By Pete "NetDoc" Murray
ScubaBoardThere are many reasons to do a live aboard. Constant diving, not having to deal with hotels and local operators as well as the convenience of having every thing in one spot are all great reasons to do a live aboard. I like them because I just love being on the ocean. I love the feel of her waves, her smell and even her temperament. She is wild and fascinating and the best thing a live aboard can do is to give you a connection to her. So hey, I have to admit, that I loved being invited to go on this one, courtesy of Greg Holt, the man behind Scuba Radio and of course our host, Clay McCardell.
Saturday, Cinco de Mayo: The trip to St Kitts was incredibly uneventful. There was a hop to Miami with a four hour layover and then the 2.5 hour flight in. The airport was typical of most Caribbean islands: small with antiquated fire equipment. Immigration and customs on the island was efficient once they got started and they were more than friendly enough. When I met Percy just outside of the airport my worries were over. The ride to the boat was short, enjoyable and Percy gave us quite the insight about life on St. Kitts. On the CEXII, the crew introduced themselves and promised me a wonderful vacation replete with astounding dives. The boat appeared to be a bit Spartan, but as I was to find out: looks can be quite deceiving. Greg the Dive Master arrived a bit later missing his camera equipment, and we went off on our obligatory search for Cuban Rum (his favorite). The prices were cheap enough, but we found no rum worthy of carrying aboard.
You should know from the start that the Island of St Kitts is stunning and deplorable at the same time. The volcanic mountains soaring up to 4,000 feet in the air give the island a sense of mystery and excitement: but the trash every where we turned was a major turn off. I got the feeling that the average citizen had no idea that they lived in paradise. But that can't be said for Percy. It's so obvious that this man loves his island home and was just as concerned about his messy compatriots as we were. He also turned out to be one of the best connected people I have ever met. If you need ANYTHING, just ask Percy: even if it's a meeting with their minister of tourism.
Sunday, St Kitts: Monkey Shoals (X2). This was a wonderful dive to check out all of your gear and to be sure that it's working properly and that your weighting is spot on. 10 pounds was perfect! Among the many treats here was finding a small black sea horse. Spanish Hogs, Creole Wrasse, banded coral shrimp, arrow crabs and a litany of jacks, parrot fish, snapper, goat fish and the like made this a great place to find the bold and the sublime.
Our second dive here was just as fun, until the end. My buddy and I seemed to find the only current in the area and were able to see a ton of barrel sponges. We surfaced a good bit from the boat, inflated our sausages and started a 300 yard surface swim. You know, most people make fun of my old Jet fins… at least until they see me do a long surface swim with relative ease. They may be old school, but I made the boat easily. They sent the skiff for my buddy.
We blew off the afternoon dives for a meeting with the Minster of Tourism for St Kitts, Ricky Skerritt. Remember Percy? Well after our contact fell through getting us a meeting with Ricky, Percy was asked. No problem! When we me the minister, we thanked him for meeting us on such short notice (it was his wife's birthday). He told us that Percy said he SHOULD meet with us and that was good enough for him! I was quite surprised to see that there is no coherent Marine Protection policy for this island. According to Ricky, there have been studies done and largely ignored as the politicos don't want to upset the fishermen. The five of us agreed that there is a LOT to preserved here, and Ricky seemed to think that their Marine Park would come to fruition in the not too distant future. I sure hope so. Apparently, this area is one of the biggest secrets in the Caribbean. There is only one dive shop on the island and the tourism is geared more towards sunners and gamblers. The islanders should wake up, smell the sun tan lotion and work to provide a lot more eco tourism.
After our meeting, our gracious host and owner of the CEXII, Clay McCardell suggested that we have Pina Coladas at Turtle Bay. While this effectively stopped diving for the night, it seemed to be the appropriate thing to do. We passed Sugar Cane ruins, saw some breath taking views, and a ton of goats as Percy drove us to our destination My Turtle Colada was coconutty and wonderful! I also got to try Ting, a grapefruit based carbonated beverage that makes Mountain Dew seem tame! On the way back we saw spider monkeys and a couple of mongooses in addition to the incredible number of cows and goats on the island.
