UnderwaterBumbleBee
Contributor
Sorry in advance, I will have a ton of photos from this trip but haven't had a chance to whittle them down or upload them online yet.
Nekton Pilot Dec 15-22
Belize
We had spent 3 days on Ambergris Caye before heading back to Belize City for our Nekton trip. LOVED Ambergris, stayed at White Sands Cove which was great. Hol Chan Snorkel was awesome and I wished we had decided to dive it instead since Eagle Rays were continually swimming just below us, huge schools of fish, large stingrays hiding in the sand, turtles, nurse sharks...GREAT PLACE
We arrived in Belize City again at the municipal airport this time. We had called Nekton 3 days prior and told them which airport we would be at and they said someone would pick us up but no one ever showed so we just took a cab to the Princess. Didn't love the princess while hanging out in the lobby but there aren't tons of places to stay in Belize City and it's not a total dive. Since we came from the municipal airport there was no one from Nekton to show us where to put our bags (no one at the hotel had any clue what we were talking about) but we found everyone's bags near the bell hops desk. The drivers that are subcontracted by Nekton are nice, they picked everyone up in a large van and we sopped at a decent grocery store to get snacks, alcohol, drinks. NOTE: You really do not need to get anything or very little aside from alcohol if you want it. There is so many drink choices on board (no pop though) and tons of food all the time so our purchase mostly went to waste.
We arrived on board around 8PM. All our bags were delivered to our rooms. We all got name tags and they had appetizers and drinks for a welcoming. Almost all of the crew had a few moments to introduce themselves and talk about what to expect, their job on the boat, etc... We had two guests that had not arrived and had not been heard from so we hung out a little longer to see if they would show up and then the boat took off later that night (they ended up being transported to the boat the next evening and had delays due to weather). The boat was only half full, about 15 people. You set your time to one hour ahead to "Nekton Time" so you take more advantage of daylight hours. I think we were getting up around 5:45 am everyday for breakfast, the things you will do for diving...
The Food
Food was pretty good. They have a ton of juices that aren't super sugary. I'd guess about 8 different kinds were always available (grape, ice tea, fruit punch, belizean fruit punch, crystal lite, orange juice...Hot chocolate and Coffee as well). Every day was a little different with breakfast. It ranged from scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, grits, malt-o-meal, pancakes, french toast...They always had toast, bagels, cereal, fruit and yogurt everyday. Between or after then second dive in the morning there were always different kinds of fresh baked cookies. Lunch was always different. My favorite was the BLT lunch with every fixing you could have. Sometimes she made soup for lunch too. Hot stuff always felt great. In between or after the 2nd afternoon dive there was some kind of snack like nachos, conch ceviche, etc... Dinner ranged from turkey, bbq, taco night, pasta (one of my favorites) and she almost always had soup as well. She has a dessert every night after dinner (key lime pie, pumpkin, cake, flan, etc...) She is really inventive with the food, leftover turkey becomes the turkey soup for lunch the next day but nothing tasted like leftovers. Arminda that cook was accommodating for people and very nice. Christina was great, she helps get your drinks and makes sure your settled at your table. She also cleans your room during the day. You will not go hungry on this boat!
Diving
The vis at the beginning of the week wasn't very good, made picture taking difficult. We saw a spotted eagle ray at the beginning of the trip. After a couple days the vis and sites got a lot better. We didn't see tons of big schools of fish but they do have some of the best and biggest barrel sponges and yellow tube sponges I've ever seen. Great condition, color and huge. We really liked Tarpon Caves, Eternity, The Aquarium, Que Brada sites. Walls were beautiful, really nice color. We saw lots of large grouper, tarpon, trigger fish, one eel garden, sting rays, huge crabs, lobster, etc... Every night dive we did was pretty good in terms of conditions (no blood worms, no jellies) but I couldn't believe I only saw one really small octopus out and about at night and hey flew into a hole as fast as he saw my camera coming. We did see two nice size octopus sleeping in two holes nearby each other literally all day and night at one site. Guess they ate well. Huge schools of fish hung out under the boat so that was fun when doing your safety stop.
Rooms
Rooms were adequate. We knew what to expect, it's not a luxury boat but it was good enough. Bedspread could have been a little nicer and the bathroom was the most dated but felt like everything was pretty clean. I never once saw any roaches as mentioned on another post about liveaboards in general. The bed is firmer but that was good so you don't really feel anything when you move around. Nice windows and views. We had great and instant hot water all week, good water pressure but I know one guest didn't have hot water. Water leaking from the ceiling might have been an issue for some people on the lower deck but we didn't have much of a problem in our room. Be careful flushing the toilet but we never had any backups as previous guests mentioned.
