My wife and I dived with Ocean Spirit in December 2022. We undertook a total of 26 dives with them, ranging from reef dives, night dives, wreck dives and shark dives.
We are PADI Rescue with 20 years experience and over 400 dives each and always take our own equipment.
We have dived all over the world including South Africa, Maldives, Fiji, Red Sea (5 times), Mexico both sides, Caribbean……. The list goes on and we are also regular UK divers. The reason I state this is to demonstrate that we have other places to compare Ocean Spirit with.
Our interests lie mainly in shark/pelagic encounters and this was the primary reason we booked to dive in Mauritius - don’t get me wrong there are many places in the world where the encounters are greater, but Palau etc from the UK are just too expensive.
Before we booked our flights to Mauritius (£672 return) I contacted a number of dive centres to see what was offered and by whom, I have learned that you get a very early feel for a dive centre from responses you get in advance of booking, some promise the earth or don’t respond or change the information when you probe deeper eg they disclose that you are actually visiting in the wrong season for that species. OS were honest from the start and very responsive to questions, I got the sense they actually cared about managing our expectations, no promises of sightings etc, their website was clear with pricing and they clarified their prices for us taking our own gear, having said that their own gear was of a very high standard and we would have been completely happy to use theirs (we have experienced some appalling dive gear over the years with different centres hence we use our own).
On arrival in Mauritius we went in person to the dive centre and met with the staff who were very friendly and accommodating, it was clear that they cater for every range of experience from non divers undertaking a ‘try dive’, to new starters, to the more experienced.
The staff were a pleasure to deal with and couldn’t do enough to help, everyone has a passion for diving. The owners Jill and Roger are like newbies with their enthusiasm (Roger 40+ years of diving coming up to his 6000 dive!!!). We dived with them both regularly and can say they bring a tranquility and professionalism to the experience, coupled with their professional instructors Bernard (what a character and comedian) Bobby, Yo, Nandi and Dhani.
I will also give a special mention to Jovani (at the helm of their dive boat which is a very comfortable purpose built dive boat not all dive boats in Mauritius are in my view suitable for comfortable or safe entry/exit - choose your dive centre carefully) as an experienced boat skipper myself, it’s very comforting when a skipper with Jovanis experience is dropping you off and getting you out - his boat handling is exceptional.
The diving OS provided was varied with different sites and they go the extra mile to ensure you see as much as you can, IF you decide you want to do the shark dives, which I highly recommend, your experience will be taken into account and your safety managed to an exceptional level.
My acid test is - “Would I book to dive with OS again?”
My answer - 100% definitely yes!!!
Excellent dive centre, Excellent Facilities, Excellent equipment, Excellent safety standards, Excellent staff. Well done guys and thank you for a wonderful 2 weeks