One of the dives I missed and the night dive was on the only wreck we would do this trip. Maybe the Turtle Colada wasn't such a good idea!
Monday, St Kitts: Paradise Reef (2X). The diving off of Paradise Reef was truly beautiful. Lot’s of the usual Caribbean reef residents were there, and I saw a shoal of ‘cuda shadowing the dive party. On my second dive I was approached by one of the Dive Masters (an instructor), Beth. She asked me politely if I had forgotten to measure my NitrOx. Nope. Did that. Then she asked if possibly I had forgotten to record the info. No, Beth. I wrote it down on the sheet. Again she asked, with no hint of judgment, harassment malice or (insert any negative attitude here) if possibly, quite possibly could I have put it under the wrong day. Whooooooooops! I had just put it under my first two dives, which were under Sunday. My bad! The reason I recount this incident, is that it clued me into an awesome observation. These people paid more than lip service to safety. Beth was checking to see that we were taking the time to be safe. I like that! Also, when you get out of the soup at the end of the dive, someone is asking you for your max depth and ending pressure. I don't think they do this for liability as much as they want to impress upon you the NEED to honor your limits. I have been on many a boat that were too cavalier about this. Kudos to Captain Fergie and the entire crew of the CEXII for their dedication to keeping this sport fun and safe!
Anchors Aweigh (2X) What a cool dive! Anchor, anchor, have you seen the anchor? There are a number of reef encrusted anchors here and some seem to be from the 17th century. There are even a number of ballast piles where ships had gone down. No one seems to know their names, only that they were caught in a hurricane long, long ago.
Night Dive- Paradise Reef . The most notable part of this dive was the descent and ascent through the large school of Horse Eye Jacks. We saw a lone lobster, but the number of sting rays on the bottom as well as the number and variety of shrimp were impressive. Candy Cane, Peppermint, dwarf, Pederson, and a number I could not ID were all over the place. My 10 watt Dive Rite Can Light was perfect for spotting and getting close to all of these critters. We saw one small turtle asleep and were careful to not disturb him and right after that we saw a nurse shark looking for her evening meal. Glad I made this one!
Tuesday, St Eustatius: Barracuda Reef. This was our first stunning reef. We dropped down to about 30 fsw, and passed over a wall. We were being guided (park rangers in tow) and I watched Lobzilla come out from under his ledge and defiantly wave his feelers at us. We hit the turn point and I noticed that some of our group were having issues with air, trim and keeping up. We zoooooooooomed past a large spotted eel, 20 or thirty lobsters and made a dog leg for the boat. My official buddy on this trip gave me the "Low air" sign, and I flipped her my long hose. She grabbed on to my arm and we leveled at our safety stop. We had more than finished our stop by the time we got to the boat and I got out of the water with just over 700 psi.
Ledges. This too was a striking reef, though I was feeling a tad weird through the whole dive. There were a number of large lobster as well as many juvenile fish. It occurred to me that the health of these reefs were far better than St Kitts.
Double Wreck. I didn't get to dive these wrecks, which are piles of ballast stones and two anchors. The divers were effusive about the life.
