Instant Reader Report
on Palau Aggressor II / [same] in
Micronesia: Palau, Truk, Bikini Atoll and Marshall Islands / Palau on
2002/04
by
Dennis Johnson , NY, USA
Report Number 020821202422383

 Truk, Palau, Fiji, Grand Cayman, Little Cayman, Thailand/Burma, Bonaire,
Turks & Caicos, Cozumel, Anguilla, St. Tropez/Port Grimaud France,
Hawaii, New York/New Jersey Wreck Valley, Great Lakes/St. Lawrence Seaway.
 

Dive Conditions

No decompression diving  

Daily E-6, large camera table and dedicated rinse buckets. Most of the crew
careful with equipment. Photopro (Doug) very helpful with advise and
accomodating to all requests. Doug also went the extra mile taking lots of
pics of all the guests for his end of the week slide show - he then gave
away all the slides of the respective guests - very nice touch! Light
boxes and mounting supplies provided free.  

Overall Rating

Palau Aggressor II (April 21-28 2002): 
This was the second trip on the Palau Agressor II (my first trip was in
Feb of 1997). A few good surprises… and a few bad. First of all the
"coral bleaching" problem isn't as bad as I was lead to expect
and Jellyfish lake had literally millions more jellyfish than it did first
time around. The diving was even better than I remembered - Blue Corner,
Blue Hole, Peleliu Corner… absolutely fantastic. Diving from the Aggressor
skiff is as easy as it gets. The skiff drivers were there whenever/wherever
you surfaced (EPIRBs were issues to all diver pairs just in case one of us
got away). 

On the bad side, the Aggressor itself according to the crew has not been
in drydock for at least 7 years (it hadn't been renovated since my first
trip!) and while it's kept very clean and organized the entire boat is
starting to show serious wear and tear. The bilge pumps periodically ran
(loudly) due to leaks in the hull and the fridge in the galley was totally
dead by the end of the week. However the rooms were still OK with good AC
and plumbing. My only real complaint was a general indifference by the
crew (especially toward the end of the week after the tab was settled) and
the lack of ability to keep to a schedule during the day - to get 4/5 dives
a day in, I always felt like things were rushed and on the verge of not
happening. In fact, at the end of the week on the last day we were so
behind schedule that we never made it to town as planned and didn't even
get to eat dinner before needing to get to the airport to leave the
island. Overall the crew "did there jobs" for the most part but
there wasn't any real stand-out service (except Doug the Photopro and Rick
a new divemaster who seemed to really care about the guests). This was the
second week for my group on back to back aggressor trips (Truk Agressor
was week 1) and while the Truk boat/crew totally spoiled us, the Palau
boat/crew left something to be desired - as they say "there is a
choice in airlines and liveaboards today". If Palau is in my future
dive plans, I may try one of the other options. 
 

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