Did it last winter... and I live here.
What I can tell you:
Crew: Young (this is the Agressor training boat) professional & enthusiastic.
Food: best on any liveaboard anywhere in the world, thanks to weekly trips to excellent nearby food sources (all food is fresh, never frozen) and a very good young chef. Best food in Kona, for that matter.
Diving: above average for Kona, since they do the best sites the day boats do and also go south to South Point, where nobody else goes on any regular basis.
They do the manta night dive once & sometimes twice as well.
You will get a lot more diving in this way and a lot less effort involved.
If you are an experienced world traveled diver, you would find the diving in Hawaii pretty dull. But if you are new to the Pacific, this is a great starting point.
My guess is its actually a better financial move than resort/restaurants/day boat dives/car rental, etc. But I would still recommend a few extra days on land to do some of the other fantastic things on the Big Island.
Go for it!
