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What are Mona Island Trips Like?

What’s up with Mona Trips?

I’m sure you all are well-versed in our Bahamas and St. Croix trips by now. Maybe a snotty crossing here or there, a bit of a roll in St. Croix if the wind is from the wrong direction for a few hours, but overall the ideal relaxing vacation, right?

But what about those Mona Island trips? Why the warnings all over the destination page? Why the nitrox requirement? Why do I need to provide detailed diving experience when I ask about this trip? And why does Juliet only go there two times a year?

As for timing, we make a quick stop on our way to and from St. Croix every year (every December and March). Yes, the weather in Puerto Rico is better in the summer, but that’s true of the Bahamas too and there would be a revolt if we replaced Bahamas Summers with Puerto Rico. So that means the weather in Puerto Rico isn’t exactly ideal when we’re there…

Mona island trips are definitely not for the faint of heart (that video is just a taste, really hard to capture the conditions!) . There are two islands: Mona and Monito. The diving around Mona Island is beautiful but underwater not super challenging – fringing reefs on the edge of dramatic wall drops, some patch reefs in 40-50′ (12-15m). But the surface conditions are tough! Because of the area’s winter weather patterns, there’s a constant ground swell that inconveniently runs perpendicular to the wind. That causes the boat to roll back and forth pretty much constantly; mostly a slow roll but every 20 minutes or so there’s a good rail-to-rail one that gets the cook cursing and sends some unsuspecting guest flying. When that roll hits when you’re on the ladder? That requires strength, skill, coordination, and confidence in your diving skills.

Then there’s Monito, which is always live-drop diving – there are no moornings so each dive is treated like a drift dive.The dive briefing is held in the lee of Mona before we make the 3 mile trek to Monito to limit time spent on the deck and the surface once there. During the crossing, the captain requires everyone to stay securely seated for everyone’s safety. Once in the very small “lee” of the very small Monito, the captain keeps the boat in a somewhat stable position for as long as possible while you get geared up and in the water as quickly as possible. The area’s currents are working to separate the group, so if you’re delayed, the rest of the group might be completely gone from sight.
Most of your dive is spent hiding behind boulders at the bottom at about 90′ (27.5m) – hence the nitrox! – or kicking into the current to stay in place. Any shallower and the currents will try to sweep you away! On the dive, you’re treated to some gorgeous sea life along the wall of Monito and among the boulders, sharks, pristine coral formations, schools and schools of fish. When the dive is over the divemaster leads you on a good-paced swimming safety stop away from Monito so when Juliet comes to pick you up everyone is far enough away from the to the island to avoid running into it while everyone comes aboard. The boat is kept safely in gear while you’re boarding for stability, so hold on tightly to the tag line. Oh, and that roll we talked about in Mona? So much worse here! Be extra careful but quick-as-you-can going up that ladder.

So why do we put ourselves through this? Because it’s one of the few places left in the Caribbean that is almost completely untouched by human intervention. The reefs are pristine, the sea life is abundant and diverse, in the spring the humpback whales migrate through and serenade you on just about every dive. There are no resorts, and no tourists save for the occasional camper, ranger, or naturalist. And to our knowledge we are the only operation that still dives here! It’s tough diving, but it’s pretty magical.

If this sounds like your idea of a good time, there are a few opportunities to join us this fall in November and December. And one space for our last Bahamas trip in November if you’ve got a hankerin’.

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Nitrox for all in 2023

Some think liveaboards are the best way to do a dive trip – we certainly won’t argue! You set up your gear one time, you literally eat, sleep, dive, repeat and never have to think about parking, dinner reservations, crowds, or traffic. You typically get the reefs to yourself, and are able to travel to some seriously remote destination, experiencing the underwater world with less human interference.

But there’s the rub. The remoteness. Great for pristine reefs and quiet vacationing, not so great if there’s an emergency. And when you’re intent is to breathe underwater on quite literally a version of recreational life-support, the probability for an emergency goes up a little. In an effort to bring that probability back down – even just slightly – starting in 2023 we’re requiring nitrox certification on all of our trips.

  • What if I’m not certified for it? No problem, you can get certified at your Local Dive Shop beforehand, or we can do the certification before we even leave the dock on boarding day. It’s that simple.
  • But what if I want to dive deeper than nitrox allows? Good thing we fill to 30% O2 which allows you to dive safely to a maximum operating depth of 121 feet, which is just within recreational dive limits. But honestly, not very many of the dives we offer require you to go that deep, and all the good stuff is typically 80′ and shallower anyway. So you’ll be fine.
  • What if I don’t want to pay extra for it? Luckily, our 2023 pricing will include nitrox in the rate so there’s no extra fee anymore (check your confirmation documentation).
  • What if I want a discount and only dive air? Sorry, air will no longer be available in the scuba tanks. If you want to breathe 21% O2, looks like you’re headed to the sundeck!

Looking forward to seeing you soon!

