Dive Review of Oasis Divers/Osprey Beach Hotel in
Turks and Caicos/Grand Turk

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Oasis Divers/Osprey Beach Hotel, Jun, 2005, by Shawn Nelson, MN, USA . Report 2093.
No photos available at this time
Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Accommodations		Food
Service and Attitude		Environmental Sensitivity	N/A
Dive Operation		Shore Diving
Snorkeling	N/A
Overall Rating
Value for $$	N/A
Beginners
Advanced
Comments	Oasis Divers owners Dale and Everette Barker ran an excellent dive operation including very knowledgeable and friendly dive support staff. The facility is just a couple minute walk from the Osprey Beach Hotel where we stayed. My wife and I dove on a small boat with no more than 7 total divers throughout the 7 days of diving. Cookies, water, and towels were provided. There was no oxygen, rinse tank or table for cameras but we were told they were unnecessary because of the short boat rides. All entries were back rolls and exiting the water required removal of your gear and handing it to the dive master before climbing the ladder. Our dive master/boat captain (Mackie) was awesome. He was very laid back but informative and responsible. We enjoyed his sense of humor and approach to keeping us entertained. We prebooked 3 dives a day for our trip and didn't regret it. We only repeated one dive site as we went to the "Library" again on one of our night dives. Many times Jackie and I were the only divers on the island diving the beautiful wall on our afternoon and night dives. The diving was incredibly easy with no dive restrictions that we encountered. We dove on air for all of our 19 dives that averaged 71 minutes while our max depth averaged 83' on each dive including a number of dives below 100'. Dale accompanied us on one dive and on the way out we spotted a pod of dolphins at which time Mackie stopped the boat and let us snorkel with them for quite a while. We were very impressed with the abundance of fish life and the most impressive soft coral that we'd ever seen. We didn't see much that we hadn't seen before in the Caribbean other than a Batfish and very approachable Grouper at "Coral Gardens" - not a lot of sharks, turtles, or rays. Our most entertaining creature was a very playful octopus on one of our night dives. The wall where we did all our diving was no more than 5-10 minutes ride from Oasis dive shop. Good shore diving on the island was really non-existent although Oasis will provide all the air you want. Air temp was in the low 90's much of our stay while the water was a nice 82F. We only experienced one small stretch of rain. There wasn't a lot to do in terms of activities other than diving. We rented bikes one day from Val's but our experience was far less than perfect. We road them 3 miles and pushed them 5 miles during the short time we rented them. We each got flat tires while riding on tar roads and a pedal broke off. Val was quite rude as she accused us of wrecking her bikes and stated that now she had to pay someone to get them fixed so our attempts at trying to obtain a partial refund failed. No hard feelings. We were entertained almost every night by the enthusiastic band High Tide. A great value and great time to spend an afternoon was going to Gibbs Cay for barbecue and swimming with the stingrays. Our stay at the Osprey was nothing special but had no complaints. We enjoyed the barbecue that the Osprey provided one evening during our stay - it was about $30 each which included one entree (fish or chicken) and all you could eat salads - drink not included. We had horrible service at the Water's Edge restaurant but the food was fine. Hopefully the waitress was just having a bad day but upon simple questions about menu items she rolled her eyes numerous times and sighed heavily as if were seriously inconveniencing her. We enjoyed the rest of our meals at the quaint and extremely friendly Sandbar restaurant/bar on the beach. The food on the island is quite expensive for what we're used to on a dive trip. Each meal could reach $50 US with just one drink each even for a simple burger and fries. We brought items from home for our breakfast and snacks which worked out well. There are only a couple other dive operations on the island but none can compare to Oasis. A new resort with a dive shop (Bohio) was about to open which may provide some actual competition. Oasis is in the process of building a second facility on the south end of the island by the new cruise ship pier being built. We were promised the arrival of cruise tourists would not alter the experience that we encountered but it's hard to believe. Although it was the most expensive of all our dive trips thus far(including Maui) we had a great trip and would definitely recommend diving here. In fact all the people we met come here regularly to dive with Oasis because of the great and easy diving. www.oasisdivers.com Shawn and Jackie Nelson
Reporter and Travel
Dive Experience	101-250 dives
Where else diving	Cozumel, Roatan, Dominica, Maui, Lake Superior, Iron Ore Mines in Minnesota, Various Minnesota lakes
Closest Airport		Getting There
Dive Conditions
Weather	sunny, dry	Seas	calm, noCurrents
Water Temp	80-82°F / 27-28°C	Wetsuit Thickness	3
Water Visibility	60-80 Ft/ 18-24 M
Dive Policy
Dive own profile	yes
Enforced diving restrictions	Stay with your buddy
Liveaboard?	no	Nitrox Available?	N/A
What I Saw
Sharks	1 or 2	Mantas	None
Dolphins	Schools	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		Boat Facilities
Overall rating for UWP's		Shore Facilities
UW Photo Comments	There was no rinse tank or camera table aboard the boat. Rinse tank and table at the shop.

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Dive Review of Oasis Divers/Osprey Beach Hotel in Turks and Caicos/Grand Turk

Oasis Divers/Osprey Beach Hotel, Jun, 2005,

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 Oasis Divers/Osprey Beach Hotel in
Turks and Caicos/Grand Turk