Shore Diving at AKR

[noj3333]

With this deal we have unlimited shore diving. How good is the shore diving? Is it a short swim to get to the house reef? Depths? Any details would be appreciated.

 

[diversteve]

There's actually two. You can muck dive in the channel between the Key and the mainland - there's actually sunken wreck (small plane?) used for training purposes. We did a mask clear/check b4 the Dolphin dive in the area (off the back of a docked boat) and I poked around till it was my turn. Saw a few interesting things but it was kind of murky and shallow.

The shore dive is off the key by the beach - you walk out for awhile before seeing any depth.
Roatan Shore Diving | Anthony's Key Resort | Roatan | Honduras

I would believe Al on this - I know him from somewhere:

03/29/2006 Al Mialkovsky (Avg: 3.42 Review) - We were guests at Anthony's Key last week and we had a wonderful time. I used this site for open water checkouts for a new diver. The reef conditions are fantastic but it's a long hike out. The water is about 1 foot deep for around 100 feet, then it quickly drops to 3 feet deep for another 100 feet but you can snorkel or surface scuba until you get to open water there. Anthony's Key specializes in boat diving and lodging but this site is open nearly every afternoon. The DC3 dive is in the open channel, this site is not. The DC3 dive has very limited visibility while this site has fantastic vis.

 

[ROXANNE]

Thanks Steve! We were out and about yesterday.
I would agree with Al's description. It is definitely some work to get to the shore dive, but it is a great dive. I'm trying to remember the depths, I think at least 50 '.
We didn't do the muck dive.

 

[noj3333]

Is it a sandy beach entry, or more like crushed coral?

 

[Lorenzoid]

The problem with the AKR shore dive is that, if you do all the scheduled boat dives, and if you want to eat meals during the scheduled times, there is hardly any time left to shore dive. Also, there seems to be some conflicting information on the hours that shore diving is available (permitted?). A sunrise dive or a night dive would have been great for us, but we couldn't figure out how to manage it. The staff told us the shore dive shack is closed after dark, which we interpreted as meaning that shore diving isn't possible after dark. It didn't seem to be open in the early morning, either. However, SB'ers have reported that night shore dives are indeed possible. You may have to be persistent with them, though, to make sure you have tanks ready. That AKR seemed reluctant to encourage people to do shore dives is one of the reasons I don't think we will return to AKR.

 

[ROXANNE]

Roatan Shore Diving | Anthony's Key Resort | Roatan | Honduras

 

[noj3333]

Thanks for the info. It looks like it'll be possible to do a later shore dive, either eating dinner later in the evening (maybe 8pm) and diving around 5:30pm. The other possiblilty would be to eat dinner early (dinner starts at 6pm) and doing a shore dive a bit after that.

At any rate, I'd be up for a few shore dives, and I doubt I could get my wife to walk out a few hundred feet. With that being said if anybody is interested find me when we're there and I'd be happy to buddy up with someone.

 

[SquidSpotter]

We found that when we were at AKR there just wasn't time for the shore dives. It was reported to us by other guests that it really wasn't worth the time and trouble, and I would hardly exchange the fantastic boat dives for something that just isn't that great. If you want great shore diving you can go to Bonaire.

 

[Lorenzoid]

We found that when we were at AKR there just wasn't time for the shore dives. . . .

Which is along the lines of what I said above. It seemed to us that the only practical way to do a shore dive would be to jump off the afternoon boat as soon as it arrives back at the dock and immediately haul your gear over to the key, so you could cram in a shore dive (no surface interval for you), haul your gear back to the other side and put it away in your locker, run back to your room to shower, and show up in time before dinner ends. After a day of boat diving, this seemed like a lot of work to us, and the prospect of a shower, a snack and a sunset beer won out over the allure of a shore dive. Bring a snack to eat after the afternoon boat returns, such as an energy bar or a piece of fruit you surreptitiously took from the breakfast buffet, because you will be hungry after the last boat dive, and AKR doesn't hand any fruit or other snacks out for free.

 

[SquidSpotter]

Bring a snack to eat after the afternoon boat returns, such as an energy bar or a piece of fruit you surreptitiously took from the breakfast buffet, because you will be hungry after the last boat dive, and AKR doesn't hand any fruit or other snacks out for free.

one of the things my daughter can't wait for is the post-dive ice creams we would get after the afternoon dives from the little shop there. It became a thing...