Captain Red is the best of the best -- knows his stuff and obviously very committed to customer safety and experience.
James Palkovic
The Vessels
Blackbeard’s cruises are delivered on one of our two 65′ diving liveaboard sailboats, the Sea Explorer and the Morning Star.
- Exceptional oceanfront and island views
- Dining – picnic-style outdoors in the horseshoe or inside near the kitchen (galley)
- Bunks – beds come in doubles and singles as uppers or lowers
- Bathrooms (heads) – small and shared with your mates
- Showers – hot water and long showers are a luxury – enjoy them before you arrive
- Kitchen (galley) – yes, a compact space where all your meals are prepped. We’re serious.
Don’t pack tons of clothes. We’d rather have room to store all the food we’ll eat each trip.
Our dinghies are our transportation to and from islands.
Meet Our Crew
Chris
Captain
Hailing from San Diego, Chris is a professional Uno player and believes you can stack multiple pickup cards on top of each other. A recently certified diver, working towards his rescue course, he now enjoys the recreational activity of practicing rescue breathing on damsels in distress. His favorite color is pink, he owns the most magnificent flamingo shirt. He traded in his bar tending skills and cold water fishing expeditions for the sunny teal blue skies of the Bahamas. Tinkering is his strong suit, therefore as one of our engineers, he plays with all sorts of tools.
His hobbies included crafting animal figurines out of used o-rings, and racing Japanese imported hamsters.
Morgan
Captain/ first mate
Morgan, or Biggins as his friends know him, comes to us from Orlando, Florida. When he was just eight years old, he took a trip to Boston with his family and ended up meeting his father’s scuba instructor, Steve. Morgan was fascinated by the underwater photos that were on Scuba Steve’s walls and told himself that he too, would one day get scuba certified. He got his scuba certification in 2010 and has loved being on the water ever since. All thanks to Scuba Steve! Morgan took to the water for 4 years with The Navy as an Aviation Electrician and when he got out he went to the Marine Mechanical Institute in Orlando for a year. In his spare time he loves metal working and aquariums. When you see him, please make sure he has put on sunscreen!
Ian
Captain/ first mate
Ian “Hoppy” comes from a small town in sunny South Africa. He is a PADI dive instructor as well as a PADI Freedive instructor. He has been working as an instructor for the past 5 years along the South African coastline. Ian is passionate about the ocean. Ian loves playing soccer and is an avid cricket and rugby fan. Something no-one knows about Ian, he loves all animals except for squirrels.
Amone
Chef
Amone is 25 year old and is a Qualified chef that comes from Garden Route in South Africa . She enjoys hiking , camping and has camped in almost every National Park in South Africa . She Speaks English and Afrikaans. Her Favourite sea animal is a cape Fur seal, she loves how cheeky they are.
Aaron
Engineer
From a young age Aaron has been mechanically inclined. He has always been interested in finding out how things work.
Aaron is a 28 year old Engineer from the sunny shores of Cape Town South Africa. He enjoys hiking and camping . He has the crossed the Atlantic and loves a good sea shanty . He loves sea otters because they hold hands in order not to drift apart. He Speaks English and Afrikaans .
ANDREW
DIVE INSTRUCTOR
Born in a small rural town in South Africa, Andrews affinity for water came to the fore at school in Johannesburg swimming competitively and playing water polo . Introduced to scuba diving at school, he learnt to dive on the Indian Ocean reefs off South Africa and Mozambique .Whilst passionate about the ocean and all things in it , the African bush has a special place in his heart . His favorite ocean animal is moray eels because they have two jaws called a pharyngeal jaw which is why it swallows their prey and if they had to bite something too big it would be like a pit bull with lockjaw. In his free time, he enjoys health and fitness and watching documentaries.
Ariel
Cook
Ariel joins us from the beautiful twin islands of Antigua and Barbuda. Ari achieved her Associates degree in culinary arts and gained experience working in various hotels among the islands. She is down to earth and very approachable so be sure to engage her in some fun conversations. She enjoys sitting down with a good book, swimming in the ocean and exploring.
