Customer Comments 2007

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Thanks for the Travel Reports

H2OTours, Inc. first Traveler Report
Travel name: Leah and 12 year old daughter Eliana
Destination visited: Grand Turk
Hotel visited: Osprey Beach Hotel

In any case the trip was GREAT! I really liked diving with Sea Eye; the staff Joannah and Donna was very friendly and helpful. I felt very good with the DM named Smitty who inspires confidence and relaxation in his divers. I liked the whole set up of this shop (as opposed to others I saw on island) because it was small, and less commercial and seemed technically good (tanks & equipment, boat in good order, etc.) I also liked the Osprey Beach. We were inadvertently upgraded which I did not realize until the last day of our trip. So we did not pay more, but we had a little kitchen which was helpful to make food for Eliana, since she does not eat most of what restaurants any where in the world serve (typical child). What was also nice was that we tended to dive with the same small group for all four days. They were an eclectic mix of expat, returning visitors, and assorted sorts. Not people off the cruise ships or typical tourist types. We ended up becoming friends and hung out a lot too. There was a nice camaraderie on the boat and afterwards. Other things that were good about our trip were the surprise direct flight from JFK to Provo, utilizing the layover in Provo to go to Grace Bay (Coral Gardens) and hang on the beach and have lunch for 3-6 hours. The diving itself was fine. Good visibility, decent coral, fish, turtles. (I am spoiled regarding really exceptional diving because of the time I spent in Asia/South Pacific) but this was lovely, especially for the type of diving experiences I am trying to give my daughter. You told me the water was cold and you were right. I added stuff to help her stay warm and even I got a bit cold with a 3mm long suit. If someone is looking for a resort experience, excellent food (although we went to a new Chinese restaurant that just opened up in Brown Houses, really good) or a lot of on land action, this is not the place. But I am not looking for that, and I like to specifically avoid that type of setting, so this was perfect.

Of course the inter island connection is a bit of lunacy (late, confusing, spastic) but this is to be expected. Eliana did not find it too amusing, but it seems normal to me for these types of situations.

Overall, our travel experience was excellent and I look forward to booking again with you. We have some time in April, but I am not sure if we will look at Bonaire or Roatan, or if I will use this time to get Eliana advance certified with a friend in Florida, or else where. She will turn 12 in March.

Thank you for this wonderful experience and I am sure we will be talking soon.

Happy New Year,
Leah

H2OTours, Inc. Traveler Report
Travel name: Neal
Destination visited: St. Lucia
Hotel visited: Anse Chastanet

Hi Larry- Shelley and I had a great time at Anse Chastanet. It really was
a beautiful place and they would do anything for you. Our room was great
and I think we were upgraded to a Deluxe Beach side room, #9. We were
glad we were at the bottom because that is where we spent most of our time.

Everyone was so attentive. Most of the time we were diving but did manage
to take a Jungle Bike ride through Anse Mamin and a little kayaking and sailing.

As for diving, it was very good, reef seemed healthy with beautiful coral
and sponges, and the dive shop and crew were great, dive sites very close
by, and the weather and water were perfect (only rained at night a couple
of times). It was kind of curious we did not see any large fish but
plenty of turtles and we saw the resident frog fish and sea horse while snorkeling!

We loved the restaurants and food. Never got tired of it or felt like we
were eating the same thing over and over.

Overall it was a wonderful trip. The trip was a little different than
Shelley and I usually take in that and the meals were included and more
expensive in general. The crowd seemed a bit older perhaps and more well
off, good people watching. We didn't meet as many people as we usually do on our trips, but maybe it was us. The only other thing is I felt like
the staff was always looking for a tip, mostly the beach guys. But I repeat
we had a great trip.

Sorry we missed you at the Our World Underwater. Maybe next time.

Cheers,
Neal

H2OTours, Inc. Traveler Report
Travel name: Liz
Destination visited: St. Eustatius
Hotel visited: Old Gin House

Hi Larry,

The staff was great, very warm and friendly. They memorized my name and my room within 24 hours. Very informal and relaxing. The waterfront room was terrific, well worth it. The Wednesday night BBQ was fun, Lisa (the dive master) is in a band and they played the night away! I ate mostly at the Blue bead, which was good.

