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This is written in a hurry and is a bit rambling in style, so apologies.
We have just come back from Dominica where we were diving for the first two weeks in January 2008.
There are no direct flights from the UK or North America so we flew first to Barbados with BMI and then took a LIAT flight to Dominica.
We stayed at the Evergreen Hotel at Castle Comfort which is about 1 mile south of Roseau. There are 3 hotels next to each other at Castle Comfort, the Evergreen, the Anchorage and the Castle Comfort Lodge. Both the Anchorage and the Lodge have their own dive / whale watching operations, the Evergreen is a hotel only. We chose the Evergreen as it had larger and better rooms. That’s not to say the rooms at the other places were bad, nobody I met staying there complained, but we reckoned that as we would be there for two weeks we would pay a little extra to be more comfortable. All three hotels had reasonable restaurants. Menus changed daily but could at times be a bit uninspiring. I didn’t travel 4,000 miles to eat minestrone soup.
We used Dive Dominica, who operate out of the Lodge, as our dive operator and we were very happy with them. They have 4 dive boats of varying sizes that can sensibly carry from 6 to 14 divers plus dive masters. All carried a first aid kit plus oxygen. The dive masters had a good knowledge of the dive sites and were all bar one local Dominicans. The non local was Canadian (Hi Jamie, if you are reading this!) Their rental equipment (BCD, Reg etc) was fairly new and in reasonable condition .Generally we set out at 08:30 and were back by 13:00 after two one hour dives. Dive Dominica will do a boat pickup from the cruise ship dock and the Fort Young hotel in Roseau.
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The other operator we considered was Nature Island Dive based a few miles south in Soufriere. We heard good reports about them from other divers we met. What swung it for us to use Dive Dominica was that they were next door and we were unsure how easy it was to get down to Soufriere in the morning. As it turns out it wouldn’t have been that difficult.
We pre-booked a dive package over the Internet before leaving the UK which gave us a significant discount over the day rate. Both the Anchorage and the Lodge offer combined hotel / dive packages which are worth looking at
All our diving was within the Soufriere and Scott’s Head Marine Park. This is on the Caribbean side of the island rather than the Atlantic side. There was no diving on offer anywhere that we could find for the Atlantic side.
Most days there were no underwater currents. If there was a current it was weak and easy to swim against. A couple of days there was a fair surface current but nothing to worry about.
Visibility was generally excellent. Often over 100ft and clear water. Only on a couple of sites were there sediment / particles in the water. Conditions for photography were good. Several times on the trip out to the dive sites we were chased by pods of Frasers and Spotted dolphins and on one occasion we passed by some sperm whales.
Underwater there was an amazing array of corals and sponges and large shoals of chromis and damselfish. There were quite a number of turtles. There were even frogfish and seahorses. No sharks have been reported on this side of the island in recent years.
All the dive sites were worth visiting but our favourite were La Bim (The Abyss) which is an incredible wall and Coral Gardens which was just like swimming in an Aquarium.
Hope this is of some use to somebody.
Andy
BTW: Try the fruit cake from Sukies Bakery, it is laced with rum and lethal.
thanks for the trip report. I'm thinking about doing a quick dive trip upto Dominica at some point this year, so i'll make a note of your report for future reference.
Sounds like I remember it. We stayed at the Lodge when we were there. We would do the two morning boat dives, and then 2 - 3 dives from the shore in the afternoon/night.
A few other bits and pieces of information that may be of some use.
Most restaurants in Roseau are open at lunchtime only. If you’re out in the evening then the choice is limited if you don’t want to eat in a hotel or snack in a local bar. The best restaurant in town is La Robe Creole which can be found opposite the Fort Young hotel. It's expensive, we ate there a couple of times and didn't get much change from £40 (US$80) for a meal for two. It was good though, the crayfish in pepper sauce was delicious. They have a take-away shop by the restaurant that is open at lunchtime and has really good chicken rotis. Also good is the Port of Call down near the cruise ship berth which is less expensive and frequented by locals.
If you’re in Roseau at lunchtime the place to eat is Pearl’s Kitchen. They have a set menu that changes each day. All food is prepared in advance for lunchtime and they only cook once. So when it's gone, it’s gone. On a busy day they sell out by 14:00 other days it might be 16:00. The Bulls Foot soup is delicious and is exactly what it says it is.
Just about everything except the hotel restaurants shuts on Sunday.
There is a coffee shop down on the front called Rituals. it bears an uncanny resemblance to Starbucks. Not bad if you are in the mood for iced coffee and chocolate cake in the aircon.
The trek out to the boiling lake is a must. It really is something different. It's an 8 hour round trip and really strenuous. The views over the rainforest are spectacular. There's a lot of scrambling up and down near vertical paths. Our leg muscles ached for a couple of days after. You will need really good hiking shoes with a strong grip and a lightweight waterproof in the rainy season.
We drank the tap water with no problems over two weeks.
Thanks for the report. We will be there the 23rd for a week at Ft. Young Hotel. What was the water temp and what did you find comfortable to wear while diving?
Water temperature was around 27 celsius, 81 Farenheit.
We both had full length 3mm suits and were generally happy, an undershirt would have been nice on the deeper dives.
Have a good one.
Ditto the thanks - my wife and I just booked the Anchorage for 22 April - 2 May this year.
fisheyeview - how was the shore diving, and do the Lodge and the Anchorage use the same site? Can you cross over or will they get mad atcha?
I'm also wondering if the unlimited shore dive tanks would let you hitch down to Soufriere and do the shore dives there - Champagne I think I read is shore-access?
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