Nekton in July

My wife and I are thinking about going out on one of the Nekton live aboards in July. We're leaning toward a trip to Medio Reef, but they have trips to St. Croix, Cay Sal Bank, and Northwest Bahamas during the time period we're available.

Any tips or past experiences to share?

We are aware that the Nekton is not a luxury-style vessel, and that's fine with use.

We've done the Aquacat and the Kona Aggressor, and had a GREAT time on both of those trips.

I did the Rorqual (Caymans) a while back and loved it. I had no issues with the entire operation but I am low maintenance!

Experiences for and against have been exhaustively debated beyond logic on the board.

Having been on the St Croix trip, I would recommend any of the other destinations as likely providing better possibilities. The St Croix trip wasn't so bad but the emphasized locations will likely not materialize due to obvious location issues, and the remaining diving is OK, but the other spots probably will provide more access to more and larger critters.

I've done Medio reef and Cay Sal Bank on Nekton. I would do Cay Sal Bank. We had a good mix of both big critters and small stuff to see and take pictureson at that location.

Thank you all for the great advice. I ran a search of the forums on the Nekton, and didn't really find specific info comparing Medio Reef, Cay Sal Bank, and St. Croix. I apologize if this topic has already been discussed; but once again, I didn't see it.

We are going to be booking either Cay Sal Bank or Medio Reef next week

We did a back-to-back NW Bahamas/Cay Sal Bank a couple of summers ago and would whole heartedly recommend Cay Sal Bank. I would go back and do that itinerary in a heartbeat. If you go to Robin's website (RnR Scuba), you can read trip reports on both Cay Sal and Medio as she's done both. I think she's in Roatan right now, but if you can wait a week, she'll be back and could likely do an excellent direct comparison of the two.

Hi all. Yes, Eric we know from Calif (we met and have been diving out there twice together) and I think we influenced him to check out the Nekton.
My personal comparison on the two options:
Big critters (sharks and turtles): Medio wins by a nose because of the day over a Cay Sal
Small critters: tie
Variety of dives: Cay Sal
Deep dives: Cay Sal
Night dives: Cay Sal
Drift dives: both did them, Cay Sal was a true drift, Medio was just sites where there was no mooring pin yet
Wreck dives: Cay Sal has 1 shallow airplane, Medio has none
Photo dives: Medio wins because vis was best there at all sites
Video dives: tie
Coolest moment each trip:
Medio - baby sharks on several dives, huge turtles at every site
Cay Sal - teenage sharks who were curious and followed us around like puppies

I would do either trip again in a heartbeat. If I could only do one again, I might go for Cay Sal just because there was more variety (walls, holes, shallow, deep...) But that might be different now as when we did Medio we were on the First trip they every did for that itinerary so Nekton crew and capt were all new to the sites , too. They may have found some new ones in the area (we did several exploratory dives for them as a group and rated them). They were looking for a wreck also as it was reported but no exact GPS location. Maybe they found it this summer. :blinking:

So, knowing that Eric is a videographer, like me, I would say do either one. Pick whichever one works best with your schedule. They do a couple of days at the same sites, so there isn't a huge difference - Both do 2 days at same sites on their way south and back north again, Cay Sal itinerary does 3 days at the Holes and a day at Medio, Medio does 1 day at the Holes and 3 days over at Medio area.

Eric, you should post the link to your videos here.

robin

Thanks for the detailed information! After reading through Robin's detailed trip reports, my wife and I agree that both Medio and Cay Sal Bank would be outstanding choices. My wife's leaning slightly toward Medio, and I'm leaning slightly toward Cay Sal Bank.

Since Nekton is doing both trips all summer long, we're going to let the date dictate the choice of site.

I'm a little behind in putting together my videos. I got GREAT footage from San Clemente and Catalina Islands, and I just returned from a week in Cozumel. (Went with Ray...not the same wife I'll be going on the Nekton with ) I'll be getting those posted later this month...I hope.

Here's some video that I have posted.SCUBA Videos

Robin's videos are AWESOME. It was fun to see different footage of the same San Clemente/Catalina trip. The conditions on that trip were great for video. Lots of sunlight shining through the kelp forests, and lots of critters.

Back to the Nekton, we'll be booking the trip next week. I'll let you know which trip we ended up on.

I can't wait to see you videos from San Clemente & Catalina. We did have perfect conditions! We'll have to plan it again for next year! Oh, and I love the Pumpkin Carving video, too funny!

As far as the Nekton trips go, the biggest difference between the two trips was Vis and Depth. Medio had excellent vis at every site, Cay Sal had sites with 30-40' vis and others with 80-100'. But that said, the reason for low vis at some sites was due to richness of life - sorta like California. The low vis sites were full of macro life & fish nurseries, and I probably saw more species on those dives that at the clear vis sites.

Depth difference - Medio sites all ranged 40-70' max and zero current, where Cay Sal was 30' to over 200' at some sites and some sites had a surge or current. I would definitely say Cay Sal was more Intermediate-Advanced diving. Medio was Beg-Intermediate. The boat Rule is no dives below 130' but you can easily do 100' depth at many sites at Cay Sal if you want. At Medio you would need a shovel to get that deep.

As I said, I would do either one again - but the feeling of dropping down inside one of the Cay Sal Blue Holes is very weird. otherworldly, and quite a rush.

humm:

I've done Medio reef and Cay Sal Bank on Nekton. I would do Cay Sal Bank. We had a good mix of both big critters and small stuff to see and take pictureson at that location.

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I would agree...........Cay Sal.