My recent tour of the Jardines de la Reina was fantastic! Blue Water Travel and Avalon Outdoors were extremely helpful and covered every detail in the planning for the tour. Living aboard the Avalon IV was wonderful, and the large Cuban staff were extremely warm and very professional. The lodging was very comfortable and the food was superb.
As a newly certified diver the diving crew made sure that I was safe and enjoyed every dive to its fullest. My knee replacement made it difficult for me to climb the ladder with my tank and gear, and they always helped me to remove the gear and lift it into the boat, which made the dives much easier.
The Gardens of the Queen is a beautiful and very important marine sanctuary which holds a vast diversity of corals, sponges, fishes and other marine life. As it is one of the most protected marine sanctuaries and visitation is limited, it was a a great privilege to visit and explore its wonders.

The trip on Calico Jack was a resounding success. We where only 6 passengers on a 10 passenger boat. The two single Guys where instantly upgrade to single Occupancy cabins. The diving in the northern part right out of Manokwari was marked by WW2 wrecks of ships smaller vessels and aircraft from both sides of the conflict. It reached from a very large heavy transport ship to a wonderful overgrown patrol boat. The food was good it catered to the mostly British clientele on this trip. The chef tried his best to please the taste and heat tolerance of food. I like spicy foods, so I was admiring the Indonesian chefs ability to make the food bland. There were options for me. The middle part of the cruise was marked by very seldom visited dive sites with wonderful pristine sea fans and black corals with everything that lives in it. My favourites are black corals so I got everything I could hope for. The dives were interesting because there was a mix of very nice coral reefs that ended up in a rocky little island or other rock feature that where not overgrown by corals. It turned out that the rock is granite and the corals seem not to like to grow on it. It makes for a very interesting area where lots of coral fish inhabit huge blocks of rock. It also gives big groupers lots of hiding places. The southern part near Nabire is of course marked by the whale sharks coming to fishing platforms to feed on little fish. We did 5 dives with this magnificent creatures over two days. It rained heavily on the first day the rain created a green layer of water over the clear water below. The water temperature was also markably lower in the green. The second day made it clear what the green water did to photography. It was Cristal Clear and bright ideal for taking pictures with no flash. Diving with this giants is definitely a highlight.
I stayed in Nabire for two days after disembarking. I found a very interesting big market and an access to the beach to walk by some boat repair facilities to the market.

This place was really something else. Our Overwater Bure was a sanctuary, with breathtaking views, and glass inlays in the floor so we could watch the fish swimming in the reef below. The food felt like dining at a 5-star restaurant every day. And the staff were extremely hospitable and welcoming. Just a small anecdote to illustrate this - the beds were made with two large pillows and two medium pillows, as well as two tinner pillows in the closet. Both my wife and I prefer thin pillows, so our first night we switched out the largest ones for the thinner ones and left the medium ones on the bed to use as well. By the second night, the turn-down staff had noticed this, and without us even needing to ask, had brought us two more thin pillows and removed the larger ones from the closet. Just small touches like this really elevated the whole stay. It was a truly luxury experience that we don't often get to experience, but for our Honeymoon, it was just perfect.

We did not do any diving at LikuLiku, as this was more the 'laid back' portion of our trip, but there were still lots of activities available to do there. We did a boat tour around a couple of the nearby islands, and toured the island where the movie 'Castaway' was filmed. We also did lots of snorkeling in the reef right below our Bure. We were pleasantly surprised how much coral and fish were in the area, as sometimes higher-end resorts focus more on manicured white sandy beaches rather than the marine life underwater. You can really tell they work to protect their reef and the marine life living there. There were even a family of 5 or 6 black tip reef shark babies that lived around the lagoon which we saw every day, and took the chance to jump in and snorkel nearby them one afternoon.

Overall it really was the perfect Honeymoon trip!