WarmWaterDiver
Contributor
It's a bit late, but here's our trip report & pics from our trip to St. Croix this Spring. It was a combined business and pleasure trip, but only 2 days were spent on business stuff, and it was the first 'getaway' trip we had after my wife had completed her surgical and radiation treatments after being diagnosed with Stage 1 Invasive breast cancer just after returned from our 4th of July 2008 trip to Bonaire.
So, as usual for us, we didn't 'dive our brains out' but had some very nice quality dives sprinkled in among other activities for a nice romantic getaway with a bit of business mixed in. This was our third trip to St. Croix, we have friends who live on-island there.
Picasa Web Albums - abrjwest - St. Croix 200...
We did all our diving through Cane Bay Scuba, a la carte running a tab. We had only very minor hassles; I was able to educate the staff the Luxfer 100 cubic foot tank is designed for 3300 psi to get the full 100 cubic foot capacity, so if it's only filled to 3000 psi, it's shortened to a 90 cubic foot tank fill right off the bat (this is stamped on the tank shoulder). All our diving was us as a buddy team except for the one guided night dive at the new Fredrickstead Pier. It was significantly different from our night dive on the old Fredrickstead Pier in 2002 since it's been completely renovated, but this was the only spot we saw a seahorse this trip. All our other diving was just at Cane Bay itself; the barracuda you see in our pics was there on almost every dive and was about 4'-6" long, and not skittish so it was a very cooperative photo model and good dive buddy!
Scuba Dive St Croix, Cane Bay Dive Shop
We booked travel on Delta from Baton Rouge through Atlanta to St. Croix and back. Our outbound flight was delayed by 4 hours at Baton Rouge, but the gate agent squeezed us in on a flight from Atlanta to San Juan, PR with an evening connection on Cape Air. Our bags were checked all the way through to St. Croix, but Delta dropped the ball on transferring them to Cape Air. After 45 minutes on hold the Delta agent at the other end of the phone was trying to deny any responsibility on Delta's part, I got fed up with this and assertively told the Delta agent that we never purchased tickets on cape Air, we would have never been passengers on Cape Air if Delta had honored their time commiitments, and just how ridiculous it was for the agent to say she was trying to be helpful. I had an exit row seat and watched our bags go onto the flight from Atlanta to San Juan through the aircraft window before we pushed back at Atlanta. Long story short, our bags were waiting for us at the Cape Air counter on St. Croix the next morning - Delta didn't even have them sent to our villa. very poor customer servive, I hope that call was one that was recorded in order to help improve quality of customer service. Our return flights had zero hassles, straight from St. Croix to Atlanta, then Atlanta to Baton Rouge.
We rented a villa through Vacation St. Croix, the folks there were an absolute pleasure to do business with for us. We booked a property named Paradise at cane Bay, and it was a good value for the privacy we got, with the proximity from Cane Bay. It's about 3 houses east of the Cane Bay Reef Club and Bogey's bar and restaraunt.
Paradise at Cane Bay
We rented an extended cab Nissan Frontier from Buget for this trip, with zero hassles, even including the delays from Delta getting us on-island late on arrival. We have had two great experiences with the local Budget franchise on St. Croix, and one very less than desireable experience with the Hertz franchise on St. Croix, so Budget has earned our repeat business when travelling to St. Croix. By making the reservation through the www.budget.com web site, we got the same price but no credit card deposit etc. required and no obligation to charge us for one day of rental if our trip was cancelled or changed dates. It was a good divemobile and OK for up to 3 people since my wife is petite, when we needed to use it for our business days during our stay.
Budget St Croix, Sub Compact Rentals
We ate in or made light meals from leftovers for a good deal of the trip, enjoying the intimacy of the property and keeping our waistlines in check. Places we did eat at included
Bogey's,
Virgin Islands St. Croix beach front beachfront hotels motels resorts Caribbean vacations weddings and honeymoons packages
Lobster Reef Cafe,
Lobster Reef Cafe, St. Croix, USVI
Tutto Benne,
Tutto Bene Restaurant, St. Vroix, USVI 340-773-5229
Off The Wall,
Off The Wall Beach Bar, St. Croix, US Virgin Islands
and Angry Nate's.
index
I loved the T-shirts at Angry Nate's and bought one for myself, and one for a co-worker whose office is across the hall from mine, and she loved hers too!
We had a good time evn with the business part of the trip, and we plan to return to St. Croix in 2010 for another visit.
Here's the details on our dive profiles.
3/29/2009 Cane Bay Entry 3:51 PM Dive Duration 75 min. Max Depth 85 ft.
3/30/2009 Cane Bay Entry 5:47 PM Dive Duration 67 min. Max Depth 102 ft.
4/01/2009 Cane Bay Entry 10:36 AM Dive Duration 80 min. Max Depth 113 ft.
4/01/2009 Cane Bay Entry 5:39 PM Dive Duration 70 min. Max Depth 61 ft.
4/02/2009 Cane Bay Entry 12:49 PM Dive Duration 68 min. Max depth 131 ft. (this is where we found the chain moray free swimming in broad daylight during our deep stop depth)
4/02/2009 Fredrickstead Pier Entry 6:42 PM Dive Duration 94 min. Max Depth 33 ft.