Boat Overall
You will feel waves in this boat, it doesn't eliminate them all together but it does a pretty great job compared to a single hull so we've heard. We never once felt sick and never saw anyone get sick. We did feel the waves on land for a little while afterwards. I love how big the boat is. Lots of room to stretch out. The Salon/Galley is decent, big screen tv and they have lots of movies to watch (many pretty recent). Lots of reading material, books and magazines. They have a small nook with lots of different medical needs. Cold medicine, sunscreen, aspirin, etc... I assume a lot of guests leave behind their extra stuff because it's somewhat well stocked. The Sun Deck is large, lots of chairs and places to relax. They have a hot tub that can get extremely hot. Some days it felt great after a dive (especially at night) and one day I couldn't even put my feet in it, it was so hot. You hang your wetsuits up top and they are pretty much always dry. The only thing that would have been more convienient on this boat would have been to have everything dive related on one level. Your gear is on the dive deck, the showers are one flight of stairs up from that. Another flight of stairs up is the camera table, warm towels and dunk tanks. The last flight of stairs up is where you hang your wetsuit. I doubt they would be able to change any of that but the Sundancer II that we checked out in Belize City had everything on the dive deck.
Excursions
I think they really only have one which is to Half Moon Caye. We were one of the very few on board that in between dives decided to go over for about 2 hours. It costs $10 PP US but is worth it. It's not really inhabited, small pretty island with NO BUGS! Great bird observation deck with Blue footed boobies and other birds. If the sun wasn't so intense I could have stayed up there for awhile watching them. Island also has hermit crabs, iguanas, gecko and other wildlife. It's run by an Audubon society and the lady was very nice to talk to. They had college students staying on the island t help clean up some of the Debris from Dean that washed ashore recently. The day we were there the Nekton crew offered to help her get probably 20-30 bags of garbage off the island and they said they would help her weekly. Good Deed not unnoticed by us, the captain and crew immediately made several trips and loaded up their skiffs with trash bags for her. All the islands that we were near though were beautiful, the water was striking.
The Crew
The crew was pretty great. Anytime we asked for something, we were always taken care of. We did feel like some of the crew were more personable with us than others but everyone had a different experience with each crew member. Lieutenant Dan was always checking in with us, we really appreciated that and liked his personality. He'll make a great captain someday. Captain Grant is nice, he's a little quiet but that's obviously his personality. He was friendly with us though and also periodically checked in how things were going. One of our favorites was Cory AKA "Ginger" or Ginge as most shortened it to. Sadly he was lost at sea on one of our night dives. He videotaped and compiled a trip video for everyone which we watched the night he disappeared.
Overall if we think about all of the above, I think we would consider going on a Nekton boat again or at least trying the other one. (though it has been discussed that the other boat's Nitrox has been down for months and recently that they had only one engine last week on the Rorqual). The following are the issues that were discussed with other guests that occurred during our trip. These are all things that they can improve upon which would make it undoubtedly worth taking another trip with them.
1. While discussed at the beginning of the trip, there was never a safety drill.
2. Some crew members took part in some pranks that started on the dive deck in front of guests and continued to escalate all day until crew members were visibly pissed off at each other in front of guests. Someone could have gotten hurt on the dive deck in the process.
3. Two crew members had visible relationships with guests. One was a girlfriend that periodically comes on trips and the other two had just met that week on board. Nothing inappropriate but there were a few things that could have been deemed special treatment for those people who weren't technically crew. Two other crew members had been dating for a year and were always discreet when outside of their quarters. Everyone is entitled to relationships and I'm sure that job especially gets lonely but it wasn't the most professional thing and sometimes confusing what role their significant other had on the boat.
4. It may be common practice for crew to dive alone. People have different opinions or not but one of the crew was diving alone and was lost and has not been recovered. If he had been diving with someone maybe we would know what happened to him. I personally feel the crew shouldn't dive alone (at least have another crew member along). I also know one guest (who I'm pretty sure was not trained to do solo dives) was diving alone and I hope nothing ever happens to him after listening to some of his dives on this trip.
All of these things can change so I wouldn't discount them entirely. If you want a more affordable liveaboard, good stability, larger decks, etc... Nekton is great. I'll post photos when I can.