Diego
Dive Instructor
Diego is Originally from a small fishing town Called Bucerias in Nayarit, Mexico. Bucerias means “Land of divers” in a native language so its no surprise he ended up becoming a dive instructor. He grew up three blocks from the beach which fueled his curiosities and led him to study marine biology. While studying Marine Biology he always worked around water sports, kayaking, wind surfing, surfing, sailing, free diving, and scuba diving. He applied for a job on a liveaboard that use to go to the Marias Islands, 120 kilometers away from mainland on the pacific side of Mexico, that was his first encounter with sharks, bull sharks. Sharks became the animals he wanted to see all the time when he was in the water. After a year he decided to go to Cabo San Lucas, Baja California where he got a job on Socorro Islands diving with sharks every single day. After seven years building experience on the water he decided to come to the clear warm waters of the Bahamas and continue to dive and teach amongst his favorite anim
Patrick
Engineer
Pat, as he is called by friends, hails from Germantown, MD. He has a master’s degree from Johns Hopkins University. Pat likes playing guitar, diving, rock climbing, spearfishing, sailing, backpacking, and reading. He has been to about fifty countries and, prior to Blackbeard’s, he lived on his own sailboat for a couple of years and sailed primarily around the Bahamas. His favorite sea creatures are Orcas and a fun fact is that he traveled to all seven continents by the age of 25!
Chris
CHEF AND ENGINEER
I grew up in Plettenberg Bay South Africa. As a kid I loved going to the beach with friends and playing soccer in the sand. The first sea creature I ever saw I jokingly called an Elephant Shark. I later came to find out that there actually was an elephant fish. I took a cooking class that was offered in high school and my life was forever changed. I fell in love with cooking and the joy that it spreads. After high school I went into hotel management and started cooking full time and have not looked back since. It gives me great joy to see the happiness that a good meal can bring someone!
TRISTAN
Chef
Tristan got his love for the ocean from growing up so close to the beautiful waters of South Africa near Durbin. He got into cooking when he took a job as a waiter during the summers. He started cooking for family and friends when not working and just grew to love it more and more. Eventually, he decided to combine the two things that he really liked to do, which was boating and cooking. When not in the kitchen he can be found blowing bubbles.
Sophie
Dive Instructor
Sophie grew up on a working cattle ranch on the central coast of California. After diving in the cold waters of the Santa Barbara Channel as a teenager she decided to go off traveling in search of warmer waters! She has worked in Honduras, Thailand, Indonesia, and Curacao but her favorite ocean will always be the Caribbean. While she moved back to the states for a bit to pursue new things such as snowboarding and bartending, she has decided that the ocean is where she is meant to be! Though Sophie may have a tattoo of a sea lion on her ankle, her favorite fish are either frogfish for the rewarding search and grumpy faces or yellowheaded jawfish for how ethereal they look. When not working she likes to relax by doing arts and crafts of any kind (though not well), reading, or taking a long hike.
Taryn
Engineer and Dive Instructor
Taryn, AKA “T” hails from Fort Walton Beach Florida. Her hobbies include obviously scuba diving, longboarding and paddle boarding. Her favorite critter is an Octopus because they are so smart. She is super funny and always chipper!
Catalina
Dive Instructor
Cata joins us from Bogota Colombia and has her BS in Business. She speaks Spanish, English and Portuguese. She loves football/soccer, trekking and traveling. Her favorite marine creature is the octopus with their high intelligence and amazing camouflage.
We Are Now Hiring
We are always looking for adventurous individuals to join the team.
Life on board is hard work but very rewarding- send in your application today!
Dive instructors, chefs, and engineer positions available.
Kalei
Chef
Kalei hails from the beautiful north Georgia mountains. She is an avid hiker, horse rider and off roader. She learned to swimi before she could walk and was diving with him by age four. She has her BS in Chemistry from UNG where she was the president of the scuba club for 2 years. She enjoys meeting all the great divers and making new friends along the way.
Tyrone
Dive Instructor
Tyron was raised and brought up in South Africa. He loves the ocean since he has been been a child and that’s what has brought him here. He has been diving since 2018 which has given him time for figuring out what his favourite aquatic animal is which is all the nudibranch in the world. His older brother Tristan has been working with Blackbeard’s already for a while as a cook and thought Tyron would be a great addition to the team. Fishing is one of his biggest passion and his favourite colour is green.
We Are Now Hiring
We are always looking for adventurous individuals to join the team.
Life on board is hard work but very rewarding- send in your application today!
Dive instructors, chefs, and engineer positions available.
