Carpe Diem Maldives

The Carpe Novo boat was very spacious with several areas to hang out and quite large rooms and bathrooms. The cleaning service was great - everything was cleaned each morning. The roof lounge area was very fun to hang out on and enjoy the cruise or sunset. Sometimes they forgot to take the futons back out though and they were still wrapped up. The diving was nice-- we didn't always luck out with the right currents but they adapted the route based on how conditions were. Each of the guides had their strengths: one guide was super friendly and enthusiastic and helpful, others are artists and draw amazing sketches of the dive sites, and others are very knowledgeable of the dive sites. We also really enjoyed being able to leave our gear on the smaller dive boat, and it was also quite spacious! The chef and bartender were amazing and there was so much variety in the food with great service. The curries were excellent and the salads were always varied and interesting.

Boat - mostly functional equipment and appliances (some sun beds were broken thought). You get daily fresh towels and cleaning of bathroom which is great. Food - plenty of variety, but compared with what you get on Egyptian liveaboard it is just “ok”. Diving - weakest part of the whole tour. We got only 3 diving instructors instead of 4. Our instructor was outermost unprofessional and endangered the group many times. How? - lost the group under water 4 times - instead of guiding the group and showing things stayed mostly behind playing with Nemo fish and poking with his stick in the ground - let dive part of the group on Nitrox without certification and said to them that the gas was air while it wasn’t …

Fantastic week diving the deep south on Carpe Novo in late Feb/early March 2022. Fantastic manta diving, snorkelling off the back of the boat for two hours at night with the whale sharks, and my first (5!) tiger sharks. Really knowledgeable guides who made the week fantastic and were really nice guys to have on board the boat. Safety standards high, but the Tiger Zoo dive, arranged by another company, felt less safe; the entire set up had a bit of a production line feel to it and it was very difficult to hear the dive briefing on the dhoni. Carpe Novo was a spacious and comfortable boat and cabins (incl. bathrooms) were really spacious and comfortable too (though my bathroom had an occasional smell of stagnant water). Really good service on the boat itself; chef in particular was very attentive to my dietary requirements as a vegetarian. The only thing I would say is that the guys on the dhoni could have been a little more attentive and enthusiastic. The food on the boat was plentiful and tasty, I particularly enjoyed the choice of salads, but was also a little repetitive by the end of the week. Suggestions for Carpe Diem management: - For the itinerary, is it possible to offer one less day of channel diving (which became a little repetitive) and an extra day at Fuvahmulah? - Offer dive debriefs - Though cleanliness on the boat was at a relatively high standard, it was evident that underneath the beds hadn't been cleaned for some time. Some of the cushion (and sun loungers) had seen better days