AKR dolphin dive - any experiences?

[ScubaJill]

I'm heading to Roatan in a few and was considering the dolphin dive at Anthony's Key Resort. Anyone have experience with this, or the other dolphin activities? (For the record, observing sea life is one of my main reasons for diving.)

 

[gopbroek]

I did it a few years back and enjoyed it. The dive is done in open water and not in an enclosure in about 60' on a sand bottom. If I remember correctly our dive lasted about 45 minutes with the dolphins and after the show they took off for a few days and they had to cancel the scheduled dives until they came home.

 

[ScubaJill]

I did it a few years back and enjoyed it. The dive is done in open water and not in an enclosure in about 60' on a sand bottom. If I remember correctly our dive lasted about 45 minutes with the dolphins and after the show they took off for a few days and they had to cancel the scheduled dives until they came home.

:-D I like that the dolphins took off.

 

[diversteve]

I liked it in some aspects since they didn't seem over controlled. You first go out to the cay and meet "your" dolphins - 3 for our boat of 7 divers then ride about 5mins. out to a flat sandy plain that's 60? or less deep. The first few minutes they all went streaking by multiple times and two played with some weed at the periphery of the main area - watch the cameraman, he usually picks up on them first. Once they settle down you get most of the rest of 45mins. with them after which they call the dive. You get to interact, touch, pose, pet and they lay down at times which explains the smooth sand bottom.

I had a pretty cool experience - floating on the surface near the boat one came up to see what we were doing. He first allowed my non-diving friend on the boat to pet him then came over to me and stopped two feet away. I slowly and carefully reached out my hand and petted his chin (don't touch their dome - you're warned not to) He first seemed to sonar me - or it was just a warm current - then I made some gesture that caused him to come closer and "kiss" me on the chin b4 he took off and joined his buddies still down with my friends.

I'll do it again if I go back - beside there being many less canned tricks compared to the dive on Curacao - the pen fence at the Cay is maybe a foot higher than the water so I'm sure they could leave anytime they chose. They also seemed well fed and content - Ive seen dolphins at zoo's that just looked miserable and bored.

One we saw at the site:


credit to Dave

 

[robint]

According to the AKR website, they have discontinued their dolphin programs. Not sure if that is ALL or just some.

 

[ScubaJill]

According to the AKR website, they have discontinued their dolphin programs. Not sure if that is ALL or just some.

What! Send me the link! I just opened their website, and unless they're blocking people from signing up, the programs still look active:

Dolphin Programs | Anthony's Key Resort | Roatan | Honduras

Dolphin Dive | Anthony's Key Resort | Roatan | Honduras

 

[Colo Hippie]

Don't do the dive, do the encounter, you will get a lot more interaction with the dolphins. On the dive the dolphins are focused on the trainer not the other divers so you get to observe the dolphins interacting with the trainers, on the encounter you actually get to interact with them. And it is less expensive

 

[parrotman]

I did the dive and thought it was great. We were on the bottom and one of the Dolphins found an eel to play with and he was tossing it around like a cat with a toy. After that he came down to where I was on the sand and swam right up to my mask and tapped my mask with his nose. Stayed there for a few minutes and swam off. They came back to the resort a couple of hours after the dive. It was cool that they went off on their own for a while and came back.

 

[robint]

What! Send me the link! I just opened their website, and unless they're blocking people from signing up, the programs still look active:

Dolphin Programs | Anthony's Key Resort | Roatan | Honduras

Dolphin Dive | Anthony's Key Resort | Roatan | Honduras

Must have been temporary....it was on the Main page a week ago.

 

[Colo Hippie]

The dolphin dive is cool but the encounter gets you alot more "face time" with the dolphins at a better price. It is cool to dive with them though. I personally don't think you can go wrong with any of the dolphin packages.