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What the best time of year to go to the Bahamas?

This is a question we get a lot! And the answer is “Any time!” because the Bahamas are such an amazing group of islands. However, if you?re asking from a scuba liveaboard perspective, let me be a little more specific.

We run trips to the Bahamas from Miami April through November, and that?s very much by design. Winter weather in the Bahamas, while warmer than most places in the US, can be a bit unpredictable. That?s not a big deal if you?re flying over and staying on one of the Bahamas? 300+ islands, but it is a big deal if you have to get there and back by boat. The spring, summer, and fall months allow for a more comfortable ride.

April is a wonderful sailing month and the spring diving is really interesting for the hard-core critter watcher! Florida sees shark migrations up and down their coast regularly in March and April ? and the Bahamas is not much different. Our most diverse shark sightings happen this time of year. You?re most likely to see hammerhead sharks, Bull sharks out on the reefs, and once we even spotted a Sawfish! The water temps are cooler than you think (73-75) which is what the sharks like, so bring a 3mm wetsuit for sure.

May is a big month for fish and coral spawning as water temps start to rise. If you?re a dive geek like us, plan a trip around the full moon in May and you might catch a glimpse of sponge spawning during the day and if you?re really lucky maybe the corals will put on a show at night! Mutton snapper and other species of snapper get frisky this time of year as well, so expect some bigger fish on your dives in May.

June is when the weather starts to settle ? and by settle we mean flat flat flat! The breeze turns to the Southeast, drops to about 5-10 knots from spring?s East 10-15 tradewinds and things warm up really quick! Water temps are hovering right below 80F, air temps are 80-85, and this is when we do our own weekly migration down to the good stuff. Orange Cay and farther south are only accessible in calm weather and June is the best time of year to reliably head south.

July is downright toasty, and the weather even more settled. ?However, we are deep into hurricane season at this point so while the weather is gorgeous and calm and we take advantage of every minute we can of our glassy summer waters, there?s always a risk. All trips from June to October we strongly recommend the purchase of travel insurance; you never know when Mother Nature will spin up a storm!

August brings us similar conditions to July, but the night sky is where the excitement happens. The Perseid meteor shower happens for almost 2 full weeks in the middle of August and there is no better place to watch a meteor shower than from a boat, far from all the light pollution of land. Diving during the day, epic star gazing at night ? sign me up!

September and October are probably our favorite months to be in the Bahamas. The weather is still calm but starting to cool off from the inferno of July and August and the water temps are no-wetsuit-required warm at 83-85F! The best part is there isn?t a boat to be seen. Its fall, the kids are back in school, and the tourists are gone ? it feels like we have the whole ocean to ourselves.

In November we?re back to the easterly tradewinds, great sailing weather, but still warm water temps. We offer some of our longer trips this month to get some more sailing in, and allow for trips to not run into Thanksgiving without cutting anything short. Join us for a 10-day trip just before Thanksgiving, there?s no better way to prepare for the holidays.

Our Bahamas have something for everyone, so pick your month and come diving with us!

Fair winds and Following Seas, Friends

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The benefits of diving Nitrox

Nitrox is quickly becoming an essential addition to your basic SCUBA certification. And its easy to see why. Diving with Enriched Air, or Nitrox as it is commonly referred to, allows you to stay underwater longer at depth ? and that?s the whole reason we?re diving, right? To be underwater. Anything that allows us to safely stay below the surface for a few extra blissful minutes is well worth the investment.

It is especially worth it on a liveaboard, where your dive profiles can be a little more complex than when diving off a day boat. On Juliet, we offer 4 dives per day ? 3 day dives and one night dive. Our dive profiles can look something like this:

Dive Time on Air* Time on Nitrox* 32%
Dive 1, 8:30am: 100? dive at Bimini Barge 20 min 30 min
Dive 2, 11:30am: 80? dive at Tuna Alley 22 min 35min
Dive 3, 2:30pm: 50? dive at Miami Rita 67 min 2 hrs +
Dive 4, 7:00pm: 50? night dive at Miami Rita 63 min 2 hrs +

*using PADI Air and EAN32 tables

As you can see, especially after the second dive, the benefits of using nitrox are dramatic. Then take into account the money you?ve spent not only on your vacation, but your gear, your training so far? why wouldn?t you want to double your time underwater? That is why you got certified, after all!

Even if you aren?t interested in extending your bottom time, don?t forget about the extra margin of safety allotted by breathing a gas that has less nitrogen in it, nitrogen being the inert gas in air that is responsible for most decompression illness. To breathe a sigh of relief knowing that you?re protecting yourself that much more. And most divers report that they feel less tired after a dive on Nitrox versus a dive on air due to the added oxygen in the air you are breathing. After 3-4 dives on a liveaboard vacation, that extra energy is pretty nice.