The diving was terrific, Lisa was fantastic. I saw more turtles this past week than I have seen since I started diving! Turtles and Rays every dive it seems. And the variety of diving is good too, very relaxed and easy dives. Most enjoyable!

It helped that I met some people there, as I usually do. I was diving with a couple from London, you may hear from them! They were great fun. And I was surprised of the number of people there on Business. I met several from Holland and Texas.

I’ll definitely go back someday. Thanks again for a terrific trip!

Take care,

Liz

H2OTours, Inc. Traveler Report
Travel name: Steve
Destination visited: Bonaire
Hotel visited: Sand Dollar

Date Traveled: June 2007

Larry,

As usual you put together another trouble free trip for us. It's nice to deal with someone, such as yourself, that maintains a high level of professionalism. In this day and time where others don't seem to care about quality of service nor show much regard for their customers, you excel. The number of stars associated with a hotel mean nothing if the trip package and planning is not up to par. I'd let you book us in anything because I know "We'd have no worries, Mon."

The accommodations at the Sand Dollar were great, as usual. And the staff always helpful and accommodating. The wrap-around balcony on the three bedroom condo was great. It added a whole additional living area where we spent most of our time. The only time the TV was on was to watch the San Antonio Spurs win. Your suggestion of up-grading the trucks to the S10's was well worth the little extra.

There is nothing that can be said about the diving in Bonaire that hasn't already been said, but diving right off the dock in front of the Sand Dollar we swam with a large Spotted Eagle Ray for two days. When I say swam I mean it stayed in 10 feet of water feeding the whole time. It was incredible. And that was the only place we saw turtles regularly. And then, of course, all the usual suspects that swim the reef we saw there on Bari Reef. It was a little windy so some sites were not accessible. Can I blame that on you? And you can tell Andre he runs a good dive shop with quality staff.

The best place to eat on the island is Will's Tropical Grill between the MCB Bank and Cultimara Supermarket downtown. A little pricey if you're on a tight budget but worth every penny. We celebrated a belated birthday and anniversary there. And Will and Sue are great hosts.

Larry, I've booked a lot of trips with you and can honestly say I've never had a bad experience because of poor booking or inattention to detail. You always cover all the bases. I would like to blame the weather on you sometimes though. Anyway, my wife and I had a great time. And you did your normal great job putting together another trip for the Makai Divers group from New Braunfels, Texas. Thanks.

Happy Divin',

Steve

H2OTours, Inc. Traveler Report
Travel name: Jeanie and Dan
Destination visited: Dominica
Hotel visited: Sunset Bay Club

Larry,

Just wanted to let you know that we had a great time on vacation.
We were lucky to get out of O'Hare without a delay. The resort was very
nice, just what we were looking for. It was very quiet, secluded and clean.
The dive shop and crew was very friendly and helpful. The reefs were
healthy with nice corals and fish, we even saw a seahorse.   The food and
service at the restaurant was very good and the atmosphere was very casual
and relaxed. Our room was simple, but clean. No phones, TV or alarm clocks.
We had a fan & windows and did not even need an air conditioner because of
the breeze. We did take a couple of afternoon excursions by van to the
North and then the South of the island. Dominica is a very beautiful and
unspoiled island.   Thank you for all your arrangements, everything went as
planned. We will definitely contact you again when we are ready for
another dive get-away.

