I did a three day "weekend warrior"cruise with Royal Caribbean's Majesty of the Seas. I booked a dive for the day we'd be spending in Nassau. I've done this cruise before and had a stellar dive experience. This time was OK but not as good as the first time. I booked the dive directly with RCCL (cost $75) with the reason being if the trip runs late, the ship will wait for you. On the prior trip, RCCL ran the trip with Nassau Scuba Centre and
they are still the contracted operator.
I met the NSC van @ 815am (right on time) and we were at the shop/boats before 900am along with eight other passengers (a few were from Navigator of the Seas).
I had a slight "panic attack" on the way there when I remembered I didn't bring my DIN to yoke tank valve converter. Luckily, NSC has two DIN tanks because they don't have DIN to yoke converters at all. Luckily for me, those two tanks had 32% nitrox (oxygen enriched air) in them :-)
I paid my $1 chamber donation and bought a few NSC stickers and proceeded to bring my gear to the boat where the crew loaded it on the boat.
I paired up with an Indianapolis Police Search and Rescue diver. More on that in a moment.... On the way out, the DM explained we'd be diving the
Bahama Momma, a freighter with a max depth oF 60' that is adjacent to the wall which drops to 6500'.
He stated that if we had a buddy, we could dive our own profile but to please limit the total time to 40 minutes and stay above 130'. At the last minute, a diver from Puerto Rico w/ some very new looking MARES gear asked if he could dive with us. As we started to make our way to the back, he stopped us to state his mask strap broke. The DM produces a mask and we resume trying to go diving. As he's putting on his fins, he snaps a buckle. The DM produces a set of fins for him to use. Finally, we're in the water. The Indy Police S&R guy doesn't have enough weight (16 lbs. not enough????) Finally, we're descending, certainly no longer the first divers to get down. We regrouped at the wreck and proceeded over to the wall since that would be the deeper part of the dive. Just as we're going
over the edge to drop down, I hear one of those sub-duck signaling devices. It's the DM trying to herd everyone together for the dive. He must have used the sub-duck for 50% of the remainder of the
dive. We paused at 70' while everyone merged into a group. Once we were grouped, my buddies and I start down the wall. At 100', the DM starts honking his friggin' horn, pointing at his gauges & waving for us to join him at 80'. At this point, the Indy S&R guy takes off for the surface (and fairly fast), while the DM just watched..... Alrighty then.....
Meanwhile, we're at least seeing some decent coral and about a dozen 5' to 7' reef sharks "mingling" with the group. Everyone seemed to be enjoying the dive when the DM starts honking that friggin horn again and motioning everyone up to the top of the wall where we are greeted by a second, smaller wreck. We spend the rest of this dive between the two wrecks and watching the sharkys. Not the worst dive I ever did but it could have been a lot better without the sound effects.... Max depth 103' with
30 minutes of BT and a 6 minute ascent. Temp was 77 and the viz a stellar 100'+.
The briefing for the second stated 40 minutes BT... After a 50 minute SI and watching about half the other divers feed the fish, we dove a reef called Pumpkin Patch. The Indy S&R guy was skipping this one so it was the PR diver, the second DM, and myself. The second DM was not sporting the quacker horn...
Once we hit the water, the DM didn't stop once to look at anything. The PR guy was taking pics on this dive so I pointed out a spotted eel, a rock
fish, a turtle, and a big lobster so he'd go home with some pics. At 43 minutes into the dive, the DM comes over to see how much gas we have left.
I'm at 1600, the guy from PR is at 1300 and the DM is at 900. I can barely contain my amusement...
He seems to realize we're past the 40 minute mark and at this point and heads to the surface to find the boat. I mean he HEADS to the surface
at breakneck speed... He takes a bearing and descends back to us to give us the bearing 0-2-0. So we start heading back, making a slow ascent as we swim along. About this time, the DM with the quacker appears in the distance, doing what he does best: quacking..... He seemed rather perturbed at us being a few minutes late but there wasn't much he could say since we spent the entire dive w/ DM #2... Max depth 44' - Dive time 44 minutes with a four minute ascent - Viz was 100'+ (again).
Observations: S&R divers are completely out of their element on an ocean boat with 100' viz :-) Gear that looks new doesn't mean it's not going
break when you least expect it. Young, fit DM's don't necessarily have better air consumption than I do. Sub-duck quackers aren't a substitute
for good dive planning. You can communicate much more with a flashlight
Awesome report, Brian. I really enjoyed it!! Obviously you are a superb diver, and write with a sense of humor as well!! Any others you want to share, would be greatly appeciated by those of us that don't dive and live precariously though your words!!
Thanks for the kind words.
I have the "original" Nassau report (before this one) and reports from Cozumel, Aruba, Cayman, and Panama. I'll try to put one up every week.
I'd like to learn to dive. I love snorkeling and next thing is snuba.........then if that works well and the things I see down deeper don't totally freak me out, I'll take up diving. Brian, that is a great story. Come back and write more, I felt like I was down there with you!
Thanks for the kind words.
I have the "original" Nassau report (before this one) and reports from Cozumel, Aruba, Cayman, and Panama. I'll try to put one up every week.
I, for one, think it's time for another one of those great dive reports from deepstops!
Anyone with me here?
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A dive report from Nassau from April 2004
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I really enjoyed it!! Obviously you are a superb diver, and write with a sense of humor as well!! Any others you want to share, would be greatly appeciated by those of us that don't dive and live precariously though your words!!
We Want More! 
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