If you?re not Nitrox certified but want to know more about it, you can try Nitrox diving for free ? our experienced instructors will explain the benefits of Nitrox, walk you through the very simple steps of checking your tank?s contents and planning a dive with Nitrox. And when you see the value in it, we can certify you on board!

Unlimited Nitrox (EAN32) fills: $100 (7-day) $80 (5-day) $150 (10-day). Proper certification required
Nitrox certification course: $250 (includes unlimited Nitrox fills, add $50 for 10-day)

Juliet Sailing and Diving also offers rebreather support (oxygen available by request, O2 booster system). Please contact the office well before your trip to inform us of your needs.

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Preliminary Images of the Renovations!

The refit is almost done! Here are some preliminary pictures of the Aft Ensuite Cabin. PLEASE NOTE: the wall coverings are not in place yet and will be finished when the boat is back in Miami.

Aft Ensuite

Aft Ensuite entrance door

Ensuite private head and shower

Ensuite cabin with top bunk folded up

Ensuite cabin with top bunk folded up

Another new addition – Main Salon cubbies!

An finally, the on-deck head!
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Neutral Aluminum 80s – now on board Juliet!

Aluminum Neutral 80s

As an early Christmas present, thanks to a DEMA special, Juliet got herself a new set of tanks. If you’ve been on board in the past few months you might have noticed that the tanks were shinier, and that you surprisingly were able to shed a few pounds off your normal dive weighting. No, it’s not the extra density from Thanksgiving, or that fruit cake you got from Aunt Martha. No, it’s not some special extra gravity in the lower latitudes due to the earth’s rotation. And while I’m sure your scuba skills are improving with every trip you take on Juliet, that’s not the only reason why you seem to be able to dive with less weight on board lately.

Our new tanks are called Neutral 80s and they’re a new concept in tanks. They are made with a little bit of thicker aluminum but have a higher fill pressure (3300 psi instead of 3000) which allows them to behave a little better when they are empty.

I’m sure you’ve noticed at the end of your dive sometimes it feels like you’ve got a balloon strapped to your back. That aluminum tank you are diving with, once you’ve used up (almost) all the air inside of it, is positively buoyant by a little over 3 lbs. When it’s full it’s almost 2 lbs negatively buoyant. So if you were to drop two tanks, by themselves, no gear attached, into the water, the full one would sink to the bottom while the empty one would float at the top. That’s why the balloon-on-your-back feeling, because that’s kind of what’s happening.

 

With the Neutral 80s, when filled they are 5 lbs negative and when empty they are 0.1 lb positive (which is basically neutral). Which means that you can shed about 2 lbs from your normal diving weight since you’re no longer having to overcompensate for the 2 lbs of positive buoyancy with a regular AL 80 tank. Less weight means more streamlined trim, means more comfort in the water, means easier on your knees getting out of the water, means overall added comfort. It’s just two pounds, but over 18 dives each week, it can make a huge difference.

In addition to being neutral, these new tanks are also fitted with new convertible valves that allow for yoke regulators as well as DIN. Each valve has a spin-out insert that converts to a 230 bar DIN outlet to accommodate DIN regulators, and easily convert back to yoke to work with our fill system. These tanks, as always are prepared for our nitrox fills, and have one more feature that makes it easy to use.

The Indicator safety handwheel makes it easy for you, and your divemasters, to tell if your tank is all the way open. The red indicator tells you that the tank is off, or only partially open, while the green indicator only appears when the valve is all the way open. It is always prudent to double check, and we will always check your tank valve before we send you diving, but this feature is an added bonus!

So happy diving next time you’re on board! And let us know what you think of the new tanks!

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What happened to the Lily Pad? Wait, what exactly is a Lily Pad?

If you’ve been out on Juliet even once, you know we’ve got some unique names for some of the areas on the boat. Boats in general have a language unto themselves – front is forward, back is aft, right and left don’t exist as they normally would, and don’t even think about calling that line a rope! – so this is not surprising, but new passengers might find themselves extra confused when asked to “Meet on the Lily Pad” upon boarding.

Huh? Where?

The Lily Pad was the forward hatch (that’s the one towards the pointy end) that was covered in a weather-proof forest green cushion and shaped resembling a Lily Pad in a pond. It was a comfy gather place, an area where impromptu afternoon naps would often happen, a congregation for dive briefings – but a very difficult place to eat dinner under the stars!

As much as we will miss her, the Lily Pad has been replaced by a beautiful polished aluminum table with seating for eight. Three charter’s worth of people have had the pleasure of being able to enjoy the new addition and so far the feedback is very positive. Moonlight dining, square-ish table discussions, a perfect place to set up your camera when the main salon is being used for other things like games of “Vampire.”

And to those of you who are concerned about losing your nap-space, don’t worry. Once the boat returns to Miami in March we are going to turn “The Beach” into a big huge foam pit! Ok, not really, but we will be adding lots of comfy cushions for lounging elsewhere.

What do you think? We still haven’t come up with a clever name for it yet but we definitely think its a great addition!

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