Jeanie and Dan

H2OTours, Inc. Traveler Report Travel name: Christine Destination visited: Providenciales in the Turks & Caicos Hotel visited: Sands At Grace Bay and did diving with Dive Provo TRAVELED: June 14-21, 2007 Hey Larry, The trip was great! No screaming kids next door this time! haha. The two bedroom worked out great. We definitely had an ocean view (third floor unit) and two king sized beds. We loved it! The Sands is very nice. And guess what... We saw a juvenile lion fish!!!! Also, had great service from Dive Provo! Christine	H2OTours, Inc. Traveler Report Travel name: Brad Destination visited: Bonaire Hotel visited: Buddy Dive Larry, All seems to have had a great time one guy did 31 dives. We saw all kinds of creatures. I found my first Seahorse without the Dive Master pointing one out to me. The folks at Buddy were great and did give us a fourth vehicle to use. The only complaint was that the lunch service was slow. I think they had new kids working and they were having trouble with the computer. They now have wi-fi in the bar and restaurant area. I had a little trouble hooking up but think it was more my problem/computer than it was theirs. Did not know they had this. You may have heard one of our customers opted to arrange his own limo to drive him to the airport and back. They failed to pick him up. So he missed the plane. Tony got him on the red-eye at customers expense and he traveled down with Sue Young. All worked out okay, The limo service is providing him with a couple of free rides. Hope to do this again next year and will be looking for something good to do in late October. Any Ideas? Thank You, Brad
H2OTours, Inc. Traveler Report Travel name: Jenifer & Russell Destination visited: Turks & Caicos Hotel visited: Sands At Grace Bay and did diving with Dive Provo TRAVELED: June 29- July 6, 2007 Hey Larry, Yes, I got your e-mail. Sorry for the delay. Vacation hangover and crazy at work. We had a great time. The diving was great. I was very pleased with Dive Provo. They were very professional, safety conscious and tons of fun. The Sands was very good also. The rooms were huge. Russell and I really like that. I think we would have liked to be closer to the beach. We did have a view of the ocean but a pretty far one. I think if I had it to do over, I would have done the ocean front room. We had a great time. Oh, one more thing, customs took forever in Miami as did getting our bags. We almost missed our connection to Dallas. I'm noting to myself to have at least 3 hours in-between connections. We just had one hour and that just wasn't enough time. If our plan hadn't been delayed we would have totally missed it. Thanks again for all your help. We decided we would go there again. Thanks tons. Jenifer & Russell	H2OTours, Inc. Traveler Report Travel name: Robin and Shannon Destination visited: Roatan Hotel visited: Fantasy Island Hi Larry, We had a great time. I wanted to bring a couple of the monkeys home with me but Shannon wouldn't let me :). All of the staff were as nice as they could be. I loved the property, having our own beach without the public and taking nightly sea kayak tours of the sunset were great! The diving was fun and a great place for Shannon to get his cert dives completed. Although the visibility was not what they typically have there, the reefs were some of the most colorful and full of life that I've seen, parts were like diving in an aquarium. I was terribly disappointed in my trip last year to Belize. It was like diving in a quarry...everything was dead and brown. Once I finish visiting all of my 'on the list' destinations... I will definitely go back there. Thanks for setting it all up for us! Robin ...I'll attach our favorite picture from the trip :) Robin
H2OTours, Inc. Traveler Report Travel name: Tammy Destination visited: Bonaire Hotel visited: Plaza Resort TRAVELED: June 18-25, 2007 Hey Larry, We finally got to Memphis about 1:40 this am. Stood in line at the lost luggage counter until 4am. Got home about 6am. All luggage got lost, even my moms. Hers has been located, but still no luck with ours. All dive gear was in ours even underwater housings for cameras. The Plaza was great. They have made some improvements since we went 2 yrs ago. Grounds were alot cleaner. New bamboo shades to sit under on the beach. Alot more people than the past two trips. You can really tell tourism and economy is better there. More new cars/trucks driven by locals. Plaza even had new trucks for the Toucan Diving. Lot of construction going on. Villa was nice. Our power went off 2 nights in a row at the same time. Maintenance said something about sprinkler system flooding wires. The manager lady moved us to another villa. She was very nice and done everything she could to help. The diving was awesome, as