Recommend room location at the Plaza

[mbs]

Scanned thru a bunch of appends and I am trying to figure out if any one section at the Plaza is best for us... We plan to do daily boat dives and shore dives. Their web site has a nice layout of the resort. Question 1 - do the dive boats go out from the Toucan dive shop (by the tennis courts). 2 - where are the shore dive entry points? 3 and maybe the most important where is the breakfast place!
Thanks!

 

[Cecil]

First recommendation for the Plaza, bring skates or a Segway. The boat leaves from the dive shop area. The shore dive is near the pool or the Tipsy Seagull, a good 1/4 mile from the dive shop. Get a dive bag with wheals.

To the Plaza's credit there are tanks at the pool, so at least you do not have to lug them, Now if they put weights there also.

 

[mbs]

Ok, sounds like we better get back to the gym How bout #3? Where's the breakfast place?

 

[diversteve]

1. Yes. The diveshop is the building to the left of the line from the Toucan sign, the tank fill, lockers and gear rental is the building to the right. The boats moor 20' away down a few steps. There's one boat shown there, but it's usually 3-4. The dive signup sheet is on the wall just about where the line from the Toucan Diving sign ends. If you pre-paid a package, your names should be on there from day one. You can change dives/boats as desired if there's space. One of our dives was an afternoon dive out to Forest - just us, a Dutch couple and the DM and Captain. Nice leisurely dive with a "forest" of Black Coral at 70'.

2. We never dove 18 Palms but I thought it was just north of the breakwater out in front of the bar. Sort of straight out from the right side of the pool.

I don't know if you can still do this but see the field just above the Banana Tree name on the Plaza map? We parked there for the Friday night BBQ at Coconut Crash. But we didn't stay at the Plaza, just dove with Toucan.

 

[RJP]

We stayed in the building adjacent to the dive shop. Seemed ideal to me. Walk to breakfast was short, walk to dive shop was short. Walk to shore diving was a bit longer, but we only did two dives there, so proximity to our pick-up and the tanks at the shop were the key.

 

[mbs]

Hey thanks folks! Now I better get on the phone and see what rooms are actually available when we are looking at going! Might might our decision easier!

 

[RJP]

PS - the upstairs rooms in the building we were in (closest to dive shop, in the part of the building closest to dive shop) have brand new bathrooms and floors as of April this year. Really phenomenal. I think they were doing the downstairs of the building next, and probably other buildings as well, but if you want try to confirm one of the rooms with a new bathroom.

 

[lmorin]

Unless things have changed recently, there are two shore dive entry points. Our checkout dive with DM was done off the beach near the pool, at the point closest to the dive shop. From there, you can dive north or dive south. If you go to the Tipsy Seagull entry point, you have a south-going dive or a repitition of the southerly dive that starts nearer the pool. In all cases, at least when we were there, if you told the the folks at the dock or dive shop that you were doing shore dives, they would put your gear in a golf cart and take it all over to the specified entry location where there are small tank storage areas. They were quite accommodating, but they were only available to move gear before about 5-6 PM, so we had to plan ahead.

 

[mbs]

Oh thats a great tip! 99% of our shore diving is not too too long after lunch so the golf cart deal should work out great! Thanks!

Unless things have changed recently, there are two shore dive entry points. Our checkout dive with DM was done off the beach near the pool, at the point closest to the dive shop. From there, you can dive north or dive south. If you go to the Tipsy Seagull entry point, you have a south-going dive or a repitition of the southerly dive that starts nearer the pool. In all cases, at least when we were there, if you told the the folks at the dock or dive shop that you were doing shore dives, they would put your gear in a golf cart and take it all over to the specified entry location where there are small tank storage areas. They were quite accommodating, but they were only available to move gear before about 5-6 PM, so we had to plan ahead.