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Dive Review of Mayan Princess Divers/Mayan Princess Resort in
Honduras/Roatan

Mayan Princess Divers/Mayan Princess Resort, Aug, 2012,

by Elaine Matthews, CA, US (Reviewer Reviewer 4 reports). Report 6681.

No photos available at this time

Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Accommodations 1 stars Food 1 stars
Service and Attitude 4 stars Environmental Sensitivity 3 stars
Dive Operation 5 stars Shore Diving N/A
Snorkeling 3 stars
Value for $$ 2 stars
Beginners 5 stars
Advanced 3 stars
Comments I highly recommend the dive facility, even if you stay at another resort. Most of the customers on the boat were from other resorts THAT HAD THEIR OWN DIVE FACILITY. Staff are all highly capable, friendly, very helpful with everything. The dives are pretty shallow and controlled, but they easily made accommodations for me, as I typically go very slow to see everything. They simply slowed down. In most instances, we were welcome to continue diving near the boat, even after other divers were done. Nonetheless, in a week of diving, I never got out of the water with less than 1,000 PSI. The resort, on the other hand, should be avoided. Units were all shabby and not well maintained. Food was horrible. We did all-inclusive, since it was little more than the rest of the package. Our theory was we would get breakfast and lunch at the hotel, then find a restaurant for dinner. However, after the first 2 days, we never ate there, more than to get a bit of fruit or some tomatoes. Additionally, you have a 2-hour window for each meal, which usually starts later than advertised in any event. Food is INORDINATELY sub-par. The beach is lined with restaurants and resorts, any of which did at least an adequate job with food. There is an Argentinian restaurant that we particularly recommend. The resort folks (outside the front desk), were extremely friendly and helpful. Front desk staff behave as if you are a tenant, not a guest. They give you 2 bottles of water at the beginning of your stay, and you are told you may re-fill them at a variety of water stations throughout the resort. Mayan Princess is much more like a summer camp, with rules and regulations and hall monitors, than it is a resort.

This may have been mentioned in other posts, but keep a few things in mind when traveling: YOU WILL pay overweight charges if you are lugging dive gear. Ours was about $13 each. Interestingly, on the trip back from Roatan, airline staff wanted to charge us significantly more. I pulled out the prior receipt, asked to speak to a supervisor, and magically, the overweight fees went back to $13 each. (TACA) Roatan is a cruise ship stop. We were told that a cruise ship stops there 4 days a week. When the ships stop, all of the resorts open to the cruise passengers. So, you will get poor service and fight crowds nearly everywhere on the beach areas. Interestingly, other than trying to get a beer at the bar after diving, the Mayan Princess resort seemed to accommodate the influx rather well (this from someone that hates crowds!).

For this section of the island, all boats are moored off-shore. Which means you are walking through the surf (which is tiny), into the water to get to the boat. There seems to be one operator at the end that ties up to the doc (it's about 1/2 mile away). As the water is warm, this is no big deal, unless you are lugging gear. After a recent Undercurrent report, we called them to ensure they were aware that we were on VACATION and didn't want to lug our gear.

The dive operation is managed by Anya, and we dove with her, Sara, Julie and Henry. All were excellent, calm, interesting and capable. We never toted a single piece of gear! They will seriously do whatever is necessary to ensure you have safe and interesting dives.

The diving itself was generally interesting, if not spectacular. Several dives were wall dives, where we saw large grouper, several huge rays swooping down the walls, a turtle or two on nearly every dive, large eels, small eels, some really large parrot fish, occasional barracuda, usual suspects for reef fish. Also saw large crabs, lobster, an octopus resting in a cave, a couple of scorpion fish. For small stuff, flamingo tongue, fire worms (large and small), tiny fish hiding in soft coral (sorry, don't know what they were), and a couple of fuzzy crabs(??) hiding in soft coral. Since I generally am looking for the macro, most of the larger stuff was pointed out to me by others. For a Lion Fish report, I only saw 5 in 7 days of diving, but they were all pretty large.

The corals are in good shape. It's a marine park, but I can tell you that someone is pulling out any shells that can be found (because you can't find any). Not that I am looking to pull out shells, but their location can often tell you there is something interesting to investigate nearly. Does seem to be locals that pull them out to sell (speculation). I didn't see coral bleaching, nor did I see much trash. I pulled a plastic bag up on one dive, and we found another plastic bag floating on the surface after another dive, but that's it.

I recommend the trip if you want relaxed diving with a good variety, and want a relaxed vacation where most of what else you can do is sit around, read, eat or drink.
Websites Mayan Princess Divers   Mayan Princess Resort

Reporter and Travel

Dive Experience Over 1000 dives
Where else diving Hawaii, Mexico, Puerto Rico, US, Australia, Tahiti, many others
Closest Airport Getting There

Dive Conditions

Weather sunny Seas calm
Water Temp 82-85°F / 28-29°C Wetsuit Thickness 3
Water Visibility 50-70 Ft/ 15-21 M

Dive Policy

Dive own profile no
Enforced diving restrictions Shallow depth limits (60-65'), go as a group, come up as a group. Always had more than 1000 psi left
Liveaboard? no Nitrox Available? N/A

What I Saw

Sharks None Mantas None
Dolphins None Whale Sharks None
Turtles > 2 Whales None
Corals 4 stars Tropical Fish 4 stars
Small Critters 2 stars Large Fish 4 stars
Large Pelagics 3 stars

Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Subject Matter 4 stars Boat Facilities 1 stars
Overall rating for UWP's 3 stars Shore Facilities N/A
UW Photo Comments There is no set up for photographers. no rinse buckets, no place to put the camera to be safe.
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Note: The information here was reported by the author above, but has NOT been reviewed nor edited by Undercurrent prior to posting on our website. Please report any major problems by writing to us and referencing the report number above.

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