expected. Steve and Holly saw turtles, eels, eagle rays, dolphins, octopus and much more. They saw something new everyday. Great trip had by all. Not to fond of DFW airport. Seems like a lot confusion there. Next time I think we will try the red eye flight out of Houston to avoid San Juan and Dallas. Thanks for all of your help. Once again Bonaire is one of the most awesome places we have ever been to. Thanks Tammy	H2O Tours, Inc. Traveler Report Travel name: Kerry Destination visited: Cozumel Hotel visited: Casa Mexicana and DIVING with: Aqua Safari Benos Dias Larry! Wow, what a fantastic trip!! We absolutely loved everything about our Cozumel vacation. The hotel was great - would definitely stay there again! The diving (as you know) was awesome. Aqua Safari was very nice to us - not sure if it was much different than how they treat other guests, but Bill did replace an inflator hose on my BC for no charge. (It blew out on one of our dives) Turns out we really enjoyed diving in the afternoon - so many less boats and people to deal with. We would actually do afternoon dives instead of morning next time. There was one day when it was just Jeff and I - very nice. The other days the boat was full. I could go on and on about how much fun we had. Thanks for everything - you put together an awesome vacation for us and of course we want to go back very soon!!! The hard part is deciding whether to go there again or try some other island not yet visited! Ok, back to laundry! Muchos Gracias, Kerry
H2O Tours, Inc. Traveler Report Travel name: Debbie and 3 family members Destination visited: Bonaire Hotel visited: Divi Flamingo TRAVELED: August 3-10, 2007 Larry, We love Bonaire! The diving couldn't have been easier, (except for maybe the rocks). Divi's rooms need updating but they were clean. Loved the location of our rooms. The staff was very nice. Great food everywhere we went. Grounds are clean and well kept up. Dive shop staff was helpful, especially Serge and Alvin. Enrique and Orlando made our boat dives memorable, they were great! We saw a small black tip shark, seahorse, and dolphins while with them. We did a tour while in P.Rico but used other company. The people from the tour company you gave me where more money and where not very accommodating when it came down to it. We took a private tour of Old San Juan, had lunch and toured Bacardi factory. We had a Lincoln Navigator and the driver Tony was very nice. I would probably not do it again and stay at airport hotel if laid over again, just because already did it once. American tours of Puerto Rico We all enjoyed 1,000 steps and the Hilma Hooker. My daughter and I dove about 8 times and my husband and son dove about 10 times. Great vacation for all. I will send you a few pictures, we took about 300 and have over 10 hours of underwater video. Let me know when there is a special for Bonaire we would like to go again. Thanks for all, Debbie	H2O Tours, Inc. Traveler Report Travel name: Patrick & Debra Destination visited: Curacao Hotel visited: Sunset Waters TRAVELED: May 28- June 4 Hey Larry: You made a great pick on Sunset Waters Beach Resort. We had a great time, no disappointments, dove well, ate & drank well. The live music was excellent, the scenery was awesome. We didn't participate in any DiveFest activities. The resort was host on Thursday and it was pretty much a party day with a big photo shoot going on to update the website and show off the resort. They took alot of pics of Deb I'm sure we'll return there. Deb is talking about next year already. When we go back it will be for a 10 or 14 day trip. Patrick & Debra
H2O Tours, Inc. Traveler Report Travel name: Juliana Destination visited: Saba Hotel visited: Cottage Club and DIVING with: Sea Saba TRAVELED: August 28- Sept 4, 2007 Larry- I can report that the medical care in Saba is great! On day 4 of diving, I managed to poke myself in the eye with my snorkel....no major damage, just scratched my cornea, but it did sideline me for day 5 of the dive...boo hoo! Mike's dive bag didn't arrive on our flight from St. M to Saba as the flight was full of med students and the cargo bay got filled quick. A cabbie brought it up the next day and we ended up paying $10...shouldn't the airlines have picked up that cost? We were also charged a ($20/$25?) "eco fee" (or something) when we went to check out of the Cottage Club. When we questioned the clerk, she didn't know what it was for...so we didn't pay it. Another lady came in and they were checking into it (as Aaron was not there), and it seems that it was a "voluntary" fee by the gov't? Hmmmm.... Anyway, we missed the first day of diving, but Lynn at Sea Saba said we could make it up, no problems - she was great. We really enjoyed the diving - the boats were great, as were the dive guides and the sites. We really enjoyed the island, the food was great and we had a wonderful time! We had to laugh, because Honduras was smacked by the hurricane, and we had perfect weather in Saba. Thanks, Larry....we'll give you a call for our next dive vacation. Juliana
