Dive Review of
Seaside Dive Resort/Sunset Bay Club in
Dominica

 Palau, Philippines, Maldives, Thailand, St. Lucia, Cayman, Cozumel, Fiji,
Maui 

Dive Conditions

More or less follow divemaster, no time limit  

[None]  

Overall Rating

"Seaside Dive" is at, and part of the same operation as,
"Sunset Bay Club".  Best thing about Sunset is the location,
along the shore in it's own little valley.  Driving around, we saw that
most of the other "resorts" are right in towns.  Rooms, all
ground level, were OK, but not great.  Hot water most of the time.  Bed not
too comfortable.  AC would have helped.  Rooms cleaned properly every day. 
The grounds very nice, with one of the few nice sand beaches on the west
side of the island.  The restaurant had mediocre food, with the same few
selections most days, but the service was good.  The all-inclusive package
was a bargain, if you're not looking for gourmet fare.  Dive shop is just a
few steps from the lodging.
The island is beautiful, with great green mountains and seascapes.  We
rented a car for the week, and found an interesting place to drive to most
afternoon/evenings.  Roads are in terrible shape, even by Caribbean
standards, but it's not so bad if you think of it as a live video game or
skiing moguls.  Dominica is not yet "over-touristed" - not a
single Club Med or Sandels yet.
Dive operation gets mixed reviews.  The two guides we had were pleasant,
and one was knowledgable.  The boat was not very comfortable or functional,
especially when it had nine or ten divers; breaking out the second boat was
apparently out of the question.  Having the shop a few steps from the beach
where the boat landed was convenient.  We started out most dives as a
group, but drifted apart, which was fine since there was little or no
current on most dives.  Most dives were in the 40 - 70 foot range, but we
could go deeper if warranted.
The fish life was nothing spectacular, but something interesting on most
dives.  Lots of stingrays and eels.  Also a fine place for scorpionfish, if
you're into testing your eyes.  Good variety of corals, and impressive
barrel sponges.  Rodney Rock is a shallow dive with lots of interesting
critters, most notably a number of large seahorses.  Most of the big fish
are apparently fished out; something about people wanting to eat.  From
Sunset you mostly dive the central portion of the west coast, although they
were talking about a trip down to the more popular Scotts Head area the day
we left.
All in all, not exciting, but every dive was enjoyable. 

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