Sandals (or other all-inclusive) options/questions

[Jamaica2000]

My wife and I spent our honeymoon at a Jamaica Sandals in 2000. We are considering visiting a Sandals (or other similar resort) for our 25th anniversary celebration. Our wedding date is in late November and we did our honeymoon in early December. I remember the weather being somewhat rainy with storm surge in the ocean and therefore reduced visibility. So we are thinking about delaying the actual trip to early January perhaps. I have several questions that I am hoping some of you can help with.

I would like some input regarding the weather (and its impact on diving/visibility) in mid November, early December or early January. I suspect that the weather may vary depending on where in the Caribbean we end up going but am not sure of this. Is it pretty much the same all over within the Caribbean? So far from the research I have done it is looking like St Lucia or Grenada locations might be best for Scuba if going to a Sandals resort.

We only have about 25 dives each so we are far from experienced divers. My wife worked hard and tried to get certified on a trip to Puerto Vallarta back in 2003 but the dive shop never followed through with their end so she never actually got certified despite doing all the course work and dives and paying the money. PADI has no record of her. When we later dove in Cabo San Lucas and the Dominican Republic those shops allowed her to dive based off of her dive log book which had stamps from the PV dive shop. Anyway if we go to a Sandals resort she is thinking she would try to get certified through them so that it is taken care of finally.

Between St Lucia and Grenada it looks like the Grenada resort is extremely close to the airport. For those of you who have stayed at the Sandals Grenada location how much of a pain is that? How noisy it is with the airport that close? I have no idea how busy that airport is. Are there multiple flights going in and out every day?

My wife is prone to motion sickness so that obviously is an issue with scuba diving but it is also an issue with being in a vehicle. Grenada is attractive for that reason since the resort is close to the airport (contradictory to the noise factor though ha ha).

The idea of going to the 3 various St Lucia resorts to check each out and dine and more restaurants is attractive but that might not be much fun for my wife due to her motion sickness issue.

My main hobby is bird watching. Any birders here? Wherever we end up going I would like to try to find a guide to take me bird watching for a day or part of a day.

I have considered going to Roatan but I have heard many bad reports about the sand fleas and do not think we want to deal with that. Cozumel is of interest as well and we might end up there but are leaning towards a Sandals, partly since we did our honeymoon at one and partly for the all-inclusive aspect. I do like the idea of knowing in advance what it is going to cost us.

That is all for now. Thanks for any input you can offer.

 

[Ontwreckdiver]

We stayed at Sandals Montego Bay in 1999.
You can't predict what the weather or vis will be in advance. The closer to the equator you are the better the weather will be during the “winter”months.
I recommend your wife does all her book work, tests, final exam and confined (pool) dives at home, and then take a referral letter with you on vacation to complete her open water dives.

Not all the Sandals resorts in St. Lucia have a dive shop on site, so a bus ride may be involved. The dive shop is on site at Grenada. The Grenada airport only has one runway, so there shouldn't be a lot of air traffic.
The east side of both St. Lucia & Grenada face the Atlantic ocean which will affect the diving conditions.

I would also look at Sandals Curacao as the whole island is entirely in the Caribbean Sea, so the dive conditions will typically calmer. The diving is very good off Curacao.

Some advice, Sandals has an elite diver program ($$$$) and if an elite diver shows up and the dive boat is full you will bumped off the boat to make room for the elite divers. This is more of a problem at the better dive locations. You could stay at a non Sandals resort and pay for your dives and be cheaper than staying at a Sandals and be guaranteed a spot on the boat.

Look at joining the Sandals diving Facebook group.

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[Redtwo]

Curaçao is great in november/december (both topside and under water) and very easy/benign diving. Has some All inclusive resorts but i have never been in one there.

 

[CathyE]

Stayed at Sandals Ocho Rios, pais for extra luggage to bring dive gear, got out diving a total of one day. ‘Visibility wasn’t going to be good due to the weather’ it had been rainy the week before. There didn’t seem to be any inclination for them to go out since they got paid either way.
Heading back to Sunscape Curacao in Sept. The resort isn’t fancy but it and diving is still cheaper than Sandals.
I’m not slagging Sandals as a resort, I loved the resort, but the dive shop wasn’t really a dive shop by any stretch of the imagination.