Nekton Pilot Dec 15-22
Belize
We had spent 3 days on Ambergris Caye before heading back to Belize City for our Nekton trip. LOVED Ambergris, stayed at White Sands Cove which was great. Hol Chan Snorkel was awesome and I wished we had decided to dive it instead since Eagle Rays were continually swimming just below us, huge schools of fish, large stingrays hiding in the sand, turtles, nurse sharks...GREAT PLACE
We arrived in Belize City again at the municipal airport this time. We had called Nekton 3 days prior and told them which airport we would be at and they said someone would pick us up but no one ever showed so we just took a cab to the Princess. Didn't love the princess while hanging out in the lobby but there aren't tons of places to stay in Belize City and it's not a total dive. Since we came from the municipal airport there was no one from Nekton to show us where to put our bags (no one at the hotel had any clue what we were talking about) but we found everyone's bags near the bell hops desk. The drivers that are subcontracted by Nekton are nice, they picked everyone up in a large van and we sopped at a decent grocery store to get snacks, alcohol, drinks. NOTE: You really do not need to get anything or very little aside from alcohol if you want it. There is so many drink choices on board (no pop though) and tons of food all the time so our purchase mostly went to waste.
We arrived on board around 8PM. All our bags were delivered to our rooms. We all got name tags and they had appetizers and drinks for a welcoming. Almost all of the crew had a few moments to introduce themselves and talk about what to expect, their job on the boat, etc... We had two guests that had not arrived and had not been heard from so we hung out a little longer to see if they would show up and then the boat took off later that night (they ended up being transported to the boat the next evening and had delays due to weather). The boat was only half full, about 15 people. You set your time to one hour ahead to "Nekton Time" so you take more advantage of daylight hours. I think we were getting up around 5:45 am everyday for breakfast, the things you will do for diving...
The Food
Food was pretty good. They have a ton of juices that aren't super sugary. I'd guess about 8 different kinds were always available (grape, ice tea, fruit punch, belizean fruit punch, crystal lite, orange juice...Hot chocolate and Coffee as well). Every day was a little different with breakfast. It ranged from scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, grits, malt-o-meal, pancakes, french toast...They always had toast, bagels, cereal, fruit and yogurt everyday. Between or after then second dive in the morning there were always different kinds of fresh baked cookies. Lunch was always different. My favorite was the BLT lunch with every fixing you could have. Sometimes she made soup for lunch too. Hot stuff always felt great. In between or after the 2nd afternoon dive there was some kind of snack like nachos, conch ceviche, etc... Dinner ranged from turkey, bbq, taco night, pasta (one of my favorites) and she almost always had soup as well. She has a dessert every night after dinner (key lime pie, pumpkin, cake, flan, etc...) She is really inventive with the food, leftover turkey becomes the turkey soup for lunch the next day but nothing tasted like leftovers. Arminda that cook was accommodating for people and very nice. Christina was great, she helps get your drinks and makes sure your settled at your table. She also cleans your room during the day. You will not go hungry on this boat!
Diving
The vis at the beginning of the week wasn't very good, made picture taking difficult. We saw a spotted eagle ray at the beginning of the trip. After a couple days the vis and sites got a lot better. We didn't see tons of big schools of fish but they do have some of the best and biggest barrel sponges and yellow tube sponges I've ever seen. Great condition, color and huge. We really liked Tarpon Caves, Eternity, The Aquarium, Que Brada sites. Walls were beautiful, really nice color. We saw lots of large grouper, tarpon, trigger fish, one eel garden, sting rays, huge crabs, lobster, etc... Every night dive we did was pretty good in terms of conditions (no blood worms, no jellies) but I couldn't believe I only saw one really small octopus out and about at night and hey flew into a hole as fast as he saw my camera coming. We did see two nice size octopus sleeping in two holes nearby each other literally all day and night at one site. Guess they ate well. Huge schools of fish hung out under the boat so that was fun when doing your safety stop.
Rooms
Rooms were adequate. We knew what to expect, it's not a luxury boat but it was good enough. Bedspread could have been a little nicer and the bathroom was the most dated but felt like everything was pretty clean. I never once saw any roaches as mentioned on another post about liveaboards in general. The bed is firmer but that was good so you don't really feel anything when you move around. Nice windows and views. We had great and instant hot water all week, good water pressure but I know one guest didn't have hot water. Water leaking from the ceiling might have been an issue for some people on the lower deck but we didn't have much of a problem in our room. Be careful flushing the toilet but we never had any backups as previous guests mentioned.
