Hotel Cozumel and Blue XT Sea Report

[Hooked4Life]

Dates: March 10 - March 17, 2005

Hotel: Hotel Cozumel

Overall the general appearance of the hotel was very good. You would see a crew of workers every morning on the grounds. The staff was courteous and helpful. They had onsite travel advisors to book day trips and to rent automobiles. We rented a jeep for a day and they gave you a 25% discount. The rooms were sufficient, but the beds were pretty hard. We went all inclusive for this trip. The breakfast was good and had a nice fruit selection. The lunch was good and very convenient. We would be dropped off from our morning dive and we went straight to lunch since it was located right off the pier. For the price that we paid for the all inclusive option the Breakfast and Lunch made it worth it. Each dinner had a theme for the night. Some of them were good and some were bad. They had Italian night 3 nights. Since we live in NJ we would not go to Mexico to sample Italian food. It was mediocre at best. They did have cookouts on the beach 2 nights that were excellent. Since we were diving we did not become a lush for the alcoholic drinks, but it did come in handy some times. The mixed drinks were pretty good, but the beer was so watered down. Okay I admit that we had several My Ti's but Gaza talked us into it.

Diving: Blue XT Sea

We booked 5 days of 2 tank dives and 1 night dive. The first 2 days were our AOW (Advanced Open Water) training dives. Javier was our instructor and he was really excellent! He made sure that we nailed every skill. He stressed Buoyancy Control on every dive. If anyone here has had the pleasure to dive with Javier you will see what I am talking about. He leads by example showing you during the dive. Our buoyancy improved tremendously over the week of diving and our dive log shows how much air we saved. We were on a fast boat each day and the most amount of divers on the boat were 5. They had 2 dive masters on board. Mago (The Captain) was excellent and he knew the reefs like the back of his hand. Tell him you want to see his magic tricks. There were so many great dives. Some of my favorites were Santa Rosa Wall, Palancar and Paradise Reed. We had the pleasure of diving and meeting a few people Gaza(hangtimex), Dick, Fran(sailit2000), Chuck, Dave/Cindy. Next trip to Cozumel we will get our Nitrox certification. Javier is a great instructor and you cant beat the diving. If you like fast boats, personalized service, only a few divers on a boat, great crew, safety first, and a great dive experience then I highly recommend Blue XT Sea.

Pictures: http://www.scubastruck.com/

 

[Warren_L]

Great report. We also had a group down in Coz at Hotel Cozumel in January. This was my second trip there and the accomodations were decent, but the food had definitely gone down hill since my trip there a year prior. Not bad for all inclusive still.

 

[ggunn]

The BEER was watered down?

 

[Len]

The BEER was watered down?

I don't understand that comment either.
It does seem to be a little weaker than Canadian suds...but watered down ???
Where would the "watering down" take place ?

 

[Hooked4Life]

The tap was watered down. No bottled beer available at Hotel Cozumel.

I suppose the watering down would take place somewhere between the tap and the keg.

 

[Hooked4Life]

I had the same beer in town bottled and it tasted totally different. Draft beer vs bottled beer there is a difference, but not that great of a difference.

 

[parrotheaddiver]

Draft beer always tastes different than bottled beer to me. Could that been the difference? It didn't taste watered down to me, but then it has been 10 months since I was there. I guess they would have to water down the whole keg at the brewery :06: