Last April I had a great trip to Socorro for a dive medicine meeting sponsored by the hyperbaric medicine department of Long Beach Memorial Hospital.  Now I had been fortunate enough to be invited to be on faculty for a similar meeting in Dominica.  Thats Dominica, not the Dominican Republic, but the island of Dominica which is one of the windward islands in the eastern Caribbean.  Unfortunately, our flight out of Tampa left at 6:15am so it was up at 3am and then leaving for the airport at 4am.    But, hey, were off to paradise!

Thankfully we had been warned before leaving but the problem with going to Dominica became very apparent when we arrived at the airport.  Dominica only allows 70 pounds of checked luggage per person  total!  And there is no option of simply paying overage fees.  Apparently, if your bag isnt caught at your departure city it will be caught in San Juan and may be kept there and not allowed on the flight to Dominica.  My original plans included flying with my Sport Kiss rebreather but with all of my camera gear there was no way I was going to get all of my camera gear, dive gear, laptop, battery chargers, etc to Dominica with my 50lb rebreather!

We connected through San Juan and met up with Ron Samson, Stuart Miller, and Michael Strauss, organizers and other faculty members for the Dive Away Medicine meeting.  It was then a quick two hour flight to Dominica.  While the diving is on the southwest part of the island, the airport is on the northwest side of this mountainous island.  The shuttle to the resort took almost 1 ½ hours through narrow winding road.  I think that was the closest to being seasick I got the whole week!

We arrived at the Fort Young Hotel just in time to get settled in and have some dinner.  The hotel is fantastic.  We had an oceanfront room right down the hall from the restaurant which had wonderful food (but very slow service!) and very close to the dive shop where we stored our gear for the week.  There are also a couple of other restaurants I would recommend  the Creole restaurant across from the Fort Young hotel and Port of Call.  Most of the entrees are fish and seafood and everything our group had got high marks.  The hotel rooms were very large and comfortable with air conditioning, free DSL, cable TV with all of the U.S. networks (I didnt miss the season premiere of 24!!!), a coffee maker, and a small refrigerator. 

The hotel provided a complimentary breakfast at the restaurant each morning and included cereal, fruit, breads, omlettes, pancakes, etc. along with juice, tea, and coffee.  All of this in a picturesque outdoor setting overlooking the ocean.  Each morning at 8am a different cruise ship would arrive and unload their passengers.  Then each evening wed see them head off into the sunset to make room for the next days arrival.

We dove with Dive Dominica who I would recommend very highly.  They were very knowledgeable and very safety conscious with very comfortable boats.  There were camera buckets, plenty of room, and lots of fresh drinking water.  While they dont provide snacks, my wife always travels with pretzels, etc on these dive trips.  There was no showers or fresh water hose for rinsing off after the diving but the trips from the sites back to the hotel were never more than about 15 minutes.

Ive been diving all over the Caribbean but I have to admit I was very impressed by the diving in Dominica.  First of all, its a macro place.  Dont go expecting to see a lot of sharks, turtles, manta rays, etc.  However, there were lots of seahorses, blennies, anemones with shrimp, crabs, eels, etc.  The reefs themselves are very healthy and beautiful.  A few of the places that stood out were Champagne where steam from volcanic activity constantly bubbles through the coral making it look like a glass of champagne.  Theres also a vent where very hot fresh water enters the ocean which is pretty cool.  Just a short swim north of the bubbles is a patch reef with lots of seahorses.  We saw seven different seahorses on one dive there!

Scotts head point and pinnacle were also very nice.  Due to the current we did this area as a drift dive along the wall which was beautiful.  This area, along with Champagne, is a signature dive for Dominica.

While the diving was mainly macro, Dominica is also known for whales.  Thanks to a lot of hard work by Peter Allinson along with Jeff Bozanic, we had the opportunity to snorkel with the resident sperm whales.  There were trips out each day  some very successful whiles others were a bust.  Personally, Carol and I went out two days.  One day we saw lots of whales on the surface but they dove before we could get in the water.  On the other day, we managed to get in the water and catch a glimpse of a couple but no photographic opportunities.  The day before, however, the group had several hours in the water up close and personal with several of these 50 foot animals. 

The last day we took the afternoon off for some sightseeing.  After all this is the island where they filmed the second and third installments of Pirates of the Caribbean.  We went on a tour through the rainforest and swan in Titou Gorge back to its waterfall.  There are all sorts of land activities from waterfall tours to a three hour hike (each way) to the boiling lake.

All and all, this was a great trip and a destination I would recommend highly.  Check out the pictures in the Gallery.