St. Lucia or Antigua??

[O-ring]

We have the opportunity to go to one or the other, but not both this fall. Anyone have any general experience with either place? I hear St. Lucia is prettier, but the diving is better in Antigua.

TIA!

[DocVikingo]

Hi O-ring,

Those are my opinions.

I suspect you'd much enjoy either one.

Best regards.

DocVikingo

[michaelkuznet]

hey oring, i'm still trying to figure out how to insert a link to another thread, but if you go to the search function, and search for my name, my only other post is about st. lucia and my trip at the end of last year
peace
MK

[Natasha]

Here's the link.http://www.scubaboard.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=50993#post50993

[michaelkuznet]

hehe, thanks, now i can respond to other posts without confusing people
<<easily amused>>

[O-ring]

I appreciate the link...always good to know what to expect...I will post a trip report once we get back...

[MissAmberDiva]

I went to St. Lucia last July for my honeymoon. I was very disappointed. If I had to do it over again, I would not have went there. Diving there is not good. Never been to Antigua though.
-Amber

[gzscuba]

MissAmberDiva,

What specifically didn't you like about St. Lucia? I'm considering going there for my honeymoon.

Thanks,
-Greg

[MissAmberDiva]

Well, for one, the water was dirty looking. I swam in it anyway and then I dove in it and the dive sucked. Didn't see anything really and the visibility was not good at all. I pretty much stayed on the resort most of the time because there was nothing else to do! We hired a driver to take us to the volcano, botanical park, and the pitons. I could have lived my life without seeing all three. Nothing spectacular.

And a major thing that bugged me was everywhere, even on the beach of our resort, we'd get natives coming up to us and asking if we were american. We'd say yes then we'd get a hard luck story and would be asked for "ten u.s dollars". That got old in a hurry. Some wouldn't even give us a hard luck story. They would just ask for ten bucks. Ten must be the magic number down there. One of the other resort stayers tried to give one guy five dollars. And he refused! He said "No, ten U.S. dollars!" They almost got in a fight right there and that was a little scary.

For the most part, the people there sucked. AFter our venture off the resort, we decided to stay there and not go anywhere else. The resort staff were good friendly people. I guess after you leave civilization people get nutty. So we stayed on our resort's beach most of the time.

I was told about some black sand beach that was there. Well we never found it. So that was disappointing because the other beaches weren't pretty at all.

The food was horrendous. I think I lost ten or fifteen pounds. I was glad to come home and have a big fat Sonic cheeseburger!! Also they don't have a lot of fruit on the island (except bananas). So any mixed drink you ask for will be made with yucky syrup. The only food that I really enjoyed was the chocolate desserts the resort would cook up. They have a lot of chocolate down on that island....so anything chocolate is great. But as for the regular food....it's disgusting. Goat cheese, lamb, duck...stuff like that.....I had a steak down there and that had a wang to it. I live in Oklahoma so I know what a good steak should taste like!:upset:

Anyway, if I had to do over, I would have spent my honeymoon elsewhere.

:blahblah:


Any more ????'s I will answer
Amber:sunny:

[sactomags]

We went to Sandals St. Lucia in 1998 and had a wonderful time ... and it wasn't our honeymoon. There are two Sandals resorts on the island and if you are going for a honeymoon, I suggest you go to the smaller one (which is the one we chose, I believe it is Halcyon). They only have 120 or so rooms, and no children allowed at this one -- so it is a good choice for honeymooners. The landscaping is gorgeous, with hammocks or shaded lounges scattered among the trees, a lovely wedding gazebo, and very nice accommodations. We had a standard room, but some people we met had upgraded to one of the "garden" rooms, which are a bit more private.

We dove each morning on the a.m. dive, and each dive was a new adventure. It was our first tropical dive, having just finished our certification dives in Monterey and Lake Tahoe, so we found it incredible. The reserve by Anse Chastanet (probably misspelled that) was so fish-laden that I probably got whiplash looking from side to side. We dove several wrecks that didn't have a lot of fish on them, but there were enough to keep us busy. We also did our first ever night dive, and I vividly recall two sensations: rolling over on my back and looking up through 35 feet of water and seeing the stars (incredibly CLEAR water); and the second was when a small porcupine fish swam up to me and just settled softly on my hand. Incredible. The average boat ride was probably about 30 minutes, some a little longer, some a little shorter. We were there in November, so the rains came almost every day, but were brief and helped to cool things a bit. Lovely tropical flowers almost everywhere you looked.

That Sandals resort has 3-4 restaurants -- one called The Pier that is exactly that, and only serves dinner. They also have a continental style restaurant that serves all three meals, and then a "fancier" Italian, plus the usual snack bar. All meals and drinks included in the package. Two pools -- one "quiet" and one for the usual games, etc. You can also go to the other Sandals resort -- I think they have a shuttle -- it is much larger (I think 300+ rooms) and quite a few more restaurants -- also a golf course. The beach wasn't much by the resort, but all the water sports, including scuba, were included in the price -- except for the night dive (I think it was $45 extra and there were only 4 of us on that one). Since we went on the a.m. boat (which left pretty early), we usually only had around 5-6 divers versus the afternoon boat which was always full. The dive masters were all friendly, fun, and pointed out interesting critters.

We did a tour of the island and found it very interesting. We like to explore, and the others on the tour were a lot of fun as well. We did hear that the natives could be a bit demanding and nasty. Having said that, we only saw two walking the Sandals beach area during our week at Sandals, and they didn't bother anyone, just walked by. We saw many more on the one day we toured, and they were are friendly. And the resort staff is incredible -- if Estelle is still working the little grill, by your second day, she'll remember your name.

I'd go back again, but probably only to Sandals. And, as you can see, our experience was totally different than others.

Margaret

[gzscuba]

Thanks very much for the replies, sactomags and MissAmberDiva.

MissAmberDiva, just out of curiousity, what section of the island did you stay at? From what I can tell, there are cities on the SE and NW corners of the island. I wonder if one side of the island is better than the other.

Sactomags, I was interested in your post as my fiancee and I were looking at one of the Sandals resorts on St Lucia. I'm glad to hear a positive report. I'm happy to hear that night dives are allowed - I'm willing to pay extra for that! Couple of questions for you: how did you find the ride on the boat - specifically, were you breathing boat exhaust? On my 1st ocean dive, part of the reason that I got seasick was (I think) due to the diesel exhaust.
Also, how was the condition of the scuba equipment?

Thanks very much for the advice,

[MissAmberDiva]

Hi GZscuba-
I was at the Rendezvous resort. It was next to the Sandals resort. I was there last August. That part of the island has been overfished. Which is why the water looks muddy.
We should've stayed at the Anse Chastanet which is on the other side of the island by the piton volcanoes. However, that is the most expensive resort on the island. I mean--it's expensive:whoa:
Also that particular resort is like a two and half hour drive up in the mountains on a twisty little road and it's not close to town or anything like that.
Rendezvous resort is who I dove with since it was included in my package price. Their boats were small and they didn't have a dock. I remember hopping off the boat and literally rolling back to shore. The waves were hitting me hard and a little british man had to drag me in. The crew were of no help!

AMber

[sactomags]

GZ Scuba:

The boats used by the Sandals resort we were at were more open than anything. In fact, if you didn't sit towards the front during the downpours of rain, you were soaked. I don't recall an overwhelming smell of diesel, but I'm sure if you were toward the back of the boat where the engines were you might have gotten a few strong wiffs of fuel. Like I said, the morning dives had a maximum of 8-10 divers, with DMs taking groups of 2-4, depending on how many people, and if anyone was taking a class (one of the gentlemen there was doing his AOW at the time, so he had numerous dive skills to complete).

The equipment was in pretty good shape. They use full foot fins there, so if you do go there, I recommend you try them on and not take the word of the staff in the scuba shack. Although they mark down what you take on Day 1, some times they get a little rushed and on that Day 3 dive -- you don't want to wind up with the wrong fins (which happened to me, but there was another boat there who had an extra pair of fins that luckily fit me).

If you have any other questions, let me know and I can go through my dive log to give you more specifics.

Again, we loved the Sandals resort. (Just a reminder: we went to the smaller Sandals, not the one near where MsAmberDiva was staying). We were by Castries and flew into the small airport, which was about 10 minutes from the resort. Our flight went from Puerto Rico to Castries. Jets can't fly into that airport as the runway is too small -- all that goes in there are prop-style planes. But since it was only about 1 1/2 hours flight, it wasn't bad. And we're not talking the tiny prop-planes ... I think the one we were on held approximately 30 people.

Regards,
Margaret:)

[O-ring]

My girlfriend and I went to Sandals Royal Bahamian (Nassau, Bahamas) in March and dove every day we were there (7 or 8). After a couple days, the DMs and crew at the scuba shop/shack get to know you and they let us put the equipment we were using in the back room and use the same gear every day (instead of checking it back in...saved them time and made us much more comfortable).

My gf had a bad inflator on a BC one day and we had to disconnect the lp hose and inflate orally. Other than that, the equipment was ok...regs seemed to be in better condition than the BCs and wetsuits. We were ok just bringing all our own personal gear and using their BCs, regs, and tanks.

[Dectek]

The reefs around Antiqua had so much sand on them that the bottom and the reef had one color....White... We tried spots on 3 sides of the island with the same results. I don't know if this is normal or if we got there after a big storm. Agreed that we would not try to dive this area any more and had better appriciation for the Pacific side of Costa Rico and the Yucaton of Mexico.
Just my $.02
BTW....not much to see on land there either....except the friendly folks there.
Took a 2.00 tour of a pineapple planation there.
The girl pointed to the right and said" we picked those pineapples last week."
She then pointed to the left and said " We will be picking those pineapples next week. Are there any questions? Feel free to walk around and thanks for coming to the Black Pineapple Plantation."

[clive francis]

must be the same all over the caibbean!, i went to jamaica and after 3 days i had enough of people offering me every drug and woman under the sun and demanding in a menacing way money or drinks.

apart from trip to the bahamas to dive with sharks, i probably wouldn't go the ahe caribbean again, there are much better places around the world!

trouble is you yanks would have to break with tradition and get passports! ;)