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I did a 7 day trip to TBR and did not 17 dives with Subway in June 2013. I went back in December 2013 for 7 days and did 13 dives with Subway. I'll give you a quick synopsis:
Hotel - A nice resort, typical of Latin America or Caribbean. Very clean, big rooms, hot water, great air conditioner. No bug problems in the rooms. Typical "No-See-Ums" on the beach, bring your Cactus Juice and you will be fine. Food was good for an all-inclusive. Not typically a fan of all-inclusive resorts, but this rises above most. They mix it up pretty well. If we had any "special" requests, for meals, they helped us immediately.
Staff - Both Subway and TBR staff is AMAZING. Cannot say enough. Friendly, outgoing and helpful. Divemasters Selvyn and Osman are awesome! Subway Watersports has a new owner (July '13), Markus, and he is doing a fantastic job! Still a work in progress, but you won't be disappointed.
Diving - I have dove on the North, West and South side of Roatan. The structure and diversity of the North side is awesome. Dolphin's Den and Grouper Alley will stick in your mind for years to come. Can't say enough about the diving.
Value - I was in Cozumel in early January and all I could think was ... I wish I was in Roatan! Enough said. Going back for a third time in April 2014 for the DIVERSion event and can't wait.
Great to have you on ScubaBoard! TBR is in a great location for seeing a very interesting zone of Roatan's diving. They are smart to have Subway as a provider for the dive op.
What do you mean by "interesting zone of Roatan's Diving? How does this end of the island compare to the other end? In some of the videos I have seen viz looks a bit less than desired. I am used to Bonaire, TCI and GC viz. How does Roatan compare? How about sea life?
Your question is often posed in some manner or the other, it has an explanation that is difficult to piece together, it is a multi-step algebraic puzzle, and is also fraught with political (marketing) bias from one stake-holder versus another. I just bring you specific measurements and geographic/weather facts, do with them what you will. (As a disclaimer, altho I have been diving all around each of the Bay Islands, I like the character of diving presented on the South Side, specifically CCV, but that's my current needs and situation)
First: Get on to Google Earth and get the satellite view of Roatan.
Note that it is a long slender island that lays on a line that runs SW to NE.
I have heard locals (specifically the land owning class) refer to TBR as "Northside, long up East". Hell if I know, but it makes some sense. Here they are, denoted as TBR:
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NOTICE IN THE ABOVE MAP: See how they rotated it against the actual compass points? This is what causes confusion!
Niggling technical references that are important if you want to talk about Roatan: Locally, the island has references including West End (also West Bay), South Side, North Side, and East (the word "End" is not tagged on, as the property in the actual East end gets a bit uninhabitable, so you might hear phrases such as "South down East" or "North up East". In short, there simply is nothing to be called "East End". The few resorts extant along the North side that are located anywhere East of Anthony's Key (which is adjacent to West End) become difficult for most folks to reference. That's when you see refernces to "North End" and "East Side" that have no descriptive application.
From the West End, as you travel East along either the North or South shore, dive operations and resort beds get sparse pretty quickly. If I had to guess, I'd say that 95% of overnighting visitors to Roatan are sleeping on some West End/Bay pillow.
This is the area that the West End/Bay ops dive:
Look at the obvious reef structures as shown from space in those satellite images. See the distances from shore out to the actual reef as you scan around the island. People constantly ask about Roatan and shore diving. In reference to your TBR specific query, it's not happening. Yet, some with peculiar slants on this will insist that shore snorkeling is an option- even better if they take you the 1/2 mile out to the coral heads by boat. But- that strains somewhet the definition of a shore entry. So, no, no shore diving.
Understand that although the regular day-to-day breezes come steadily from the ESE, the fierce storms and heavy weather come from the North. Long term effect? See the below YouTube explanation.
This can have an immediate impact on your diving. During storm season (Sept thru March), if you select a West or North operation, if you are there to dive, find one that has a demonstrated ability to have their boats stationed on the South side (not driving you around) so that you can indeed dive- the North side will be untenable.
Here is Doc Radawski talking about reef structure:
Now, Doc Radawski there is going on about the reasons he has for 45+ years lived on the South side and has had his base of operations there. He also makes some very cogent points of description about the UW reef structures that you can access.
"Visibility is highly over-rated" a quote in DAN Magazine, could have been either from Doc R or me, Doc A. We simply do not know as we both repeat the phrase constantly and spent time with the author. Here's the deal:
The North Side, long about midway (central) in the zone where TBR operates, there is most always a very mild current running to the WSW offshore, at the actual reef break line. This cleansing effect, combined with the simple fact that, as of yet, there is very little soil being disturbed upstream and to the East, the offshore clarity is as good as it ever was.
As a slight distraction in the flow of this answer, the same very limited siltation from the East has had a remarkable and observable effect on the coral head structure "behind" the North side wall line. The area, misnomered but referred to as a lagoon, has gone from sandy to silty bottom. Used to be lousy with Garden Eels and Rays- one got covered in muck, the other got fished to death by the burgeoning population of subsistence-fishing locals.
