Northwest Dive Club

Wondering if anyone here have thoughts on dive operators and general diving in Cozumel/ Cancun in early May. Or what to do or not do. Should I find a dive shop once I get there, or do some planning before leaving? Thoughts???

Note, I plan to bring a 5mm full suit since I get cold easily; don't know if I should bring a can light, or just back-up lights.

Cozumel is great. There's not much diving in Cancun but you should do the cenotes at the end of your trip. No washing of the dive gear

I have an article or two on the diving down there on my old blog.

Tangfish wrote:No washing of the dive gear

AWESOME!

Perfect! I'll be in Cancun for the end part of the trip, so I'll look into the Cenotes. Thanks man!

The diving in Cozumel is pretty easy -- it's all drift diving, and some of the currents can be strong, but it's not that difficult to stay on the structure. (It can just be difficult to stop and LOOK at much of anything!) We dove with Aldora Divers and I thought they were excellent, but there are a LOT of dive ops on the island. This is one place where some research on the Cozumel forum of ScubaBoard would really pay off.

There is some diving off Cancun, but I don't know how good it is. Ben at Mayan Aquadive comes up repeatedly as a recommended operator. The cenotes are an hour and a half south of Cancun; if you are not committed to staying in the city, you might want to stay in Playa del Carmen instead. There are a lot of tour operators who will pick up in PDC for cenote dives. If you are not with a group (and especially if you will have your own gear with you) I'd recommend Jason Renoux as a guide. He's a delightful person and a very good diver (one of my cave diving buddies).

Thanks for the heads up Lynn! I'll check out Scubaboard over the weekend. I wonder if I should bring my can light, or just a back-up/ back-ups. I miss diving in the PNW with laidback and real folks.

How have you been?

If you are doing cenote tours bring your can light. If just OW I'd go with just a backup light to look in holes etc.

Be sure to pack all batteries in checked baggage on return. MX screeners will not allow batteries on planes regardless of TSA recommendations or any rational thoughts.

Hi Babs!
Watch out for the cattle car operators in Coz unless you like diving with 50 of your closest cruise ship friends. It's best to stick with the 6 Pax (person) operators. The smaller group of people and the individual attention makes all the difference. We used Blue XTSea and they were great. Lynne mentioned Aldora and although we didn't dive with them they seem to be the premier operator on the island.

If you go, you MUST do a Cenote dive on the mainland. If you have the time see if you can take a cavern class.

Bill

BillZ wrote: Blue XTSea

Ecstasy! Rotfl

sorry sorry I just had to hahahahaha

Thanks so much for the thoughts!

cool smileys.... -->

I'm with Richard. If you want to do the cenotes, take your light. They're not BAD things to have for the daytime reef dives, either. But if you do night dives (and DO, they were the best dives we did on our Coz trip) take a backup light. HIDs are overkill in that very clear water.

On Cozumel, #1, go eat at El Moro. It's about 15-20 blocks inland so take a cab if you don't have a car. #2, avoid the waterfront like the plague especially when cruise ships are in port. The main drag about 6 blocks inland has lots of great food. Pretty much anyplace selling Pollo Asado is going to be excellent.

I've gone diving with Aqua Safari both times I've been to Cozumel. The owner has a great condo with good package prices. Their large boats are 12 person IIRC. One small boat is a six-pack. They run a nice operation and are very environmentally conscious. I prefer the six-pack but if you want a comfy head and a place to lay out in the sun during your SI, the larger boats work for that.

On the mainland, doing a cenote dive is an absolute must. For my taste, Playa del Carmen is much nicer than Cancun which seemed like like a mexican disney resort to me. Better yet, go further south to Akumal if you like getting out of town to relax.

LCF wrote:We dove with Aldora Divers and I thought they were excellent.....

THANKS LYNN for the rec.....ALDORA DIVERS ROCK!

Other pluses- Aldora only dives with steel 100s and 120s, and also DIN. YEA!

What else...they take divers to sites that many of the other companies don't go to or frequent, small groups (under 6), their DM's dive long hoses, as soon as the first person in the group reaches 1000 psi - the whole group starts ascending, long dives not exceeding NDC limits.....

Yes, we had a very good time with Aldora -- who was your DM? Was it Mateo? We really liked him.

Did you end up doing the cenotes?

Was there two weeks ago. Stayed six nights and dove five days with Blue Angel, and really liked it. Small resort (only 22 rooms), and boats were 6-10 people. They went where you asked to go, and the DM we had was there to help but otherwise hands off which we liked.

Missing it already. But my fire coral funky hand won't let me soon forget the trip. *sigh*

We went to Playa del Carmen two years ago. We chose it over Cancun because we were looking for something more relaxing and less 'Spring Breaky'. Also it's closer to some of the parks just south of there which were really beautiful. The cenotes were really cool and we enjoyed diving in them. We also took some day trips to the Mayan ruins which I would recommend. It can be crowded and touristy but I really enjoyed it.