Andy077
Contributor
Spend a week on AC, did my diving with Amigos Del Mar, 3 days locally plus the blue hole.
overall, mixed review. The operation is efficient and smooth running, picking us up at our dock in the morning, the only downside to that was pickup time is 8:00, no matter what, made kind of sense on day 1, when we had to do the usual paperwork, get gear, etc.. but for every following day it meant getting to their dock at 8:05, and sitting around for over an hour, except for one customer they see a lot who they pick up on the way to the dive site, making it convenient for him, but wasting time for everybody else. We asked for a later pickup, and were told it wasnt possible. Aggravating since the pickup boat is not one of the dive boats.
The last day we walked over, got there at 8:45 and still had half a hour to settle our tab, and wait for the boat to leave.
Pre-dive briefings were good, no complaints there, they seem to take safety seriously.
During the day though, they don't keep track of who was using what gear, leading to swapping of BC and regs between dives, I wasn't too happy to share spit with whoever had it before me. On the plus side, the DM washes everybodys mask real well on the way our to the reef. All surface intervals are done at their shop, since the ride to the reef is only a few minutes. The diving itself was fine, I wasn't very impressed with the reef, but you take what you get.
The DM's themselves, hit or miss, Tony and Mike were great, pointing out plenty of things to see, checking on the group often, others seemed much more interested in hunting lionfish than anything else, showing off their kills every time they got back to the dock. Yes, I know its good policy to slaughter them, but do it on your own damned time.
Blue hole trip was nice, it was definitely worth seeing, IMHO. The only downside was the idiot that was harassing the hell out this poor turtle, and the two numbskulls that were half an hour late getting back to the boat after the lunch stop.
overall, not bad, but not super, either.
overall, mixed review. The operation is efficient and smooth running, picking us up at our dock in the morning, the only downside to that was pickup time is 8:00, no matter what, made kind of sense on day 1, when we had to do the usual paperwork, get gear, etc.. but for every following day it meant getting to their dock at 8:05, and sitting around for over an hour, except for one customer they see a lot who they pick up on the way to the dive site, making it convenient for him, but wasting time for everybody else. We asked for a later pickup, and were told it wasnt possible. Aggravating since the pickup boat is not one of the dive boats.
The last day we walked over, got there at 8:45 and still had half a hour to settle our tab, and wait for the boat to leave.
Pre-dive briefings were good, no complaints there, they seem to take safety seriously.
During the day though, they don't keep track of who was using what gear, leading to swapping of BC and regs between dives, I wasn't too happy to share spit with whoever had it before me. On the plus side, the DM washes everybodys mask real well on the way our to the reef. All surface intervals are done at their shop, since the ride to the reef is only a few minutes. The diving itself was fine, I wasn't very impressed with the reef, but you take what you get.
The DM's themselves, hit or miss, Tony and Mike were great, pointing out plenty of things to see, checking on the group often, others seemed much more interested in hunting lionfish than anything else, showing off their kills every time they got back to the dock. Yes, I know its good policy to slaughter them, but do it on your own damned time.
Blue hole trip was nice, it was definitely worth seeing, IMHO. The only downside was the idiot that was harassing the hell out this poor turtle, and the two numbskulls that were half an hour late getting back to the boat after the lunch stop.
overall, not bad, but not super, either.
