drrich2
Contributor
Hi:
Recently did a Royal Caribbean Adventure of the Seas southern Caribbean cruise. We docked in St. Lucia on Wednesday, January 15'th, 2014. Like a number of people on the forum, I like to book private scuba excursions. This trip I did so in St. Lucia and St. Croix.
Online reviews looked good for Scuba Steve's Diving, so I studied their web page for cruise ship visitors. They've got 2 trip options; Standard Service ($95) Standard - dives are in the Marine Reserve in the Anse Cochon area, and Premium Service ($150) - dives are by the world famous and breathtaking Pitons in Soufriere, which is home to Anse Chastanet Reef and Superman’s Flight, two of St. Lucia’s “must do” dives, and it says offers a more personal service to divers preferring small groups (max 8 divers), perhaps valuing a little extra assistance, and wanting to avoid busy “cattle boats”.
I contacted Scuba Steve's for more info. They don't have tanks larger than 80 cf. I asked:
Part of his response:
So, I opted for the Premium 2-tank package. I wrote some notes later, and will add a few photos now.
We docked at Pointe Seraphine. I headed out for a 9:30 a.m. pickup by Scuba Steve’s Diving at the area where local water ferries depart. From a shore perspective, we headed out, turned left & headed up the coast line a long way, to the Pitons. While they’re distinctive, St. Lucia on the whole is very mountainous, with a lot of shore line amounting to steep cliffs. Lush, tropical vegetation makes the island very attractive.
I’m guessing there may've been more customers on the boat, but it seemed like around 6 or 8 divers were in the diving group? Hard to say, since there were 2 staff on the dives; one hunting lionfish. I saw some people snorkel between the 2 dives. My dive buddy was ‘Richard’ from Utah. We had a cup of juice, small sandwich bites and little cookie packs. It was good! For both dives, we giant strode off the boat closer to shore than any boat dive I’ve ever done. After the dives, they took us to a big vertical split in a cliff, where you could hear noisy bats and smell guano. I saw one flit around inside. We were told there were fruit bats.
Dive 1: Superman’s Flight. The Superman 2 movie was partly made here. We headed out with the island to our left, and the current was mild & we swam with it (you could call it a very mild drift dive). Sloping reef, very similar to Bonaire, where it would be a decent reef but not exceptional, and viz. was maybe 30-50 feet and it wasn’t all that fishy. Somebody saw a sea turtle, but I don’t know whether it was a diver or snorkeler. Several lion fish were speared. I found 2 banded coral shrimp and right above them I think a bristle worm. Also found a spotted moray eel. Guide pointed out a neat crab inside a sponge or coral. Max. depth was to be 60 feet, notify them when you hit 1,000 PSI. Temp. low 78 degrees per Oceanic VT3. Cool but not badly cold. Dive stat.s per my Cobalt (except temp.s): 46 min. dive, max. depth 60.87 feet, average depth 39.43 feet, temp. 78 degrees.
Dive 2: Fairy Land. This site was farther back the way we’d come, and this time we swam with the island shore & reef at our right, into mild current. A substantial portion of the reef was vertical wall that ran down quite deep; impressive, beautiful, and lusher reef than Dive 1 and new for me due to the vertical ‘wall’ diving. I found 2 sharptail eels, a big scorpion fish, 4 lionfish (at least 2 got speared), and a spotted moray eel. Saw some trunkfish, including a cute juvenile. A guide pointed out a golden-tail moray, another (smaller) scorpion fish, a pretty good-sized porcupine puffer fish, a scrawled filefish in the distance, and a crab inside a sponge or coral. I saw a male stoplight parrotfish, and a blue parrotfish of some sort. It was 76 degrees per VT3; I was actually shivering some late in the dive, and that’s very unusual for me (threatened my masculinity a bit). Max. depth was to be 50 feet. Dive stat.s per my Cobalt (except temp.s): 55 min. dive, max. depth 53.40 feet, average depth 35.20 feet, temp. 76 degrees.
Quite a few lionfish died on those 2 dives.
I think this was the Pitons:
Here's the lower part of that big vertical split in the cliff where we heard (& smelled) the bats.
In a nutshell: Scuba Steve's did fine, the 2 dives were fun general Caribbean dives (I hear current at Superman's Flight can be stronger than what I saw), and I'm glad I dove with them.
Years ago on our honeymoon, we hit St. Lucia and did a rainforest hike. Beautiful, lush tropical greenery and I got good photos (I'm a snap shooter). Had a good time, but in places the rocks were slick. If you do that excursion, wear something that gives you good traction.
Richard.
P.S.: Pics with Canon G10 in Canon UW housing, in Underwater Scene mode. No post processing on these pics. I suspect the 2'nd 'divers at the surface' pic was in UW mode, too, since it's kinda 'red' looking, though I shot it up top, from the boat.
