Managing Your Travel Expectations
Maximize your trip by having realistic expectations. If you got a steal of a price that is a clue…are your dates off season, the resort is in disrepair or truly the deal of a lifetime?
No two places are exactly alike which is why we travel. To see, do and meet people and places totally different than at home or those previously visited.
Try to learn a few phrases in the local language…good morning and or thank you are good starts. Those attempts to speak the language and a smile go a very long way. As a visitor to their country most locals want you to really enjoy their country and hospitality. They’d love for you to go home and tell all your friends and family what a great place their home country is.
Know the best way to show your appreciation. Local currency and tipping in cash are always preferred. Tipping in USD or by credit card might be possible but consider the complication of using either a card or USD to the recipient. Their bank to exchange currency might be on another island, miles away, etc so they have to wait until they have a day off, or their main office can convert the credit card charge to cash, before they have money in hand. That is the difference between coming home flush, maybe buying diapers and milk on the way home, versus waiting weeks or a month for your tip to be converted to something they can spend.
Seasonality of your destination is important. We often perceive our tropical paradise as constant blue skies with beautifully lush vegetation swaying in the tropical gentle breeze…our own tropical Utopia. That tropical paradise requires rain for the lush green landscape. All islands, even those on the Equator, have seasons. Sometimes there are only two but those two can be vastly different and at least one of those seasons is a rainy season. Plan accordingly to avoid disappointment.
Diving conditions, and what you see underwater, can be very different based on time of day, season, moon phase, depth, water temperature and good old-fashioned luck. If you seek unique critters on your next dive trip check to see how likely that might be. Each destination typically has something its neighbor doesn’t. Cozumel has the Splendid Toad Fish, Cayman Stingray and Wakatobi a fantastic shore dive. Coral spawning, Mandarin Fish and Blue Ringed Octopus all have environmental limitations but also season and or time of day requirements to find them. Sure, luck is a part of it but no one is lucky enough to see a Pygmy Seahorse in Bonaire.
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had someone express interest in a destination because someone told them it was the best. In my opinion everyone’s idea of the “best” varies. Your friend might be over the moon about a destination because they did a shark feed but that doesn’t interest you at all. Ask questions when people make recommendations, know what you like, what kind of diving you prefer so you can compare their preferences to yours? Did they see anything you’d consider fantastic or worthy of a trip there specifically? I learned this the hard way myself…I’d been selling dive travel for about 20 + years when friends suggested diving together. They had a very different idea on where to go than my husband and I…when I voiced my concerns they replied “but you’ve never been there with us”. Since that was true, I let my 20 + years’ experience be overruled and we allowed ourselves to talked into a trip that would not have been on my top 50 list. After the first day of diving I commented on the quality of the diving, a real disappointment, my friends were not quick to respond and then I asked the important question…where else have you been diving? I’d been diving all over the world and they’d been to two places, never outside the Caribbean, and thought the diving was exceptional. I got talked into a destination because I didn’t ask enough questions about what made this place so great. Lesson learned.