Very few things will ever prepare you for a tour of Statia with Josser Daniels. We think he is 86 and he is not large in stature or in manner. To be sure, I was not impressed with the beginning of the tour. Now, mind you, I love history. I love to see it and I love cemeteries and the history you can glean from them. As we approached the first stop of this trip, I noticed at least two cemeteries. Wanting to stick with the group, we went to the Governor's house. Wow! The archeology of the entire island was laid before us. The ancient Indians, the first Dutch settlers and a small hint of what was to come was brought to life in the array of displays that covered this house from the basement to the second floor.. Then Mr. Daniels came alive! He walked us over to the archeological dig by the old synagogue. He described in detail how and why it was built and some of the odd customs associated with it. The stone work was simply amazing, and to think this was largely done by hand! Wow! Then he brought us to the fort. We looked around the fort a bit and then he collected us together and had us sit on the wall. "I am going to give you a history lesson" he informed us in his island accent. What transpired next was magical. He explained how this little country island helped the US in our struggle for independence, by selling us powder and other items. Near the end of his history lesson, he pulled out a document which he claimed to be one of the original copies of the Declaration of Independence. The Andrew Doria (not the Andrea), brought this document in the fall of 1776 and Statia claims to be the first country to acknowledge us as a country. Now, this document was almost black, and the ink was just a tad blacker. It was tattered and torn and DUCT TAPED to the framed. He had a photo copy of the document on the reverse side that was readable. Somehow he thought it wise to put that under glass but not the actual copy of the Declaration of Independence. Some have asked if I know for certain that this was an original copy and really I have idea. Maybe one day I will find out if it was. This was not the end of our tour though: we cruised over the island even to the far end at "Lookout Point" where they had cannon pointed to see waiting for the invading armada of yesteryear. What a view! There was a volcano to our left and a sheer cliff just in front of us descending quite a distant to the rocky shore line. Here you could see potsherds lying about along with the more modern island trash. I guess the litter has been one of the few constants here since man arrived! As we left, I saw a pile of cannons by the side of the road. So I asked Mt Daniels about what they were going to do with them. "We have too many cannon! We probably just roll them down the mountain. They make a loud noise when they hit, you know!" I was stunned and contemplating if I could manage one as a carryon. That TSA can be SOOOOO picky, you know!
Wednesday's dawn came with both excitement and anticipation.: We were in Saba and our first dive was the Eye of the Needle, part of the pinnacle dive site called "The Third Encounter." Breakfast flew by and soon we were listening to our dive briefing. Now one of the best things about the dive briefing is that they are conducted by different members of the crew. Beth did this one and she was incredibly animated. She cautioned us about the extreme depth and that it was possible to miss the needle entirely. You know, Beth did a wonderful job. It's great to have a Dive Master who is so at ease under water and whose air consumption is excellent. But even more impressive was the pinnacle appearing out of nowhere in front of us. I was amazed at the straightness and thinness of this pinnacle. How does it withstand the forces of the current? The life around was as varied as it was awesome. On the way back, Beth got the Reef shark she was hoping for. I wasn't sure who was more at home on the reef. Below the boat was a different kind of reef than we had seen before. Lots of plate corals and plenty of fish made the second half of the dive truly wonderful.
Our Second dive was Diamond Rock. Ok, it was SUPPOSED to be diamond rock. I made a classic navigational error. I knew if I went on a tangent off the stern line I would hit the pinnacle easily. It is way wide and not that far from the boat. However, if you make that same tangent off of the bow line, it makes for a far more interesting dive! I could tell that we had been swimming too long, so I decided to head a bit to my right. You know, that sixth sense and all. You see, I had neglected to pack a compass which would have been perfect for this. Well in less than a minute we were cruising a pinnacle. As we cruised it, I realized that it did not break the surface like the pinnacle I had seen from the deck. My buddy and I conferred and she had a compass. COOL! So we went around the rock to the place where we hit. I took a reciprocal of the original heading and somehow it was pointing us BACK into the pinnacle. Now that was peculiar. Not wishing to waste a lot of air or time, I signaled for a safety stop and then I continued to the surface for a quick look see. Oops! Somehow Diamond Rock was on the OTHER side of the boat. We are close to shore! I drop down to my buddy and we made the swim during our safety stop. On the boat I find that we did "Man of War Shoals."
Our next dive was going to be the Man of War Shoals, so we opted to skip this one.
The first dive after lunch was the Ladder Labyrinth. What a cool dive! We were under a pretty sheer cliff and the water was incredibly inviting. The name comes from the way coral resembled a broken ladder or a labyrinth. This was shrimp heaven as I saw all kinds and quite a few crabs as well. Lynne found a cool rock crab somewhat into shore and there were all sorts of the usual suspects as we cruised the reef. Mutton snapper, hog fish, Sailor's Choice, and a lot more. If you cruised off of the reef a bit, you encountered a grove of eels sticking their heads out of the sound. Shy and thin, these guys would disappear as you approached.