H2O Tours, Inc. Traveler Report Travel name: Les Destination visited: Grand TurkHotel visited: Island House and DIVING with: Sea Eye Diving TRAVELED: August 10-16, 2007 Hi Larry, Marla is better with the play-by-play….but the bottom line: Absolutely GREAT! As per your advice (during the flight problems on the first day of travel), getting to Provo Friday night was a winner. As you had us on the early morning flight to Grand Turk, we actually lost no dive time …’Smitty’ was back on the job, foot all healed…..and he and the Sea Eye team waited for us that morning and we were diving by about 10:30 am. The Grand Turk reefs continue to rank as some of the best we’ve ever been privileged to visit. Thanks SO MUCH for organizing and arranging our wonderful vacation!!!! Les	H2O Tours, Inc. Traveler Report Travel name: Traci & Dan Destination visited: Dominica Hotel visited: Sunset Bay Club and DIVING with: Aqua Safari TRAVELED: March 23-30, 2007 Hi Larry! We returned home at 3am on Saturday (yikes the Washington airport has issues) and had a great time in Dominica. Sunset Bay Club was even prettier than their website gave them credit for! The landscaping was incredible with loads of green trees, plants, flowers and even a freshwater area with water plants and lots of crabs. They made their resort as pretty as the lush island itself and it was very peaceful. The rooms were nice and clean and the fan worked quite well - we were actually glad there wasn't any air-conditioning... the only sounds heard were from the frogs and insects at night and all the singing birds in the morning. Ahhhh, our kind of life! Oh yah, there were also a lot of cool large iguanas roaming the resort too and we must have taken over 20 pictures of them. The four of us rented a car on this second trip to Dominica as our only regret two years ago was that Dan and I didn't experience enough of the beautiful island. Last time we swam in Middleham Falls and Tituo Gorge. This year we ventured out four times in the afternoons after diving. After we figured out driving on the opposite side of the narrow twisty roads, we hiked the easy trail leading to Trafalgar Falls on Sunday and brought our masks and snorkels. We found lots of freshwater gobies, crabs and even a few watches after we adjusted to the cold water. Another day we hiked into Spanny Falls and loved it. One of our dive masters, Izzy, told us to make sure we found the second waterfall that most people didn't know about. He said to look for a rope coming down the hills and pull yourself up and over. We were rewarded with another pretty waterfall to swim in. On Wednesday, we had the day off from diving and ate breakfast and drove to Boiling Lake. Wow, what an adventure that was in the rainforest!!! It rained a few times while we hiked and it felt great. The really interesting part of the hike was going through the Valley of Desolation. It looked like a mini "Yellowstone" with all the bubbling mud and steam releasing from the ground all over the place. The colors were spectacular! Then we reached Boiling Lake and ate the lunch the resort packed for us and enjoyed seeing the middle boil every few minutes. The steam and sulfur were everywhere up top. When the wind blew a few times, we managed to take a few pictures showing what it looked like. Then we headed back down. It was a very fun six hour round trip hike! My calf muscles reminded me of the hike the next two days. :^) The final spot we checked out was the Freshwater Lake. The diving pace was very easy... breakfast and then when everyone was done, off we went - no real schedule. The boats were very small, but did the job. We normally had 6 divers on board and one day there were the maximum of 8. The five days of two tank morning dives were enjoyable - we saw three Seahorses, lots of Ballonfish, Eels, one Turtle and tons of Channel Crabs. Rina's Hole was among the best of the week. Diving is my favorite sport ever, so I can't complain... however, the diving in the Southern part of the island at Scott's Head Marine Reserve is significantly prettier than this area was. Unfortunately, there is a lot of fishing activity on this side of the island and the marine life is much less. If you can afford to do so, I recommend paying the extra fee to get to go to Scott's Head. As always, our trip was wonderful and it was nice to get away from everything (no phones, tv's or radios). The only piece of information that I think is important to note is that while Sunset Bay Club is a beautiful resort, it really is not a