Dive Review of MV Maldives Princess in
Maldives

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MV Maldives Princess, Mar, 2014, by Anne Warburton, CA, US ( Sr. Contributor 24 reports with 8 Helpful votes). Report 7585.
No photos available at this time
Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Accommodations		Food
Service and Attitude		Environmental Sensitivity
Dive Operation		Shore Diving	N/A
Snorkeling	N/A
Overall Rating
Value for $$
Beginners
Advanced
Comments	The trip was very long getting there - about 40 hours in total. I arrived two days earlier than my group having done a pre trip to Sri Lanka. I tried for 1 1/2 days to reach the Princess office with no luck and wondered if and when I might be picked up to board the boat. I finally reached them on the day of embarkation. The live-aboard was clean but very strangely laid out - two huge rooms on the upper deck (for 3), our very small room on the main deck (for 2) and a mixture of rooms on the lower deck (for 2). We had very little storage, no hooks in the room or bathroom, no drawers and no room under the beds. We were awakened about 6 every am every day. A very light breakfast was served at 6:30 and a large breakfast after our first dive. Lunch came after the second dive and dinner at 7-7:30pm. Briefings for the first were at 7-7:30am and were generally good. We then boarded the dive boat where equipment was set up with nitrox for everyone (even though several people were not certified). We had 3 DMs for 21 people (one person was sick the entire time). Once in the water and submerging the DM lost track of almost everyone behind him. I surfaced early on one of the dives as I never did locate my group or DM due to 10 feet visibility and he had no idea I was missing. Others, at other times, would surface at the end of the dive never seeing the DM to let him know. There was always some current as most of the diving was on the tops of pinnacles. One night feed dive of nurse sharks we had been told the current would be ripping. Half of the group went down and said there was NO current so we repeated the dive the next night and had very little current. I don't think the DMs wanted to take us at all. Our DM also did not show us one animal until the very last day where he pointed out a flat worm. The DMs did however know where the mantas and whale sharks were. Many people had ear trouble on this trip which I found strange except that maybe the water was warm enough to harbor some bad organisms. While the diving was great for big animals we saw few small ones - a handful of scorpion fish and fewer nudibranchs. However, there were tons of schooling fish. We dived mostly in the middle and north atolls.
Reporter and Travel
Dive Experience	501-1000 dives
Where else diving	Caribbean, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mexico, Thailand, Philippines
Closest Airport		Getting There
Dive Conditions
Weather	sunny	Seas	calm
Water Temp	85-86°F / 29-30°C	Wetsuit Thickness	3
Water Visibility	10-80 Ft/ 3-24 M
Dive Policy
Dive own profile	no
Enforced diving restrictions	We begged for 64 minutes.
Liveaboard?	yes	Nitrox Available?	yes
What I Saw
Sharks	Lots	Mantas	Squadrons
Dolphins	1 or 2	Whale Sharks	1 or 2
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		Boat Facilities
Overall rating for UWP's		Shore Facilities	N/A
UW Photo Comments	The live-aboard boat had one long table with fair lighting for equipment. We were a bit crowded. There was a rinse tank and a camera table, also a bit crowded, on the actual dive boat

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Dive Review of MV Maldives Princess in Maldives

MV Maldives Princess, Mar, 2014,

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 MV Maldives Princess in
Maldives