This is a trip report regarding my diving trip I have done recently in September 2014 with Palau Aggressor II. The boat is relatively small and a bit old but that is compensated by the cleanness and the good food. I have done really cheap liveaboard in Thailand so I can live with the Palau Aggressor boat standards. Especially that week I was on board was a discount week so I have nothing to complain about it. The diving in Palau itself is excellent with beautiful corals (some of which, such as cabbage corrals I've never seen before) and fair number of pelagics. The food was really good with a great American chief who constantly feeding us with mainly American/international food. HOWEVER, there were so many incidents that made a lot of guests unhappy, mainly the service from the crews and the attitude from Captain Scott and our divemaster/photographer Randy towards guests. I will list the things I still remember but there are so many other small incidents that other guests did not feel good about as well. Please understand that we came all the way from all parts of the world and this is not something a lot of us can afford to do every so often.
Incident 1:
When we got picked up from the hotel,Randy (our divemaster/photographer) was talking to one of the guests in a bus on the way to the boat, saying that there is a mother and a daughter in the group and they are both available with a dirty smile (you know what I mean kind of smile). Other guests were able to hear it and did not feel good about it, and it was even before we start the one week vacation on the boat.
Incident 2:
When we went on board, the captain Scott, told us that there are a total of 17 divers, who were obviously registered guests on the sheet of paper that Scott had, however, there was a mysterious girl who was always diving as a guest, eating as a guest and hanging around the guest area, however, sleeping in the clew's cabin. She turned out to be Randy's girlfriend and she made us guess that she was on board for free and it was kind of awkward (given that everyone else is a paying guest). She was just sleeping in the crew's cabin but doing everything else as a gust and not working as a crew. If she was a registered guest on the computer, it is fine, but she is not shown on the computer generated guest list. Buddy diving was required for all the guests and max 60 mins diving was enforced for all of us but this mysterious girl was always diving alone, far away from us, and well over 60 mins. Andy (divemaster/photographer) was supposed to be taking photos of us but when Randy was diving at the back of the group as always, he and his girlfriend were posing and taking pictures of each other, again, far away from us, instead of him watching over our group or taking pictures of us. One time, there were two giant clams during the dive and as soon as Randy (our divemaster!) found the giant clams, he swam over there (as quickly as possible) and asked his girlfriend to pose in front of it, and he started taking pictures of her for a looong time, in front of the guests, and making other guests waiting for them to finish so that we could start taking pictures.
Incident 3:
There was one guy who was always taking picture of the dive map on boat during the dive briefing together with the clock above it so that he could log his dives later. One time, before Randy started the briefing, this guy kindly asked Randy to step aside a bit as he wanted to take a picture of the dive map. And Randy's reply was "no" with a really bad attitude. That was really rude and some guests including myself heard it and did not feel good about it.
Incident 4:
On the first day of the liveaboard, when a guest touched a coral a bit with his fins while he was taking a picture underwater, Randy went over to him and started shouting at him with his regulator in his mouth. Surprisingly, many guests heard it underwater, as he was so furious and confrontational towards him. This was the first dive of the whole week.
Incident 5:
I rented GoPro from Captain Scott, and I lost the red filter, which I am fine paying back the cost, but he charged me US$125 and I nicely paid the cash back to him. However, he did not charge it on my invoice and seems like he just took the cash and replaced the red filter with the cheap one on the web. (However, I did not say anything as I did not want to ruin my precious vacation). It doesn't really matter whether it really costs US$125 or not, but not putting this through on my invoice seems really fishy. Also, other guests who had GoPro had string attach to the red filter in order not to lose the red filter. However, the rented GoPro did not have this string attached to it. Also, Scott promised me that he will charge the GoPro every dive but he often forgot to charge, making me not being able to capture the moment underwater all the sudden. I spoke about it to Scott but no apologies from him.
Incident 6:
At the end of the trip, Randy, our divemaster and the photographers for us, had a photo show during the cocktail party, and he set up his computer and tried to start showing the slides to us on TV. He had some problems and stepped away from the computer. There was one Asian guy who started touching the computer screen and all the sudden, Randy started shouting at this Asian guy IN FRONT OF ALL THE GUESTS saying "who's computer is it!!! who's computer is it!!! get the fxck away from my computer!!!!!" That was very embarrassing in front of all the gusts and he was being way too over reacting about it.
I needed to leave the boat half day before, and everyone including the chef said goodbye to me, except Randy and Scott. They were really rude to the guests throughout the whole trip.
A whole week of diving was great but a lot of the guests including myself did not have a good time with Randy, the divemaster, and Scott, the captain.
We did not come to this trip for free. Some guests came all the way from US, Europe, and some parts of Asia and considering the cost of whole week of diving, accommodation and the airfare are not something that a lot of us can afford to do every so often. It is their job to make the guests feel more comfortable and make the guests feel that they had memorable holidays.
---------- Post added September 30th, 2014 at 04:56 PM ----------
And last but not least, the boat crew was logging our dive time, depth, after every dive on the dive log sheet, so that on the last day, we could be logging our dives based on this. However, our dive log for the whole week for all of our guests which were logged by the boat crew, mysteriously disappeared from the the boat, no one was able to locate it, divemasters and the captain was indifferent about it and did nothing about it. EVERY GUESTS were so furious that we were not able to log our dives for a whole week! When I went to other liveaboards with the similar price range, our dive logs were transferred to the computer system after the whole week and we received the computer generated dive logs. It is hard to change the attitude/personalities of the divemasters or captains but this is something that Aggressor/Dance Fleet can improve to better service the guests.
