Short LOB in Komodo between 2/24 and 3/3/19

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I’ve just got back from a trip with Davy Jones from 31 Dec to 4 Jan. It doesn’t quite “get on land a few times”, but a point I appreciated was that the dive sites chosen were ones where we were the only divers there.
Let me know if you may have any questions
 
I liked it, but I also prioritise the quality of the diving a lot more over stuff like meals/service (may be important to some).
Davy Jones felt like a locally-run op to me, i.e. the crew/guides were locals, which may be different from other ops in Komodo, not too sure. No issues with that though, they were rather competent in identifying and pointing out stuff. Safety standards were observed as well. Diving is done out of a dinghy.
Rooms were as per the photos they have on their website/booking sites - stay was comfortable and nothing much to point out. I was travelling solo with a group of divers from Japan. Hence, we were served Asian-style meals once it was established by the chef that we preferred rice/noodles over the typical western breakfast. For lunch, we got fried rice/nasi goreng. For dinner, it was typically rice, 1 protein and 1 vegetable/soup. Again, it might be because we were all Asian guests.

Some of my photos from the trip:
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What's that thing in the second photo?
 
Don't know for sure, but looks to be some type of crab perhaps.
 
Hey, just a heads up, I dove with DJL recently and found the management (westerners who do everything via email) to be incredibly unsafe and unprofessional. The local crew was nice, but the operation was really rough. Here'y my review:

Subject: Unsafe and unprofessional

TL;DR: The Davy Jones Liveaboard dive operator was unprepared, understaffed, and unsafe: the boat was missing a full set of equipment for 4 of the 7 guests, they only had 1 dive guide for 7 of us in difficult conditions, and the crew was inexperienced with divers. After waiting 5+ hours for them to find missing fear for us, 4 of us left the boat because we did not feel safe diving with DJL. After providing photographic evidence, DJL refuses to acknowledge that they messed up and refuses to provide us with a refund.
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My partner and I booked a trip with Davy Jones Liveaboard, part of the Davy Jones Locker Franchise, for a holiday trip to dive Komodo around Christmas this past year. We found the DJL online and reached out to book directly. We put a deposit (50%) down a few months before the trip via PayPal and were all set to go.

The operator had no storefront, so we were told that we’d be picked up from our accommodations the morning of.

Things started off a little rocky - a taxi showed up more than an hour early to take us to the harbor for our departure. Upon arrival, it wasn’t clear who we were supposed to meet. A man eventually came up and asked us if we were there for a specific boat (we were never told the boat name) so we said we weren’t sure and were waiting on Davy Jones. It didn’t seem like he was our guys so we parted ways. My partner and I decided to go grab cash for the national park fees instead of waiting around. 5-10 minutes later the man we had met earlier found us walking from one atm to the next and this time knew our names and that we were supposed to go with him. We finished getting cash and then went back to the harbor where we waited for the other guests to arrive.

While we waited, our divemaster mentioned that he was the only dive guide for the 7 guests. We asked if he’d ever taken so many to which he responded “no”, and seemed a little uncomfortable with his task.

We were a little concerned at this point by the disorganization of the trip.

Once all 7 guests were accounted, our divemaster called the liveaboard crew for them to come get us. One of the crew eventually arrived in a small inflatable raft. It was pretty small, couldn’t have been more than 12 feet. We were all packed in pretty tightly with our luggage in the center - there were 9 of us in the raft in total.

After getting on the boat we were given a quick tour of the boat and dropped our bags in our rooms and went off to get our gear setup.

This is where things started to really get concerning.

The crew seemed to be pretty in-experienced with the dive equipment. The weight belts they were handing us were mostly too small to be worn (3 feet long tops on most of them). Some of them also seemed to have issues getting the octopus all hooked up which wasn’t comforting - they clearly didn’t have much experience with it. When I went to test my air, I found my rig had a bad o-ring. When I alerted the staff, they noted that they’d need to get another one from shore. They didn’t have any extras on board! What if something had gone wrong while we were out? Not a good sign.

