, but I would love some local knowledge on this as well. Are there any dive ops in the area that you would recommend for a junior referral?
2. I am a certified diver, as I said earlier, I am looking to get in about 6-8 dives too. I would love to do a few 2 tank morning boats and maybe a Kittiwake trip. Can anyone suggest a good op in Rum Point or Old Man Bay areas? I think we will be renting a beachfront home for the week, do any of the ops in the area pickup? If not, where would I likely need to meet the dive boats for these areas?

Thank you all again!

---Wes Brasher

 

[Testudo]

Your choices are Ocean Frontiers and/or Tortuga Divers/Red Sail. Both are located on the East End, 15 minutes from Old Man Bay or 20-25 minutes from the farthest areas of Rum Point. Others can advise on the pluses and minuses of each.

 

[NE_SSI_Diver]

I recently booked a trip to Grand Cayman at Grand Cayman Beach Suites and was waiting to schedule my dives. I was thinking of Don Fosters, but I haven't seen anyone recommend them. Are they a good Dave Op or are Ocean Frontiers and Red Sail better?

 

[Insta-Gator]

Just a suggestion on dive locations for your daughter, personally I'd stick with Eden Rock / Sunset House area. It's not deep and pretty much no current. North and East will be more challenging.

 

[Doug - aka "Dogfish"]

Sunset house!

 

[diversteve]

My daughter, 12, is considering taking a Junior OW Referral on this trip. I will consult my LDS on this, they will do her classroom and confined water training, but I would love some local knowledge on this as well. Are there any dive ops in the area that you would recommend for a junior referral?
[*]I am a certified diver, as I said earlier, I am looking to get in about 6-8 dives too. I would love to do a few 2 tank morning boats and maybe a Kittiwake trip. Can anyone suggest a good op in Rum Point or Old Man Bay areas? I think we will be renting a beachfront home for the week, do any of the ops in the area pickup? If not, where would I likely need to meet the dive boats for these areas?

I should mention that my daughter will require rental gear as well. Thank you!

You might consider Ocean Frontiers for your daughter. PADI Open Water Referral Complete your Open Water Check-Out Dives in Cayman

The first 2 open water dives are on a shallow coral reef, 15-25 feet, inside the East End barrier reef so it is nice and calm and then on the next day you will dive from one of our bigger boats for open water dives 3 and 4 to a maximum depth of 60 feet.

They dive the Kittiwake on Tuesday afternoon. Dive Schedule - Grand Cayman

---------- Post Merged at 11:30 PM ---------- Previous Post was at 11:21 PM ----------

I recently booked a trip to Grand Cayman at Grand Cayman Beach Suites and was waiting to schedule my dives. I was thinking of Don Fosters, but I haven't seen anyone recommend them. Are they a good Dave Op or are Ocean Frontiers and Red Sail better?

Ocean Frontiers is almost an hour drive east from GCBS. Don Fosters is downtown and works with all the cruise lines. Downtown is somewhere I avoid when the ships are in. (usually daily) You may want to go with RedSail as they're on-site at your resort.

There are many other smaller dive operations that limit divers to 6-8 max. Most will pick you up along Seven Mile Beach.

My personal recommendations are always the same:

Ambassador Divers
Neptune's Divers
WalltoWall Diving

---------- Post Merged at 11:33 PM ---------- Previous Post was at 11:21 PM ----------

Sunset house!

is probably an hour drive from Old Man Bay...

 

[Wolfie]

I recently booked a trip to Grand Cayman at Grand Cayman Beach Suites and was waiting to schedule my dives. I was thinking of Don Fosters, but I haven't seen anyone recommend them. Are they a good Dave Op or are Ocean Frontiers and Red Sail better?

This is a different part of the island and has a different answer. I stayed at beach suites as well and you made an excellent choice. Red sail is the resort operation there and it is a expensive cattle boat. If you want beach departure for west wall dives call Seasports otherwise go with one of the many small boat operations that will shuttle you. Wall to wall, indepth, are a couple that come to mind.
I would not recommend don foster or red sail. The smaller operations take a much more personalized approach. Turtuga divers/red sail is run differently from red sail operations on seven mile beach. I haven't dove the east end but turtuga and ocean frontiers are too far away for an option for you.

 

[NE_SSI_Diver]

Thanks for all of the Information, I will be sure to check out the smaller dive ops when I have the chance.

Another question, because of the walls is 100 ft a customary depth for one of the 2-tank dives? I have been to that depth before (albeit only once), so I can dive that deep but would prefer to dive in more the 60-70 foot range.

 

[scubamon]

Thanks to everyone for the great insights and recommendations! I am checking out all of the Ops mentioned so far, but I am really liking the smaller boats like Neptune's, Wall to Wall and Ambassador. Are there not any Ops like these that operate from the North side somewhere? How about East End? Thanks!

---Wes

 

[diversteve]

Testudo named them both. That's all there is afaik.

Ocean Frontiers limits to 12 divers on all their boats - all are equipped for more than that. http://www.oceanfrontiers.com/scuba-diving/dive-boats.html

Between these two links is a pretty complete list of options - if you want to check some of the others. You might try to find someone who has a boat at the marina in the Sound that they use to go to the North Wall - IDK who that would be - many are kept there just for SRC. Maybe check with Indigo Divers - IIRC they keep a boat north. Or Divetech - their boats leave from somewhere on the North Wall - it might not be too much of a stretch for them to pick you up off the dock at Rum Point - IDK.

Diving E-Brochure
Kittiwake Shipwreck - dive operator listing