St. Martin/Maarten

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Stayed at the Royal Palm Beach Resort which is located in Simpson Bay last year. Ocean Explorers is a 2 minute walk from there. There are some other resorts along this stretch that would be more of a 5-10 minute walk to their shop. They were good, but usually running behind schedule of the departure time. But that wouldn't keep me from diving with them again.

I am going again in late Oct. this year and have been looking for a shop close to where I'll be staying; Guana Bay one week and Little Bay the next. Have contacted, through email, Caribbean Dive College and Dive Encounters (also called St. Maarten Scuba Diving which is located in Sonesta Great Bay resort) which are both located around Great Bay and both directed me to contact Octopus Diving which is in Grand Case on the French side of island. I am guessing that both of these shops are no longer open. Divi Little Bay Beach Resort may have a beachside water sports center which has dive trips included.

Have also just contacted Scuba Fun Dive Center located in the Great Bay marina and am waiting for a reply. Their website says they pick up from a lot of the hotels/resorts in Phillipsburg.

Royal Palm Beach Resort is a nice place with great views and excellent restaurants close by. The beach is coarser grains of sand and rocky but resorts farther down near the tip of the bay have nice sandy beaches and a nice beach bar is just on the other side of Ocean Explorers.

Good luck finding a spot!
 
Not at a hotel, but if you can't find exactly what you are looking for, I highly recommend Octopus Diving in Grand Case.
 
what part of the island do you want to stay ? i have used Dive adventures the most. they are in simpson bay area at the simpson bay resort. they are great. we have also used dive safari and ocean explorers. dive adventures also picks up at the divi little bay. at least they did 2 years ago.
btw......it was posted above that caribbean dive college may not be open any longer. this is not the case. they are located neir the cruise ships in phillipsburg
 
btw......it was posted above that caribbean dive college may not be open any longer. this is not the case. they are located neir the cruise ships in phillipsburg

I had inquired about AOW certification there and that a buddy and I would be diving and received an email back May 18 from Michel (who I think is in charge there) that referred me to Octopus Diving and that he currently had no instructor to answer questions I had - they had no price listed on website for their AOW certification.

Scuba Fun Diving Center, located in same area, did respond back with a lot of info as did Ocean Explorers.
 
I had inquired about AOW certification there and that a buddy and I would be diving and received an email back May 18 from Michel (who I think is in charge there) that referred me to Octopus Diving and that he currently had no instructor to answer questions I had - they had no price listed on website for their AOW certification.

this sounds odd. i was in contact with michel recently. he should have been able to answer any questions you had. hmmmmm

on the flip side......i also was trying to get info from chris at octopus and cannot get a response. some you win....some you loose i guess
 
There is not much great diving in St MArtin. St BArth, or Saba, very close by are much better
 
There is not much great diving in St MArtin. St BArth, or Saba, very close by are much better

I have not dove St Barth or Saba so I can't compare them, but I found St Martin diving to be far better than most negative comments found on the internet. Maybe my threshold for "great diving" is lower than most, doing the majority of my dives in New England, but I have dove St Thomas, St Kitts and The Turks, and I found St Martin to be average among those sites. My opinion, for what that's worth, is just because it's not the greatest place to dive does not mean it's not a great place to dive.
 
There is not much great diving in St MArtin. St BArth, or Saba, very close by are much better

What makes for "great" diving? An idea for a new thread!

Not sure I've been on the "great" dive yet, but have really enjoyed every experience diving (except when in choppy water, although underwater was fine), realizing there are different things to see at different locations. There are locations that offer more types of diving than others and I do like those over other places, but I really enjoyed the shark dive, the wrecks I dove, and the largest lobsters I've ever seen when in St. Maarten last year.
 

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