After trying out the tanks, we were to see about fins, wetsuits, and BCDs. After pulling out everything they had, 4 of us were left without a full set of gear. Two people were missing fins, I was without a BCD, my partner without a wetsuit, and not one of us were given a computer. They also didn’t have any torches for us even though there was a night dive scheduled each night.

The local liveaboard manager (Riana) took out a piece of paper and took note of what was missing and told us they’d go get the missing gear from shore and then we’d be off.

Over the next 4+ hours we waited as the crew came back with a few pieces including two torches and a dive computer, but 4 of us were still without a full set of gear. We asked to speak with management. Riana refused to pick up the phone, after which were given an inactive number for the boat manager.

After exhausting all avenues to contact someone from the operator and waiting for them to find gear, 4 of the 7 of us guests decided that we were no longer comfortable diving with this operator. Having 1 dive guide for 7 guests in difficult conditions, missing equipment, and an inexperienced crew, we did not feel safe and asked to be taken back to land. It had been 5+ hours by this point.

Before leaving, we asked the dive guide to sign a statement that said the gear that they were missing at the time of departure. We took a photo of him holding the signed statement paper as proof that it was indeed his statement.

It has since been an absolute nightmare trying to communicate with the Davy Jones Liveaboard team (Ollie, Leon, and Tom). I believe we are entitled to a full refund as they did not provide us a safe environment to dive in. They have been insisting that we were impatient and that everything was in order with gear on hand and sometimes getting gear, especially around the holidays, can take time. Not only was this was a poor excuse given they knew months in advance we were going to be there and did not plan accordingly, but also they completely ignored the photographic evidence and written testimony saying they didn’t have the full gear when we left. After trying to work with them via email, I submitted a claim with PayPal including the photographic evidence and they immediately refunded us completely. The Davy Jones Liveaboard team, however, has stopped responding to us.

We have since spoken with the three guests that remained and are very glad we decided to leave. After the first dive, they three remaining guests and the divemaster were waiting on the surface for 45 minutes before they swam around the island to find the pickup just sitting around waiting. Furthermore, when one of them got a cut during one of the dives, he went back to the boat to find they had no antiseptic - their first aid kit was basically empty. We were also told that the below-deck cabins leaked when it rained, leaving two of the three beds soaking wet, and that if we had stayed there might not have been enough food for everyone.

Long story short, Davy Jones Liveaboard, part of the Davy Jones Locker dive centre brand, is a shoddy operation. They are cutting corners wherever they can and charging hefty fees (we found another trip that had space when we left the DJL boat and they were surprised at how expensive DJL was per person).

I would strongly recommend going with a different operator as Davy Jones Liveaboard has shown to be unsafe and incredibly unprofessional.
 
Hi,

We're going to be in Komodo from 2/24 - 3/3. We'd like to spend some time on land and some time on the water on a live aboard that's anywhere from 1-3 nights. I've been searching all of the sites I can find (PADI, divebooker, liveaboard.com, innfinns etc) but not much matches up with our dates. Davy Jones seems to be the only one. The Wunderpuss seems great, but their final day of diving is when we'd need to be flying. Other than that, it seems to mostly converted day boats. Would love something that has a private room/bathroom and ideally that gets on land a few times.

Alternatively, am I wasting my time and we may as well just take the speedboats out to the same north/central sites from Labuan Bajo?

Thank you!

Unfortunately, late February to early March is not he best time of the year to dive northern Komodo. Just about all of the decent LoB’s are in Raja Ampat or just returning to the region.Day boats can only go to a few sites in central Komodo. In my limited experience, many of the day boats and even the new LoB’s do not have experienced guides and may not know the sites in all conditions (lunar cycles, currents, tides). Perhaps contact @Mike Veitch. In the past five year, at least in high season, there will be over 20 boats at the popular sites. Is is possible to postpone your trip until latest March. Or just dive in Bali. Best of luck.
 

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