---------- Post added October 1st, 2014 at 01:25 AM ----------
My original post made a mistake of names. My friend on the boat just corrected me the dive master I was talking about was "Randy" NOT "Andy". Andy is a dive master/photographer on tropical dancer supposed to be a really nice guy. I corrected above as well.
Incident 1:
When we got picked up from the hotel,Randy (our divemaster/photographer) was talking to one of the guests in a bus on the way to the boat, saying that there is a mother and a daughter in the group and they are both available with a dirty smile (you know what I mean kind of smile). Other guests were able to hear it and did not feel good about it, and it was even before we start the one week vacation on the boat.
Incident 2:
When we went on board, the captain Scott, told us that there are a total of 17 divers, who were obviously registered guests on the sheet of paper that Scott had, however, there was a mysterious girl who was always diving as a guest, eating as a guest and hanging around the guest area, however, sleeping in the clew's cabin. She turned out to be Randy's girlfriend and she made us guess that she was on board for free and it was kind of awkward (given that everyone else is a paying guest). She was just sleeping in the crew's cabin but doing everything else as a gust and not working as a crew. If she was a registered guest on the computer, it is fine, but she is not shown on the computer generated guest list. Buddy diving was required for all the guests and max 60 mins diving was enforced for all of us but this mysterious girl was always diving alone, far away from us, and well over 60 mins. Andy (divemaster/photographer) was supposed to be taking photos of us but when Randy was diving at the back of the group as always, he and his girlfriend were posing and taking pictures of each other, again, far away from us, instead of him watching over our group or taking pictures of us. One time, there were two giant clams during the dive and as soon as Randy (our divemaster!) found the giant clams, he swam over there (as quickly as possible) and asked his girlfriend to pose in front of it, and he started taking pictures of her for a looong time, in front of the guests, and making other guests waiting for them to finish so that we could start taking pictures.
Incident 3:
There was one guy who was always taking picture of the dive map on boat during the dive briefing together with the clock above it so that he could log his dives later. One time, before Randy started the briefing, this guy kindly asked Randy to step aside a bit as he wanted to take a picture of the dive map. And Randy's reply was "no" with a really bad attitude. That was really rude and some guests including myself heard it and did not feel good about it.
Incident 4:
On the first day of the liveaboard, when a guest touched a coral a bit with his fins while he was taking a picture underwater, Randy went over to him and started shouting at him with his regulator in his mouth. Surprisingly, many guests heard it underwater, as he was so furious and confrontational towards him. This was the first dive of the whole week.
Incident 5:
I rented GoPro from Captain Scott, and I lost the red filter, which I am fine paying back the cost, but he charged me US$125 and I nicely paid the cash back to him. However, he did not charge it on my invoice and seems like he just took the cash and replaced the red filter with the cheap one on the web. (However, I did not say anything as I did not want to ruin my precious vacation). It doesn't really matter whether it really costs US$125 or not, but not putting this through on my invoice seems really fishy. Also, other guests who had GoPro had string attach to the red filter in order not to lose the red filter. However, the rented GoPro did not have this string attached to it. Also, Scott promised me that he will charge the GoPro every dive but he often forgot to charge, making me not being able to capture the moment underwater all the sudden. I spoke about it to Scott but no apologies from him.
Incident 6:
At the end of the trip, Randy, our divemaster and the photographers for us, had a photo show during the cocktail party, and he set up his computer and tried to start showing the slides to us on TV. He had some problems and stepped away from the computer. There was one Asian guy who started touching the computer screen and all the sudden, Randy started shouting at this Asian guy IN FRONT OF ALL THE GUESTS saying "who's computer is it!!! who's computer is it!!! get the fxck away from my computer!!!!!" That was very embarrassing in front of all the gusts and he was being way too over reacting about it.
I needed to leave the boat half day before, and everyone including the chef said goodbye to me, except Randy and Scott. They were really rude to the guests throughout the whole trip.
A whole week of diving was great but a lot of the guests including myself did not have a good time with Randy, the divemaster, and Scott, the captain.
We did not come to this trip for free. Some guests came all the way from US, Europe, and some parts of Asia and considering the cost of whole week of diving, accommodation and the airfare are not something that a lot of us can afford to do every so often. It is their job to make the guests feel more comfortable and make the guests feel that they had memorable holidays.
---------- Post added September 30th, 2014 at 04:56 PM ----------
And last but not least, the boat crew was logging our dive time, depth, after every dive on the dive log sheet, so that on the last day, we could be logging our dives based on this. However, our dive log for the whole week for all of our guests which were logged by the boat crew, mysteriously disappeared from the the boat, no one was able to locate it, divemasters and the captain was indifferent about it and did nothing about it. EVERY GUESTS were so furious that we were not able to log our dives for a whole week! When I went to other liveaboards with the similar price range, our dive logs were transferred to the computer system after the whole week and we received the computer generated dive logs. It is hard to change the attitude/personalities of the divemasters or captains but this is something that Aggressor/Dance Fleet can improve to better service the guests.
---------- Post added October 1st, 2014 at 01:25 AM ----------
My original post made a mistake of names. My friend on the boat just corrected me the dive master I was talking about was "Randy" NOT "Andy". Andy is a dive master/photographer on tropical dancer supposed to be a really nice guy. I corrected above as well.
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