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St. Maaten, Saba, and St. Kitts

February 2016

Larry, Bruce B, and Eric spent a week (February 21-26) on the Caribbean Explorer II as it went from St. Maarten to Saba to St. Kitts. They flew down to St. Maarten on Saturday, February 20 to explore St. Marten before boarding the CEII the next afternoon.

There was no diving at St. Kitts. The CEII motored to Saba after a briefing and Sunday dinner. Diving at Saba is supposed to have 100 foot plus visibility, but that week it was less than 50 feet. At the end of one dive a white cloud of sediment that had been stirred up by swells from the north “chased” them out of the water and back on the boat. The visibility off St. Kitts was much better. Usually Saba has the better diving.

Generally there were two morning, two afternoon dives, plus a night dive. Hot chocolate, Kahlua and Bailey’s greeted divers (and those not diving) after the night dive.

I got in 24 dives, including two night dives.

On one dive we saw two scorpion fish fighting. They tried to bite off each others head. It took about 10 minutes before the winner was able to convince the loser to leave the reef. Well, the loser moved five feet.

We took land tours of Saba and St. Kitts. We improvised a land tour of St. Maarten on Saturday after we settled into our hotel.

Pluses:

The boat crew were great.

The price was reasonable for a live aboard.

The boat had an open bar with beer, wine, and liquor with the usual no diving after drinking rule.

The food was excellent.

Tanks were refilled with your choice of air or nitrox (extra charge) while strapped in with your BC.

Larry booked the flights first so Bruce and I followed his lead. Going down on Saturday was a good idea. If something had gone wrong, we could have gone directly from the airport to the boat on Sunday.

Minuses:

Cabins were small.

The cabins did not have individual temperature control.

The hung a floating granny line from the stern to the bow to use to get to the mooring line, which we used to descend. I had a medium size camera with dual strobes. This made it difficult for me to use the line. It would have been better if they had used chains that would sink or dropped a down line off the stern.

Our return flight was delayed because the airplane arrived late from Miami and there were rain storms. We connected through Miami on our way home. I have TSA GlobalEntry and with some help from an American Airlines employee made my connecting flight to Washington. Bruce and Larry spent the night in Miami, and returned home via LaGuardia.

Bottom line: I would do it again, but I would do some research about the best time of the year to go diving around Saba. I would try to avoid Miami.

patowmack divers

St. Maaten, Saba, and St. Kitts

February 2016