I just returned from an 8 day/7 night charter aboard the crewed S/V "Free Ingwe", a 45' catamaran.
Arrived Friday evening to Tortola (EIS) and stayed in the Village Cay Marina hotel for the first night since I was going to pick up the charter on Saturday at noon. Room was clean, a/c worked but I have heard from others that they have had mixed experiences so your mileage may vary
The Free Ingwe did not have a compressor on board but they did have 8 tanks so we were able to do 2 dives at each site before moving to the next island dive shop for air. This did not pose a problem since we typically were only doing 2 dives a day.
Visability the whole week was over 100' with one exception.
Did 2 dives on the wreck of the Rhone...always a crowd pleaser. Easy to penetrate and the sea life was abundant. Even watched a barracuda and a lobster go a few rounds before the lobster retreated.
One of the folks on our charter did a warm-water referral with a local dive shop "We Be Diving". John Rae (A Brit) was the certifying instructor and he did a great job!
2 other dives worth mentioning: Alice in Wonderland off of Ginger Island and Spyglass Wall off of Norman Island. Saw the largest spotted drum fish I have ever seen. Also saw sea turtles, spotted eagle rays. First time I have not seen a shark in the entire week I was down there.
Also tried out a Canon A85 powershot setup with the Canon WP-DC30 housing. Slick little setup if you want to go really light. I am used to lugging my ikelite housing for my Nikon D100. The shutter lag was a bit obnoxious, something I don't have with my D100 but I got used to it and was able to time most shots.
