Any other places i should consider for trip at beginning of december?

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Pyro_

Contributor
Messages
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Location
Sudbury, Ontario, Canada
# of dives
100 - 199
So i am looking at doing a week long solo dive trip at the beginning of December.

Currently looking at liveaboards in Thailand, Red Sea or St Martin to St Kitts.

Trying to keep the budget under 2500$ for the week with flights from Toronto/Buffalo

Will bring my own equipment, have my OW and about 55 dives at this point. Have been diving previously in Belize(caye caulker and glovers), Mexico(Cenotes and Cozumel) and Bahamas(Blackbeards) and would be looking to go somewhere else so don't want to do Cozumel or Blackbeards again this time around.

Will consider either liveaboard or shore diving with the preference going towards liveaboards. Not too picky about accommodations so budget ones are fine. more just looking for good diving.

Are there any other places i should possibly consider? Or thoughts on the above places i am currently looking at?
 
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Thanks, that was one i was already considering for the St martin to St kitts
 
Seems you would really enjoy the Pacific/ Asia as it has an entirely different and far more diverse vvariety of marine life. Culture will be be a change too. Thailand, Phillipines and Indonesia can be reasonable but if you only have a week you barely get there and its time for long long flight home. Unless you can stretch it to 10 to 14 days Id stay in Carribean.
 
Come to Phuket and I'll dive with ya! You can stay at my place for free - http://DiveBnB.com for the week. We can hit King Cruiser wreck, Shark Point, Koh Dok Mai, Mai Thong, Phi Phi Islands, Racha Noi and Yai. Hin Bida, and a couple of the half day dives. Plus we can do night GLOW diving! http://PhuketGlowDiving.com

December is a GREAT month here for the weather and clear waters. Water temp is almost always 30 degrees (87f) even at 120ft.

I'm only 10 minutes north of Patong and Bangla Road so the after diving activities are much better than on a liveaboard and it's a LOT cheaper... depending on how many lady drinks you order on Bangla.
 
Trying to keep the budget under 2500$ for the week with flights from Toronto/Buffalo

I'm assuming you are not counting airfare in that $2,500? If not, then airfare is going to factor big into total trip cost. Tipping and perhaps other fees (e.g.: fuel surcharge) will also run up your bill on a live-aboard. I wish you the best, but I suspect that $2,500 price point is going to be hard to stay under (unless you compensate with expensive airfare to go somewhere unusually cheap).

If you do manage to pull this off, please post your trip plan and basic costs. I'd like to see how this shakes out.

Richard.
 
I am including airfare in the 2500$. And I do realize that airfare will eat up a lot of that unless I find a good deal

I have found that is is doable if I go with budget liveaboard and get a cheap flight. Eg have found flights for around $1k Canadian to either Red Sea or Asia. And can then get a budget liveaboard for around $1k US so it can be done however might not be the highest end accommodations which is something I can live with

Still tossing around what I am going to do at this point.

---------- Post added October 8th, 2014 at 01:28 AM ----------

Just to give a bit more concrete example with some cost since you were interested

Flight from Toronto to Phuket, Thailand is roughly 1050$ at beginning of December

5d/5n budget similian liveaboard 747$ for twin bed, plus park fees of 42$, there is also a discount of about 32$ if you bring your own equipment. Potentially could drop the base price to 653$ if you went with the 4 bed cabin instead

Airport transfers 58$ each way

So I would be just under 1950$ at this point which would leave 550$ in the budget for tips, hotel room/hostel if need at either start/finish and any other trip incidentals that will come up

Flight prices were pulled from google flights and liveaboard pricing from dive the world
 

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