Our Night Dive was also on the Ladder Labyrinth. What a cool night dive! Linda has scored an underwater UV light that she just wanted me to try. We dubbed it the "Velvet Elvis Light" and it was way cool. The coral shown in a way I had never thought possible. Bright yellows, electric blues and greens just made the scene look like a Peter Max Poster. I also tried some "Hand Free Lights" which are 6 LEDs in on a glove. They would be useful as a back up light, but I am glad I have an ultra bright primary. I have to admit that it had given me issues all week. It appears that the cord has an open in it and if you stretch the cord just so, the light goes out. I was happy to have the back up, "just in case." However, the bright light attracted a couple of small nurse sharks and one big and beefy Spanish Hogfish. The highlight was in watching one of the Nurses get sharky on us and snag some dinner. I have often described these mostly gentle denizens as big ugly catfish. I will do that no more as they have earned my respect. All in all, I would have to rank this as my second most memorable night dive and definitely in the top ten of all of my dives. That evening we watched the sun set and spotted goats up on the sheer rock face. The beautiful Tropic Birds added a kind of wistfulness to the entire scene. Later that night we listened to Linda Chorney's wonderful lyrics as we did most nights. She really added a special touch to our trip and I highly encourage you to pick up some of her music.
We stayed the night in Saba and our first Thursday morning dive was on Tent Wall. This is a stunning wall system and you could really pick just about any depth to cruise on and see a large variety of life. Turtles and morays and if you went up on the deck, you got to see more groves of eels. While you are doing this dive, and you should make the effort, be sure to explore the nooks and crannies. Just be prepared to be surprised.
My second and last dive of the day was at Customs House. This was littered with ballast stone and anchors and had some pretty cool reef structure. For a long, long time this had been the only real port on the Island. EVERYTHING that came onto the island was unloaded here and then carried by hand up a 1000 steps to the houses on the top of the hill. And no, I didn't count them! But the dive was wonderful. We were working on navigation so I had Lynne go due north. After ten minutes of swimming we headed west and then back south right into this HUGE anchor. I also saw the largest pair of Mutton Snapper I had ever seen. Way cool. Yet another turtle and we were back at the boat. Lynn's skills with a compass were getting better. Most of the tours replace only the fourth dive of the day. I had determined that my Magical Island Tour needed the entire afternoon. So Greg, Linda, her SO and I got put ashore a bit early. Greg and I met with the Manager of the Marine Park, Jan den Dulk. He showed us their hyperbaric chamber and we discussed the care and future of the Park as well as the types of research going on there. While we talked, I picked up an unsecured wireless internet connection and had my first communication with the outside world. ScubaBoard seemed to be doing just fine without me. So I made some notes for the journey so far and asked a lot of questions.
Hans was our tour guide after we finished with and he was awesome. Now the thing that strikes you first about the architecture on Saba is the diversity that can happen in the midst of uniformity. By tradition, and it's a closely followed tradition, all the buildings are white with red roofs and green trim. Big, small, intricate or plain the houses and the shops on Saba look completely different while having the identical color scheme. It gave the entire Island a kind of Christmassy feel. A second thing struck us as we drove along. The steep road we were on was called the "Road that Couldn't be Built" as that was the premonition when they started building it by hand. What a modern engineering marvel! We also got to see the world's shortest commercial runway. Somehow, I think I will continue to visit by ship. Linda and Kevin's plans for a quick hike up the volcano ended with the rain. So they joined Greg and I as we went on a tour of one of the towns of Saba. The bar known as Tropic was Han's recommendation and he did not steer us wrong. That was a good thing as one misstep or turn on this mountainous roads would put us into a virtual freefall. I am certain people only drive drunk ONCE on the island. It didn't take much at Tropic to get me feeling a bit tipsy either. Greg interviewed a couple of girls at the bar. One was from France and the other one from Gainesville. Both of them were touristas and were insta-buddies on their dive that morning. Diving helps to make trans- continental friendships.
