I ended up getting in 16 dives on my trip to Cozumel. I could have done twenty but decided
to relax on the last day. There were NO days or dives lost to weather or wind.
Water temps were 79 to 81, viz was always 100+' but a bit milky sometimes (still better
than South Florida on any given day). I did all but two of my dives with an operation called
Dive With Martin (Mar-teen). I would heartily make them my choice the next time I go.
I flew down on a Delta Airlines buddy-pass which meant I flew stand-by (and only paid the taxes
on the ticket). On the way there, I did not make the Atlanta to Cancun flight due to no seats
available. No problemo, Delta moved me to their partner airline, Aero Mexico and I was in
Cancun by 3pm. Since I didn't have the option to fly into Cozumel directly, I did some research
at cozumel.net and learned Riviera Bus Service connects from the Cancun airport to Playa
Del Carmen for $7 each way. (on nice Mercedes buses)
I then took the UltraMar jet ferry from PDC to Coz, which was $8 each way. Both the bus and
the ferry take 70 minutes combined. I was at my hotel before the sun set. Getting from Cancun
to Coz was much easier than I thought it would be. With Spirit Airlines offering cheap fares
from Fort Laud. to Cancun, I'll be headed back to Coz (via Cancun) soon.
Dive With Martin had left a msg at my hotel to let me know my dive for the next day would
be an afternoon dive. I proceeded to find a morning dive with another operator called Black
Shark and also called DWM and let them I would do two trips with them the following day.
They had no problem with this. Black Shark turned out to be a mistake...
I arrived at the shop 30 minutes earlier than suggested so I could get breakfast at the market
next door but found the entire crew pulling away from the shop in their truck w/ all their tanks
and gear. They had me jump in and away we went to the harbor, were I ended up standing
around for the next hour waiting for the rest of the divers. Once they arrived, we headed out
to Santa Rosa Wall and had a nice dive where we saw a big hawksbill and a couple big eagle
rays. By the end of the dive, I had a bit of a headache but proceeded to do the next dive, Paso
Del Cedral, a favorite from prior visits. By the end of this dive, my headache was quite a
bit worse. We headed back in and they dropped me off at my hotel. With a pounding head,
I went off for some lunch thinking it might make me feel better. (I had a breakfast planned but
missed it since they left early) I felt like crap and ate at Pizza Hut simply because it was close
to my hotel. I went back to the room to nap and puked a short time later. I started feeling
better almost immediately but the next day, I noticed my spg dropping a significant amount on
every breathe which only got worse as the tank pressure dropped but I felt fine otherwise, doing
all four dives. The inlet filter on my first stage was mostly blocked and when I unscrewed to
DIN portion of my reg, it was wet inside. I can only assume the tanks from Black Shark on the
day before had water (and bad nitrox) in them. I was able to borrow a first stage (SP MK20)
from another diver that had brought a spare and switched all my hoses to it. I dove the MK20
for the rest of my trip without issue. The remainder of the trip was uneventful in this regard .
.
All the dives were shallower than 100' with the exception of Devil's Throat,
which max'd at 138' on the exit (on air, OMG!!!!)
I dove the following sites in addition to the three already mentioned:
San Francisco Wall, Columbia Deep (wall), Los Palmas, Columbia Shallow,
Palnancar Caves, Palancar Gardens, Delila, San Juan Wall (north of town), and
Chankanaub Reef. Obviously I did some of them more than once. If I had to say which
dive really stood out, it would be San Juan Wall, where I encountered at least a dozen big
eagle rays over the course of the dive. With the current blowing two knots, we finished at
the start of Barracuda Reef. On other dives, I also saw the Splendido Toadfish
(endemic only to Cozumel), many, many turtles (close fly-bys abound), some huge lobsters
that were big enough to "ride", schooling squid on a night dive, a few spotted morays, a reef
shark, and seahorses on a couple dives. And of course loads of healthy reef. The most
"surprising" dive was on Columbia Shallow, a 25' dive where I saw almost everything I've
mentioned on a single 75 minute dive.
Dive With Martin's operation is top-notch, well organized, has good divemasters, comfortable
and fast boats, and nitrox when I wanted nitrox. They even threw in a free night dive on the
third day since the boat had room.
The only thing that went "wrong" was the divemaster dropped the video camera and housing
on day #4 so they were unable to give me the personalized video that was included in the
package I booked. They did give me a very nice video of "stock footage". Unfortunately
everyone in the video has bad trim and is wearing split fins..... Obviously not me. I was still
happy with what I went home with.
I had three absolutely fantastic meals at El Moro on the dirt road near the middle of San
Miguel, and also good meals @ Prima Trattoria, and Tony Rome's (not Tony Roma's).
It was suggested to eat at "La Chozza" which was fairly mediocre. I ate at Fridays once as
well and it was, um, pretty much like eating at Fridays here. Didn't make it to Pepe's this
time (probably saved enough money for a two-tanker w/ nitrox too).
BTW, if you haven't been to Coz lately, it's changed a LOT. Between 5 and 12 cruise ships
stop there everyday except Sunday now. The last time I was there, there were only 3 or 4 a
WEEK. Carlos 'n Charlies moved into a new "mall" called Punta Langosta (lobster point),
There's a Friday's now, two Hard Rock Cafes, and of course those irritating time share
sellers that have been there a while now. I really needed to be wearing a shirt that said:
I'M NOT LOOKING FOR ANYTHING, LEAVE ME ALONE!!!!
and on the back it would say:
YOU BETTER HURRY BACK TO YOUR SHIP, IT'S LEAVING
The ships all depart about 9pm and Coz returns to "normal".
Dive it like you stole it,
Brian
The profile below was on San Francisco Wall