 

[Jamaica2000]

Stayed at Sandals Ocho Rios, pais for extra luggage to bring dive gear, got out diving a total of one day. ‘Visibility wasn’t going to be good due to the weather’ it had been rainy the week before. There didn’t seem to be any inclination for them to go out since they got paid either way.
Heading back to Sunscape Curacao in Sept. The resort isn’t fancy but it and diving is still cheaper than Sandals.
I’m not slagging Sandals as a resort, I loved the resort, but the dive shop wasn’t really a dive shop by any stretch of the imagination.

Cathy, thank you for that report. Another person I know recommended Sunscape in Curacao. Is that resort an all-inclusive?

 

[CathyE]

Cathy, thank you for that report. Another person I know recommended Sunscape in Curacao. Is that resort an all-inclusive?

Yes, for food and drink, not diving. It a AHResorts chain like Dreams but lower end. It is an older property, but has a decent beach protected by a long breakwater. The on-site dive shop is Ocean Encounters, a satellite of their main location at Lions Den, just the other side of Mambo Beach. There are also lots of other dive shop and shore diving options. Ocean Encounters (on our last trip) included unlimited tanks for shore diving on the days you did their boat dives. The ‘house reef’ at Sunscape is decent. I am not a fan of shore diving but on our week there we did 4 days of boat dives (2 tank @) and 6 shore dives.
When we stayed, a couple of years ago, the food was okay, some really good, some not so much. Everyone’s tastes are different so that’s just my take, I like to eat well, but if it’s only a week…
The island is fairly desert like so I don’t know it there is much bird watching, beyond the pigeons at the beach restaurant.
As to Roatan, be aware some people do not have any issues with the sand fleas. I am one of them. A literal mosquito magnet at home and not a singe bug bite of any kind after two weeks in Roatan (multiple one and two week trips over the years). My husband is not so lucky, but after years of gentle suggestions he now only gets a few bites. Coconut oil, reapply often.

 

[Ontwreckdiver]

Cathy, thank you for that report. Another person I know recommended Sunscape in Curacao. Is that resort an all-inclusive?

We stayed at Sunscape Curacao in October 2023. We would go back to Sunscape again but use it as a place to sleep because it's cheap and eat most all of our meals at Mambo Beach Blvd.
This my report from our 2023 trip. Trip Report - Sunscape Curacao & Goby Divers.

 

[ColoDale]

Many years ago we stayed at Sandals La Toc twice, Sandals Royal Bahamian (Nassau, New Providence) and Sandals Emerald Bay (Exuma - just after it was a Four Seasons). The St. Lucia hotel is furthest south and the best diving is south. Though they have (had) a dive shop/water sports on the premises, we still had to take a bus into town for the boat. Bahamas: we had to take some sort of shuttle. We were in the Bahamas in January and a cold front with wind came through the entire week . 64F air and ocean temps. St. Lucia was in August and hot. November will still be hurricane season no matter where.
Sandals Emerald Bay is supposed to be a Beaches now. I assume yours is an adults trip.

I am not a fan of Bahamas diving in general but there can be interesting things to see but if I do it, it would be for sharks. Though Bahamas did have some blue holes (Exuma). St. Lucia was better diving but honestly Cozumel is better than both and both less than Pacific diving.

There are posts on SB regarding Sandals diving. It seems this is ok with you but I also highly recommend the first thing you do is visit the water sports to book the dives as they can fill up quickly and you would be there at the beginning of tourist season in Nov and in it in January.
At some point we stopped diving with them and booked with outside dive ops which increases the cost.

I would recommend that your wife get certified before or at least get the classroom part out of the way. Using vacation for that wastes dive time. I recall Sandals uses PADI. If you do only the classroom part, then make sure to ask if she can do the cert dives there.

The weather in all parts of the Caribbean is not all the same at the same time of year.

 

[CathyE]

@Jamaica2000 I also wanted to mention, if your wife has a dive log with signatures, take it into a dive shop. Ask them what would be required to complete her cert. Way back when, we did our book work and confined water dives at home and got a referral for the open water parts.
Things have a time expiration date, so look into it soon.

 

[Redtwo]

I think bird watching wise the Christoffel national park in Curaçao is good for a (half) daytrip.

But i'm no expert, Google (or AI) knows better