Boat Overall
You will feel waves in this boat, it doesn't eliminate them all together but it does a pretty great job compared to a single hull so we've heard. We never once felt sick and never saw anyone get sick. We did feel the waves on land for a little while afterwards. I love how big the boat is. Lots of room to stretch out. The Salon/Galley is decent, big screen tv and they have lots of movies to watch (many pretty recent). Lots of reading material, books and magazines. They have a small nook with lots of different medical needs. Cold medicine, sunscreen, aspirin, etc... I assume a lot of guests leave behind their extra stuff because it's somewhat well stocked. The Sun Deck is large, lots of chairs and places to relax. They have a hot tub that can get extremely hot. Some days it felt great after a dive (especially at night) and one day I couldn't even put my feet in it, it was so hot. You hang your wetsuits up top and they are pretty much always dry. The only thing that would have been more convienient on this boat would have been to have everything dive related on one level. Your gear is on the dive deck, the showers are one flight of stairs up from that. Another flight of stairs up is the camera table, warm towels and dunk tanks. The last flight of stairs up is where you hang your wetsuit. I doubt they would be able to change any of that but the Sundancer II that we checked out in Belize City had everything on the dive deck.
Excursions
I think they really only have one which is to Half Moon Caye. We were one of the very few on board that in between dives decided to go over for about 2 hours. It costs $10 PP US but is worth it. It's not really inhabited, small pretty island with NO BUGS! Great bird observation deck with Blue footed boobies and other birds. If the sun wasn't so intense I could have stayed up there for awhile watching them. Island also has hermit crabs, iguanas, gecko and other wildlife. It's run by an Audubon society and the lady was very nice to talk to. They had college students staying on the island t help clean up some of the Debris from Dean that washed ashore recently. The day we were there the Nekton crew offered to help her get probably 20-30 bags of garbage off the island and they said they would help her weekly. Good Deed not unnoticed by us, the captain and crew immediately made several trips and loaded up their skiffs with trash bags for her. All the islands that we were near though were beautiful, the water was striking.
The Crew
The crew was pretty great. Anytime we asked for something, we were always taken care of. We did feel like some of the crew were more personable with us than others but everyone had a different experience with each crew member. Lieutenant Dan was always checking in with us, we really appreciated that and liked his personality. He'll make a great captain someday. Captain Grant is nice, he's a little quiet but that's obviously his personality. He was friendly with us though and also periodically checked in how things were going. One of our favorites was Cory AKA "Ginger" or Ginge as most shortened it to. Sadly he was lost at sea on one of our night dives. He videotaped and compiled a trip video for everyone which we watched the night he disappeared.
Overall if we think about all of the above, I think we would consider going on a Nekton boat again or at least trying the other one. (though it has been discussed that the other boat's Nitrox has been down for months and recently that they had only one engine last week on the Rorqual). The following are the issues that were discussed with other guests that occurred during our trip. These are all things that they can improve upon which would make it undoubtedly worth taking another trip with them.
1. While discussed at the beginning of the trip, there was never a safety drill.
2. Some crew members took part in some pranks that started on the dive deck in front of guests and continued to escalate all day until crew members were visibly pissed off at each other in front of guests. Someone could have gotten hurt on the dive deck in the process.
3. Two crew members had visible relationships with guests. One was a girlfriend that periodically comes on trips and the other two had just met that week on board. Nothing inappropriate but there were a few things that could have been deemed special treatment for those people who weren't technically crew. Two other crew members had been dating for a year and were always discreet when outside of their quarters. Everyone is entitled to relationships and I'm sure that job especially gets lonely but it wasn't the most professional thing and sometimes confusing what role their significant other had on the boat.
4. It may be common practice for crew to dive alone. People have different opinions or not but one of the crew was diving alone and was lost and has not been recovered. If he had been diving with someone maybe we would know what happened to him. I personally feel the crew shouldn't dive alone (at least have another crew member along). I also know one guest (who I'm pretty sure was not trained to do solo dives) was diving alone and I hope nothing ever happens to him after listening to some of his dives on this trip.
All of these things can change so I wouldn't discount them entirely. If you want a more affordable liveaboard, good stability, larger decks, etc... Nekton is great. I'll post photos when I can.