4/03/2009 Cane Bay Entry 12:29 PM Dive Duration 72 min. Max Depth 107 ft.
So, as usual for us, we didn't 'dive our brains out' but had some very nice quality dives sprinkled in among other activities for a nice romantic getaway with a bit of business mixed in. This was our third trip to St. Croix, we have friends who live on-island there.
Picasa Web Albums - abrjwest - St. Croix 200...
We did all our diving through Cane Bay Scuba, a la carte running a tab. We had only very minor hassles; I was able to educate the staff the Luxfer 100 cubic foot tank is designed for 3300 psi to get the full 100 cubic foot capacity, so if it's only filled to 3000 psi, it's shortened to a 90 cubic foot tank fill right off the bat (this is stamped on the tank shoulder). All our diving was us as a buddy team except for the one guided night dive at the new Fredrickstead Pier. It was significantly different from our night dive on the old Fredrickstead Pier in 2002 since it's been completely renovated, but this was the only spot we saw a seahorse this trip. All our other diving was just at Cane Bay itself; the barracuda you see in our pics was there on almost every dive and was about 4'-6" long, and not skittish so it was a very cooperative photo model and good dive buddy!
Scuba Dive St Croix, Cane Bay Dive Shop
We booked travel on Delta from Baton Rouge through Atlanta to St. Croix and back. Our outbound flight was delayed by 4 hours at Baton Rouge, but the gate agent squeezed us in on a flight from Atlanta to San Juan, PR with an evening connection on Cape Air. Our bags were checked all the way through to St. Croix, but Delta dropped the ball on transferring them to Cape Air. After 45 minutes on hold the Delta agent at the other end of the phone was trying to deny any responsibility on Delta's part, I got fed up with this and assertively told the Delta agent that we never purchased tickets on cape Air, we would have never been passengers on Cape Air if Delta had honored their time commiitments, and just how ridiculous it was for the agent to say she was trying to be helpful. I had an exit row seat and watched our bags go onto the flight from Atlanta to San Juan through the aircraft window before we pushed back at Atlanta. Long story short, our bags were waiting for us at the Cape Air counter on St. Croix the next morning - Delta didn't even have them sent to our villa. very poor customer servive, I hope that call was one that was recorded in order to help improve quality of customer service. Our return flights had zero hassles, straight from St. Croix to Atlanta, then Atlanta to Baton Rouge.
We rented a villa through Vacation St. Croix, the folks there were an absolute pleasure to do business with for us. We booked a property named Paradise at cane Bay, and it was a good value for the privacy we got, with the proximity from Cane Bay. It's about 3 houses east of the Cane Bay Reef Club and Bogey's bar and restaraunt.
Paradise at Cane Bay
We rented an extended cab Nissan Frontier from Buget for this trip, with zero hassles, even including the delays from Delta getting us on-island late on arrival. We have had two great experiences with the local Budget franchise on St. Croix, and one very less than desireable experience with the Hertz franchise on St. Croix, so Budget has earned our repeat business when travelling to St. Croix. By making the reservation through the www.budget.com web site, we got the same price but no credit card deposit etc. required and no obligation to charge us for one day of rental if our trip was cancelled or changed dates. It was a good divemobile and OK for up to 3 people since my wife is petite, when we needed to use it for our business days during our stay.
Budget St Croix, Sub Compact Rentals
We ate in or made light meals from leftovers for a good deal of the trip, enjoying the intimacy of the property and keeping our waistlines in check. Places we did eat at included
Bogey's,
Virgin Islands St. Croix beach front beachfront hotels motels resorts Caribbean vacations weddings and honeymoons packages
Lobster Reef Cafe,
Lobster Reef Cafe, St. Croix, USVI
Tutto Benne,
Tutto Bene Restaurant, St. Vroix, USVI 340-773-5229
Off The Wall,
Off The Wall Beach Bar, St. Croix, US Virgin Islands
and Angry Nate's.
index
I loved the T-shirts at Angry Nate's and bought one for myself, and one for a co-worker whose office is across the hall from mine, and she loved hers too!
We had a good time evn with the business part of the trip, and we plan to return to St. Croix in 2010 for another visit.
Here's the details on our dive profiles.
3/29/2009 Cane Bay Entry 3:51 PM Dive Duration 75 min. Max Depth 85 ft.
3/30/2009 Cane Bay Entry 5:47 PM Dive Duration 67 min. Max Depth 102 ft.
4/01/2009 Cane Bay Entry 10:36 AM Dive Duration 80 min. Max Depth 113 ft.
4/01/2009 Cane Bay Entry 5:39 PM Dive Duration 70 min. Max Depth 61 ft.
4/02/2009 Cane Bay Entry 12:49 PM Dive Duration 68 min. Max depth 131 ft. (this is where we found the chain moray free swimming in broad daylight during our deep stop depth)
4/02/2009 Fredrickstead Pier Entry 6:42 PM Dive Duration 94 min. Max Depth 33 ft.
4/03/2009 Cane Bay Entry 12:29 PM Dive Duration 72 min. Max Depth 107 ft.