You do not come to Roatan for water clarity. Look at where God stuck it- in the corner of the Caribbean. Want clear water? Go to the middle of the pool. Heard of Cayman? You should come to Roatan for two dive experiences. #1 is the "Woowoo I'm diving" stage, and #2 is "Look at the Microscopic Critters" stage. These two stages of diver perceptual development will only make sense or be relevant to a diver who has passed through that awareness. You can not know what you do not know. For the middle range of diver skill sets, Roatan doesn't present much, nor does the rest of the Caribbean, but that's another post.
What might this imponderable mean to the diver in the zone of TBR? It presents a boat-dive-only environment where the wall structures are rather deep (a big plus when we first start out diving) and always lie within shadow of the Sun- pretty dark with heavy shadows (critters hide within, but most divers here are not yet carrying or utilizing flashlights, so much is missed). There are some interesting physical reef structure shapes that come from eons of storms battering and shaping, and this alone makes the zone very appealing to the newer diver, reef structure is a huge plus, much as any shape including the attraction some have to wrecks, overhead environments and any definable shape (versus the same-old-same-old vertical wall structure). Lots of stimulus here for the newer diver who has just gotten past seeing his SPG. Not a criticism of diver or location, just plain fact.
Locally there are also some really cool swim through, overheadish structures. Again, bring a flashlight, go slowly, there's lots of cool stuff. Most will not see these critters on their race through the rocky maze. Slow down, or did I already say that?
So that is about the "sea life" in terms of the unique smaller stuff, things you get interested in usually after you've seen your thirteenth barracuda, 23rd Lobster, and tenth Squirrel Fish. A good spot on Roatan to quickly log those eye-popping encounters quickly is the West Zone.
"Bigger stuff" ? In this zone, an observant diver will by scanning to the North and into the blue. It is a common place to find larger apex pelagic carnivores, look for big Groupers, Barracudas, that kind of stuff. Sharks are not all that uncommon, but they do run deep and outside of most of our observational range.
This is a ripping good story about the area, I dove often with the fellow "Ben" (when he owned a North side Punta Gorda dive op) as mentioned: Salvaging the "Odessa" Anchor
If you look at this thread (and search SB Forum for others), I think you can draw some conclusions about TBR itself. It is a resort that also offers diving. They have previously had one of the best naturalist DMs on the island, but I'm guessing from the lack of responses, he has moved on, as has their short lived forum presence, the transitory manager named ScubaKissed(who last visited SB in January 2014). There are no cogent reports on SB about detailed experiences, no images, You will see the standard useless foolishness posted on Twit Advisor- they know about rooms and food, they know squat about SCUBA. Go to TBR, but understand exactly what is available as a dive op first, or just go on faith as has been the historical method, consider the nature of the reef structure nearby, see if they mesh to provide what you want. It will simply not shift to conform to your needs when you arrive- no place does, yet we travelers constantly make this odd assumption.
So, after all of that, a short answer to your question: I have been diving both day and night in the immediate zone of TBR (but remember that with the ongoing fluidity of the in-house dive-op I, and others, have no predictably accurate information as to actual access, schedule, boats, etc- a big part of the equation). I logged the dives as being fairly deep, well within the useful range of EAN32 as I was doing 4 dives a day. The numerous reef structures were largely devoid of any colorful soft Corals, but those which gained a foot-hold were well worth investigating with a magnifying glass and flashlight. The swim throughs and crevices were fun if you went slowly and looked for critters hiding in the shadows. If with a larger group that was simply overwhelmed with the visuals of dramatic reef structure, it could easily devolve into a fin bump daisy chain race. Night diving was more interesting as larger meat eaters came in close and shallower to the convoluted reef structure to feed. Night diving in this zone may be offered as a once-a-week thing and in a protected (inside reef structure) area, but considerations of weather and low demand seem to curtail that more often than not.
I would dive this area again, for sure. I get better results from what my wife and I both enjoy elsewhere on Roatan, but life is all about variety. Like I said earlier, you can't know what you don't know. So... go know something!
And please- write a report, post pix of their dive operation (not just pretty fish images)
I, dove at TBR a couple of weeks ago. We booked through the Subway website. It was only for the day because we were on a cruise for the week (OOoohhhh NNnooooo, a cruise ship diver, pay him no mind!!!) but we did enjoy ourselves while there. My wife and 2 kids played on the beach and in the pool, while I went diving with Orman (yes, he is still there). It was just he and I diving and I believe our captain was Steve. We were there later in the morning and their other boat was already out with a full load of divers by the time we arrived. I only saw around the dive shop, but my wife and kids enjoyed beach and pool. I don't remember the name of the dive sites, but the first was pretty much straight in front of TBR and the second was a little further west (but not by much).
Orman was great to dive with, and we saw tons of critters and the structure of the reef was great as well. We dove a wall and then through some canyons as well. We saw a toadfish, scorpion fish, spotted eagle ray, lionfish, lobster, reef squid, just off the top of my head. It was really a great day.
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