Recently did a Royal Caribbean Adventure of the Seas southern Caribbean cruise. We docked in St. Lucia on Wednesday, January 15'th, 2014. Like a number of people on the forum, I like to book private scuba excursions. This trip I did so in St. Lucia and St. Croix.
Online reviews looked good for Scuba Steve's Diving, so I studied their web page for cruise ship visitors. They've got 2 trip options; Standard Service ($95) Standard - dives are in the Marine Reserve in the Anse Cochon area, and Premium Service ($150) - dives are by the world famous and breathtaking Pitons in Soufriere, which is home to Anse Chastanet Reef and Superman’s Flight, two of St. Lucia’s “must do” dives, and it says offers a more personal service to divers preferring small groups (max 8 divers), perhaps valuing a little extra assistance, and wanting to avoid busy “cattle boats”.
I contacted Scuba Steve's for more info. They don't have tanks larger than 80 cf. I asked:
Part of his response:
So, I opted for the Premium 2-tank package. I wrote some notes later, and will add a few photos now.
We docked at Pointe Seraphine. I headed out for a 9:30 a.m. pickup by Scuba Steve’s Diving at the area where local water ferries depart. From a shore perspective, we headed out, turned left & headed up the coast line a long way, to the Pitons. While they’re distinctive, St. Lucia on the whole is very mountainous, with a lot of shore line amounting to steep cliffs. Lush, tropical vegetation makes the island very attractive.
I’m guessing there may've been more customers on the boat, but it seemed like around 6 or 8 divers were in the diving group? Hard to say, since there were 2 staff on the dives; one hunting lionfish. I saw some people snorkel between the 2 dives. My dive buddy was ‘Richard’ from Utah. We had a cup of juice, small sandwich bites and little cookie packs. It was good! For both dives, we giant strode off the boat closer to shore than any boat dive I’ve ever done. After the dives, they took us to a big vertical split in a cliff, where you could hear noisy bats and smell guano. I saw one flit around inside. We were told there were fruit bats.
Dive 1: Superman’s Flight. The Superman 2 movie was partly made here. We headed out with the island to our left, and the current was mild & we swam with it (you could call it a very mild drift dive). Sloping reef, very similar to Bonaire, where it would be a decent reef but not exceptional, and viz. was maybe 30-50 feet and it wasn’t all that fishy. Somebody saw a sea turtle, but I don’t know whether it was a diver or snorkeler. Several lion fish were speared. I found 2 banded coral shrimp and right above them I think a bristle worm. Also found a spotted moray eel. Guide pointed out a neat crab inside a sponge or coral. Max. depth was to be 60 feet, notify them when you hit 1,000 PSI. Temp. low 78 degrees per Oceanic VT3. Cool but not badly cold. Dive stat.s per my Cobalt (except temp.s): 46 min. dive, max. depth 60.87 feet, average depth 39.43 feet, temp. 78 degrees.
Dive 2: Fairy Land. This site was farther back the way we’d come, and this time we swam with the island shore & reef at our right, into mild current. A substantial portion of the reef was vertical wall that ran down quite deep; impressive, beautiful, and lusher reef than Dive 1 and new for me due to the vertical ‘wall’ diving. I found 2 sharptail eels, a big scorpion fish, 4 lionfish (at least 2 got speared), and a spotted moray eel. Saw some trunkfish, including a cute juvenile. A guide pointed out a golden-tail moray, another (smaller) scorpion fish, a pretty good-sized porcupine puffer fish, a scrawled filefish in the distance, and a crab inside a sponge or coral. I saw a male stoplight parrotfish, and a blue parrotfish of some sort. It was 76 degrees per VT3; I was actually shivering some late in the dive, and that’s very unusual for me (threatened my masculinity a bit). Max. depth was to be 50 feet. Dive stat.s per my Cobalt (except temp.s): 55 min. dive, max. depth 53.40 feet, average depth 35.20 feet, temp. 76 degrees.
Quite a few lionfish died on those 2 dives.
I think this was the Pitons:
Here's the lower part of that big vertical split in the cliff where we heard (& smelled) the bats.
In a nutshell: Scuba Steve's did fine, the 2 dives were fun general Caribbean dives (I hear current at Superman's Flight can be stronger than what I saw), and I'm glad I dove with them.
Years ago on our honeymoon, we hit St. Lucia and did a rainforest hike. Beautiful, lush tropical greenery and I got good photos (I'm a snap shooter). Had a good time, but in places the rocks were slick. If you do that excursion, wear something that gives you good traction.
Richard.
P.S.: Pics with Canon G10 in Canon UW housing, in Underwater Scene mode. No post processing on these pics. I suspect the 2'nd 'divers at the surface' pic was in UW mode, too, since it's kinda 'red' looking, though I shot it up top, from the boat.
