Dive Review of Roatan Divers in
Honduras/West End

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Roatan Divers: "West End after Coco View", Aug, 2017, by Douglas , IL, US ( Sr. Contributor 20 reports with 11 Helpful votes). Report 10068.
No photos available at this time
Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Accommodations	N/A	Food	N/A
Service and Attitude		Environmental Sensitivity
Dive Operation		Shore Diving	N/A
Snorkeling	N/A
Overall Rating
Value for $$
Beginners
Advanced
Comments	After diving at Coco View for a week (see separate reader report), we headed to Roatan Divers in the West End to see how the diving would differ. Roatan Divers struck me as a very professional operation. The owner noticed that our pony bottles had not been hydro tested within 5 years and wouldn't fill them, for safety reasons, but also offered to try to get them hydro tested by Mares right nearby. Though it caught me by surprise, I respected his position, and the bottom line is that it was my mistake, and he was right about the safety issue. They proudly display a very current "Clean Air" certification for their compressor operation, which is very reassuring. Dive briefings were extremely thorough, divemasters were attentive, and their boats are modern and in tip top shape. They are also eco-conscious: encouraging Responsible Seafood consumption with a helpful poster clearly displayed, a poster encouraging reusable containers for lunch leftovers, and a poster politely recommending support for their marine park. The West End is about 3-4 blocks worth of touristy shops and a variety of restaurants, many quite nice. We enjoyed walking around. We also enjoyed a very romantic upscale meal at the posh Ibagari Resort about 15 minutes inland by taxi. We only had time to do 8 dives and for our 1st day of 3 dives were unimpressed with the dive site choices and being cramped on a boat with large groups, especially since their website brags about "boutique small group diving." The chosen sites were super close to the dive shop in their pretty bay, and all 3 had a lot of sandy flat areas interspersed with some coral formations and then the start of a sloping wall; but in our minds, nothing particularly notable. For Day 2 and 3 however, we were divided into much smaller groups per boat, with divers of equal experience, and we traveled farther away; both southwest to the awesome "Point" location, and northeast, where the architecture became very interesting, with lots of cuts and formations, and swim thrus . . very entertaining. One minor aggravation was that they had a young student divemaster trainee with us on every dive, and she was classic "dive police," constantly shooing us around and telling us to stay closer to the lead divemaster, etc. I suspect that had I discussed the issue with the owners, they would have resolved it immediately for us, so I didn't get too worried about it; but I mention it since so many of us can relate to this experience. It's especially humorous since I passed the DM class about 10 years ago, and.. well .. you get the drift. It's unfortunate that some divers think PADI classes provide military rank over others. The diving in the West End struck us as a lot more architecturally entertaining than near Coco View, with tons of coral formations, and cuts and crevices, and a sloping wall. The Coco area felt wilder and more open and natural with less boats, and it had some nice formations as well, but not anywhere near as many as the West End areas we dove. The Coco area has more of a sheer dropoff wall. Some of the nice dive sites we visited from the West End: "Wicked" with great cuts and big formations, "Mickey's" with a nice coral garden with crevices and a wall (we saw a big free swimming moray get stung by a lionfish), and Saaya's Reef with lots of fun crevices. The "Point," as mentioned earlier, was big time, both times we went. One of the boats came back in the afternoon with the divers ecstatic for having seen humpback whales in the northeast central area. We saw much of the same wildlife that we saw at Coco, so I won't repeat the list here (see my other report), and my divelog also noted channel cleaning crab, gaudy clown crab, and scrawled and queen filefish. The West End is fun to visit, it's nice to be able to walk around and try different restaurants and look at the pretty bay, and the diving was entertaining as well. I trusted Roatan Divers to provide a safe, professional, friendly service and they hit those marks very nicely. It'd be nice to see more of the dive areas, but I'd just ask that all the dive sites be away from the sandy bottom areas near their shop in the bay, as well as to be reassured that all of the boat trips (rather than just some of them) will be with small groups only, as advertised.
Websites	Roatan Divers
Reporter and Travel
Dive Experience	501-1000 dives
Where else diving	Solomons, Truk, Yap, Palau, Coral Sea, GBR, PNG, Roatan, Maui, Jamaica, Florida Jupiter and Keys, L'il Cayman and Grand Cayman East, Belize Ambergris and Isla Marisol, Grand Turk, Cabo Pulmo, Cozumel, Dominica, Bonaire, Fiji, Komodo and Lembeh, Bonne Terre mine and Saba
Closest Airport	Roatan	Getting There	Miami to Roatan, super ez
Dive Conditions
Weather	sunny	Seas	calm
Water Temp	80-82°F / 27-28°C	Wetsuit Thickness
Water Visibility	40-80 Ft/ 12-24 M
Dive Policy
Dive own profile	yes
Enforced diving restrictions	Once they realize you are a solid, safe, experienced diver, do your own thing, just please stay in touch with the group.
Liveaboard?	no	Nitrox Available?	yes
What I Saw
Sharks	None	Mantas	None
Dolphins	None	Whale Sharks	None
Turtles	> 2	Whales	None
Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):
Corals		Tropical Fish
Small Critters		Large Fish
Large Pelagics
Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Subject Matter	N/A	Boat Facilities	N/A
Overall rating for UWP's	N/A	Shore Facilities	N/A
UW Photo Comments	[None]

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Dive Review of Roatan Divers in Honduras/West End

Roatan Divers: "West End after Coco View", Aug, 2017,

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

Overall Rating

Reporter and Travel

Dive Conditions

Dive Policy

What I Saw

Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):

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

Dive Review of Roatan Divers in
Honduras/West End