Aruba, Bonaire, Dominica and Grenada

[richhagelin]

Will be visiting Aruba, Bonaire, Dominica and Grenada on cruise Feb 10-15. Appreciate recommendations for dive operations that can accommodate cruise ship schedules. I am an experienced diver who dives Cozumel, Grand Cayman and Turks and Caicos twice a year.

Appreciate your recommendations.

Rich Hagelin

 

[Jeff85248]

I recently dove Bonaire and Dominica.

In Bonaire dove with buddy dive. They were great. I would dive with them again. They seemed like a well run operation and could accommodate a cruise ship. You'll have to find out.

I think all the reefs were pretty much the same. The bonus of diving there is free nitrox and all the shore dives you can do.

Dominica. Was there in June 2016. Was a bitch to fly in. Not your problem. We dove with Dive Dominica. They were great and the diving was well above average. I was just in Turks and Caicos in Oct 2016. I think Dominica to be just as fun but I liked Turks and Caicos a little more.

Hope this helps

Jeff

 

[diversteve]

A couple of different Bonare options - I've used neither. Dive Friends gets generally good reviews here.

Bonaire Cruise Diving & Snorkeling - Dive Friends Bonaire
Cruise Dive Bonaire - Package VIP Diving

The Bonaire Marine Park fee for cruise divers is $10 - cash only on arrival - even if you pre-book/charge your dives.

fyi, the cruise dock is in the middle of downtown so any non-divers on your trip can walk to most things in the area. If they want a beach - I believe Coco Beach has a cruise excursion - it's about a 5min. cab ride north.

Although it seems counter-intuitive given how close (walking distance) they are to the cruise dock - the Divi Flamingo is not cruise friendly.

 

[Altamira]

Aruba: Red Sail is very close to cruise dock. Very good op the last time I was there.
Bonaire: Dive Friends Bonaire is very good and they had the cruise ship dive op contract the last time I visited Bonaire. They had an unacceptable age limit for the ship's excursion, so if that is applicable, check with The Habitat or Buddy Dive to schedule shore diving from their docks. Both of them are excellent with very good house reefs, easy in and out, and nice folks. You will have to take a taxi to and from, but not far or expensive.
Grenada: Aquanauts were excellent dive op when I used them. I do not think most cruise lines have a dive op for Grenada.

 

[richhagelin]

Thanks for the info.

Rich Hagelin

 

[tursiops]

They had an unacceptable age limit for the ship's excursion,

Can you elucidate?

 

[helen67]

Will be visiting Aruba, Bonaire, Dominica and Grenada on cruise Feb 10-15. Appreciate recommendations for dive operations that can accommodate cruise ship schedules. I am an experienced diver who dives Cozumel, Grand Cayman and Turks and Caicos twice a year.

Appreciate your recommendations.

Rich Hagelin

We dove in Aruba and Grenada, don't recall the dive operators but I wasn't overly impressed with the diving (bad vis, no life, few corals but it could have just been the site). In Grenada, we dove as an excursion from the cruise ship. Aruba- wasn't impressed with the diving there or the dive operator.

We visited Dominica last November and dove with Buddy Dive Dominica which is located very close to the cruise pier. Just take a right and head to the Fort Young hotel. They are on the lowest level, you'll see the dive dock and they are right there. I HIGHLY recommend them- outstanding staff, service and the DM's love diving so they're open to anything! We dove with them for 10 days and it was wonderful. The corals are lush, very healthy, and just amazingly pristine. Only advice, if the vis is low stay close to the DM since the reef is made up of pinnacles so you're not always going "straight". We arrived after the hurricane so vis wasn't great and not a lot of fish so it should be even better now Lots of puffers, seems like its a huge breeding ground for them! I've dove almost every site in Bonaire and I have to say that I think Dominica beats Bonaire, hands down, for corals. Not many people go to Dominica since its hard to get to so the reefs are as beat up like some of Bonaire's sites.

Bonaire- we dive there every year and love it. I would suggest Dive Friends which is very close to the where the ship docks. Just take a right and its about a 5 minute walk. We dove with them as an excursion in 2005 and they were excellent. You can do a boat dive with them or shore dive the house reef. If you shore dive the house reef, you have to dive south away from the cruise ships. It's a decent dive even though the reef is a bit beat up. You can dive with Divi but the boats can get very crowded, particularly in February. So shore diving there is decent as well, same reef as Dive Friends. Buddy Dive and Captain Don's are also very good but you'd need to take a taxi to get there. I'd call ahead to get their schedule if you're interested in boat diving. Divi's boats leave at 8:00 a.m. and if busy, they have some leaving at 8:30 or 8:45 then the afternoon boats leave at 2:00 p.m.

If you can, try to dive the Salt Pier- spectacular site! If the boat gets in early and leaves late, it may not be a bad idea to rent a truck and do some shore diving if you have a buddy since its so easy. If you do, I think its easier to go South since you could do the Salt Pier and a few other sites (they're pretty close together) then hit Jibe City Klein is also very good too, lots of great sites.

Enjoy your trip!!

 

[chillyinCanada]

Jeff85248, just curious what it was you liked better about Turks and Caicos over Dominica, thanks!

Grenada, I love diving with Aquanauts. There crew is as good or better than the best I've dove with throught the world, especially if you get manager diving with you too. Unfortunately, his name has momentarily escaped my mind. I find the diving at Grenada to be somewhat magical. True viz always all that but even so, it's pretty darn good despite particulates .. get them to take you somewhere other than the statues. Have them show you the surprises of two or three kinds of shrimp in every hole along with arrow crabs and Pedersen cleaning shrimp. I was pleased with the diving there and so went twice and may return yet again.

Have fun

 

[Jeff85248]

Hi. Thanks for asking.

Let's see. My first knee jerk response is: I like Turks and Caicos more.

BUT:

Dominica was nice diving. Close to the shore and short boat rides. Went with Dive Dominica and there was good diversity.

T&C had sharks. Variety. The boat ride to the reef was one hour each way. I now understand why this place is a big liveaboard type destination.

The major problem that I have with Dominica was Seaborne airlines that couldn't get us there. If the weather is good and you can land there then maybe I would have liked Dominica more. T&C is a short flight from Florida. Very simple.

Last note. I want to see other islands before retiring to Dominica. I want to go back to T&C sooner. But on a live aboard.

Hope this helps

Jeff

 

[Streydog]

Feb. 2015 I dove off a cruise ship Aruba, Grenada and Dominica. I had very few dives at the time, low teens.

Aruba I used the ships excursion, Red sales or something like that. Diving and operation was terrible. Low visibility, cattle boat.
Grenada I used the ships excursion as well, don't remember who it was. I remember their dive shop was on a beach south of the cruise ship pier. First dive was pretty OK but the second dive was kind of boring at some kind of sculpture park. I would find an op that doesn't use that as their second dive.
In Dominica I booked the op on my own, Nature Island Divers. It was by far my favorite experience from that cruise. I was picked up right in front of the cruise ship pier by the owner in a pickup truck. Had a very scenic drive to their dive shop about 20 minutes away at the southern end of the island. There were three total divers and the dive master on the boat, me and a couple staying on the Island from Canada. Boat was set up well for diving, short boat ride to the dive sights and I thought the diving was great. Dominica has a touristy kind of second dive site many ops use, so I was told. It is where bubbles are coming up from the cracks on the sea floor. It seems like it would be one of those things that would be neat to see but for about 5 minutes.