Instant Reader Report on Diving
Manthuri in
Maldives in
2002/12

by
Glenn Davis, CA, USA
Report Number 030116075642866

 Sipadan/Mabul, Palau, Roatan, Curacao, Cozumel, Jamaica, Monterey, Channel
Islands Southern Calif. 

120' max depth.  Followed dive guide and dove to limits of air.  

Diving was from a chase boat that did not have a camera table or dedicated
camera fresh water container (plastic trash can shared with rinsing wet
suits and sundry items - only had 10" water, leaked till I suggested
matching with duct tape).   There is an OK dedicated tank on the main ship,
not very large.  Lucky there were only two cameras on this trip - mine and
the dive guide.  Tank could hold two cameras with full setup of strobes and
arms plus small snap shot cameras.  On board is a 10' camera shelf/counter
with good lighting and 110 volt plugs to charge strobes and lights.  Would
be quite crowded with more then two cameras on it.  My first live aboard, I
hear that other boats have better arrangements for UWP gear.   The boat has
E-6 processing, two rolls min. at a time, and a light table.    

Overall Rating

Diving was very nice.  Usual dive was starting outside of a reef and
flowing inside through a channel in the reef along with a mild to strong
current.  Nice small soft corals, hard corals were mostly broken up and
dead - some starting to grow back.  Saw sharks, eagle and sting rays,
turtles, Napoleon Wrasse, lots of lion fish, honeycomb and moray eels, many
smaller colorful tropical fish and some nudibranchs.  Nice underwater
topography and good vis outside of the reef and going through channel.  Not
for the novice, relatively strong currents at times, surface was sometimes
pretty rough as were exits from water.  I was used to this from Monterey
and other dive experiences - but my companion got a bit bruised on the
ladder a few times.  The boat crew handled everything very well.  The dive
master and captain were excellent.  Really liked the crew.  

One to four dives a day (including a night dive, though not every day). 
First day got one dive, last day of diving got in three dives, in between
3-4 a day.  8 day cruise including last day which was in port where we left
after breakfast.  

My sister loves this boat and has been on it four times.  While I liked
the diving and the crew, the boat left much to be desired.  Perhaps for
Maldives live aboards it is great but not compared to what I have read
about Peter Hughes and related classes of boats.

Upon boarding the boat found it had been fumigated and the odor was quite
unpleasant.  Read another post to undercurrent that this boat has a
cockroach problem and they do this between trips.  They need to do it, wait
and do it again as we had many cockroaches mostly recent hatchlings and a
few large ones.  They didn't seem to open up all the cabinets to get the
fumigant into all spaces and so it wasn't thorough.  Also, they didn't air
out the boat before the guests arrived and so it was quite sickening. 
cabins were pretty noisy due to generator that always ran to power lights
and A/C.  A/C was turned up so high that we froze much of the time inside
the boat.  As we learned where the switches were we turned most off but
never found the one for the hall outside the cabins - the engineer didn't
know where that switch was either, so it was an arctic dash to get into our
cabins wet after diving.  

Food was OK, mostly.  Occasionally a very good dish but mostly just OK. 
Breakfasts were white bread toasted, cold fried eggs, oat meal, fruit. 
Snack before first dive and in afternoon - bland cookies, bananas and tea. 


 

Note: The information here was reported by the author above, but has NOT been reviewed by Undercurrent prior to posting on our website. It is presented here to provide Undercurrent readers with timely information on dive operations worldwide. The material may contain errors, typos, ... Please report any major problems by writing to us and referencing the report number above. An edited version of this report will likely appear in the next Travelin' Divers' Chapbook, which will be sent to newsletter subscribers and published online for Online Members.