St. Kitts, Aruba, or Curacao??

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dstrawhorn

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Going on a cruise with my wife next week and would like to dive at least one of St. Kitts, Aruba, or Curacao (and maybe two). I'm trying to plan out our week and need to narrow down where I'm diving so I can plug in other activities around that. How would you rank those three islands to dive in order and any recommendations on dive ops (that are not tied to the cruise lines)?

My wife doesn't dive (and is 4 months pregnant) so I'm needing to plan some other lower strenuous activities as well (sight seeing, tours, beaches, etc). If you have any recommendations on that on any of these islands, that would be appreciated also!

Thanks in advance!!
David
 
I've not been to St. Kitts so I cannot comment on it but I have spent a fair amount of time in Aruba and Curacao for work where I dive in my free time. Between Aruba and Curacao I much prefer Curacao for diving as the reef is in better shape and almost every dive is a shore dive.

If you need a buddy, I hear that The Dive Bus is a quality operation and while they are not officially an operator recommended by the cruise lines, they do cater to the passengers. See info on that here: Cruise Ship Passengers. I don't have any experience with them, I'm just aware of them and thought they might fit your bill.

I do my diving with Diveversity Piscadera who are in the process of changing their name to The Dive Shop at Piscadera. They are actually very close to where you will be docking (5 minutes by car) and are located on a nice beach with 2 restaurants and the Carmabi Marine Research Station. If you dive here you'll go past a couple of structures under the water where the students are experimenting on growing coral.

If you want to get a little more adventurous, Playa Porto Mari is an excellent dive site and has a dive shop, restaurant and facilities located on a very nice sand beach. It would take about 25-30 minutes to drive here from where you will dock.
 
+1 For Curacao. A better reef system than Aruba by far.
 
All three islands are quite different. Curacao my favorite by far with the most diverse type of sites and reef system is few short kicks from shore. We use CURious 2 DIVE - Diveshop Curacao and I know Hans works with cruise ships. Aruba is 2nd we use JADS Dive Center Aruba and I am sure they also do cruise ships. My favorite site there was Arashi which has little coral but lousy with turtles and seal life. St Kitts we used Pro Divers St Kitts Your Padi Dive resort in St Kitts and as I recall they did not have a pickup service. Monkey shoals was my favorite dive there. It was easy diving with some structure but no great reef to speak of. There was a ton of fish lobster and an occasional shark. Hope to have helped.
 
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