Help choosing best location to dive while cruising

[dirk23]

My wife and I will be going on a cruise the first week of December. I would like a recommendation on the best two locations to dive, from the ports we will stop at. We will stop at St Thomas, St Maarten, Antigua, Barbados and St Lucia. Thanks in advance.

 

[Missdirected]

I'm not really sure. Check the forums you will find MORE than enough information there.

 

[dpbishop]

Check with Ultramarine in Antigua:
Phone Number: (268) 462-2623
Fax Number: (268) 662-6630
Email: ultramarine-antigua@hotmail.com

They dive the Southwest side of the Island out of the St. James Club. Better diving then the Southeast side that some other opps do. They have a van and can probably pick you up at the Cruise ship dock.

 

[Tim Ingersoll]

Of that list I have dived St. Thomas, Antigua and St. Lucia. Of them St. Lucia was the best diving, St. Thomas was average and Antigua was below average. St. Thomas is easy cause they dive you in and around the harbor. St. Lucia diving was around the Pitons which are south of where the cruise ships generally dock so you might go that far. I dove the south side of Antigua so once again you probably won't get that far from the cruise ship. On a scale of one to ten with ten being the best I would rate Antigua 4, St. Thomas 5 and St. Lucia 6.

 

[DiveMaven]

We dove St. Thomas on our last cruise and found it to be very enjoyable and I'd recommend it. We didn't dive in St. Maarten because St. Maarten isn't known for having good diving. The ocean can be rather active there (waves and surge), so unless you luck into a calm day, you might be in for a "barf charter". Haven't dove in the other spots.

 

[MaraGirl]

Regarding Antigua. The South East coast of Antigua is considered Antigua's best diving, the south-east coast is home to Nelson's Dockyard, English & Falmouth Harbour. If you dive any other part of the island - then it's okay or even sub-par.

The operators on the south-east coast are AntiguaScuba Center (www.antiguascuba.com, email: info@antiguascuba.com), Aquanaut Divers (email: aquanaut@candw.ag) and Ultramarine. None of the operators pick up at the cruise ship but I do know that some of them offer a dive/taxi package. English & Falmouth Harbour is about a 30 minute drive from the cruise ship dock but the dive sites are all within a 5 - 15 minute boat ride from the dock.

If you go with a North coast dive op or South-west, then the drive will be slightly shorter but the boat ride will be longer (about 20 - 30 ) minutes.

 

[MaraGirl]

Of that list I have dived St. Thomas, Antigua and St. Lucia. Of them St. Lucia was the best diving, St. Thomas was average and Antigua was below average. St. Thomas is easy cause they dive you in and around the harbor. St. Lucia diving was around the Pitons which are south of where the cruise ships generally dock so you might go that far. I dove the south side of Antigua so once again you probably won't get that far from the cruise ship. On a scale of one to ten with ten being the best I would rate Antigua 4, St. Thomas 5 and St. Lucia 6.

Tim - you have to come to Antigua and dive all around the island. It's not fair to describe Antigua's diving as sub-par when you have only been diving one section of it.

 

[dirk23]

Thanks for everyone's responses. I dove St Thomas last year and it was fun. My wife just got her Cert this past summer so she is new to diving. We may just do the St Thomas dive for starters. Thanks again.

 

[CoyKoi]

My husband and I really love St Maarten, in large part because of Vinny, the manager of Dive Adventures at Pelican Marina on Simpson Bay (http://www.diveadventures-sxm.com). We've been 3 times at different times of the year and each time we've seen mostly calm seas and gorgeous days. The dive sites are very nice and <30 minutes from the dock. One of our favorites is the Porpoise tugboat, sitting upright in 100' 5 minutes from the dock. It has some cool swim throughs, tons of fish and the occaisional stingray in the sand. Vinny is a retired NYC detective and runs a very professional organization. Strongly recommend this outfit!