Friday morning saw our last two dives on Saba. We did a dawn dive on the Ladder Labyrinth, which has fast become one of my favorite all time dive spots. Then Lynn and I redeemed ourselves by having her successfully navigate us to Diamond Rock and back. It was a great last dive for the week. As we sailed away back to civilization, I tipped my hat to the beauty of the island and her reefs. I then sacrificed my body to the sun god in my eternal search for the perfect melanoma.
That night found us on the charming island of Sint Maarten. They had my favorite beer there, Amstel Bright and we had a good time partying with the crew and then heading out for a meal on shore. The Green room was fun, not too hurtful on the wallet and the crab races were AWESOME. I was told to pick the smallest crab possible and I think I must have picked the equivalent of Beatle Bomb! Actually, it came in fourth out of about fifty, so I didn't do too badly. The next morning we did a trip down the main street and picked up some Guava Berry Rum. My friends had only one comment about the rum: BUY MORE NEXT TIME! And yes, I think that there will be a next time for both Sint Maarten as well as the Caribbean Explorer II.
By Lynn Rodell
Explorer Ventures
A few weeks ago the Caribbean Explorer II's guest list included several guests of ScubaRadio, a couple of people from the operation office of Explorer Ventures, along with nine great guests.
This was my first time aboard an Explorer Ventures' vessel. During the past year I have been working for Explorer Ventures, my time has been spent trying to understand the business from a new perspective, learning about our vessels, and hearing what our guests have to say. I can honestly tell you from a personal perspective, I was not disappointed in my experience. The diving was wonderful; personally I found St. Kitts & Saba amazing. The vessel was comfortable, food very good, the dive deck was great to dive from and the crew went beyond accommodating each of us in every way.
One of the things our guests often say about a liveaboard, is how great it is to have a built-in group of people you can easily become friends with. The group we had aboard Caribbean Explorer II this week was no exception. What a wonderful group of people! I am not sure you could have hand picked a group who ended up having more fun together. A testament to our new found friendships was our last night together; we all chose to have dinner as a group on St. Maarten. In addition, Greg Holt of ScubaRadio taped a broadcast from the boat, as well as, a land tour and an interview with Minister Skerritt of St. Kitts. One of his listeners said "Thanks for the info on Sirius and loved the show from the Caribbean Explorer II in SABA…Your show made me feel like I was on the boat and I think I'll have to give it a go…" If you would like to experience the broadcasts, it is available online at http://www.scubaradio.com/index.cfm?sector=archives&page=archives.
One of the ScubaRadio guests was Linda Chorney. Linda is a singer/songwriter who is also an avid diver. What a wonderful experience it was, after a great day of diving, to be entertained by a talented and delightful individual such as Linda. Another terrific ScubaRadio guest was "Netdoc" of ScubaBoard. Netdoc, (I know him as Pete) by default on his part, ended up being my dive buddy. I must say I have become very comfortable diving with my steady dive buddy, but "netdoc" filled the description of the best dive buddy anyone could have found. "Netdoc, thank you!" These are only a few of the great people we had aboard. I have already received trip photos, recipes, emails and more from my new found friends.
The Caribbean Explorer II offers a unique liveaboard experience. Not only is the diving exceptional but guests can also partake in three land tours on St. Kitts, Statia and Saba. These land tours include some amazing historical sites, all hosted by amazing individuals who know all about their island, and a look at life on these volcanic islands. You can not beat the underwater geography, the reef and marine life of Saba and St. Kitts has some beautiful reefs and some special marine sightings. Resting up for the next dive, relaxing on board and socializing with the other guests is a big part of the comfort factor on a liveaboard dive trip - after all, the hours spent underwater are limited, and most of the rest of the time is spent on board. While the rooms are comfortable, the common areas of the boat offer comfortable areas to take in the sights, photograph the serene beautiful scenery, or find some seclusion.
A week aboard the Caribbean Explorer II passed far too quickly for me. After 7 days of terrific diving, wonderful historic land tours and finding new friends, it was the end of our week together. It was a trip I will soon not forget, and some aboard the week are talking about another trip with the same group - I hope I can be a part of that trip also.
ScubaRadio - http://www.scubaradio.com/
ScubaBoard - http://scubaboard.com/
Linda Chorney - http://www.lindachorney.com/
