June 18-30 Cozumel Dive Trip

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"You're kidding, right? 2,000+ dives and you post that? The North Atlantic Subtropical Gyre current circles the north ocean and passes around Cozumel, generally south to north, but with eddies that will seem like reverse currents, down currents, intersecting, etc. Surely you've dive worse, and surely you knew all that? "

Dang, that was Harsh!
After 4 yrs in college & 9 yrs in the Navy, I never knew what "The North Atlantic Subtropical Gyre current......." is & how it affected my diving in Cozumel. Maybe I should go back to school to learn all that stuff before I head down to relax & dive while on vacation. Maybe Cozumel is a little too complicated a place for me to dive, maybe I should go to an easier, more elementary place to do my diving. I should just go back to diving the Pacific, Arctic & Bering Sea, where it's to damn freezing cold that I don't have time to worry about the gyres, the eddies, & the reverse & intersecting currents...

Don you are having a "harsh" week. Negative comments about a posters photo size, aloha girls generosity and now currents. FWIW, I have never heard of a North Atlantic Subtropical Gyre current either. Thats not your usual style. Having a bad week????
 
"You're kidding, right? 2,000+ dives and you post that? The North Atlantic Subtropical Gyre current circles the north ocean and passes around Cozumel, generally south to north, but with eddies that will seem like reverse currents, down currents, intersecting, etc. Surely you've dive worse, and surely you knew all that? "

Dang, that was Harsh!
After 4 yrs in college & 9 yrs in the Navy, I never knew what "The North Atlantic Subtropical Gyre current......." is & how it affected my diving in Cozumel. Maybe I should go back to school to learn all that stuff before I head down to relax & dive while on vacation. Maybe Cozumel is a little too complicated a place for me to dive, maybe I should go to an easier, more elementary place to do my diving. I should just go back to diving the Pacific, Arctic & Bering Sea, where it's to damn freezing cold that I don't have time to worry about the gyres, the eddies, & the reverse & intersecting currents...
Yeah, maybe it was - my apologies. As I said later here, perhaps you didn't mean it like it sounded - as I often type other than I meant, including there. There's nothing to "worry" about for the average Rec diver with good principles in Coz, and certainly not for you.

Really not familiar with the NAST Gyre? Hurricanes ride it all the way from Africa at times'; it is the source of the circular current around the Caribbean with generally hits Coz from the south; and sometimes eddies form back currents close to shore. On some shore dives I am surprised but just swim into the current to 1500# then turn to ride back in 1000#. The down currents along walls are more worrisome perhaps, but easy to swim out of.

Ever dive the Flower Gardens? The Gyre is how the coral and fish got started there and of course still hits it at times now, like the one time I did it. What about Florida Keys wrecks? It goes thru there before turning north. NC wrecks? Keep them tropical until winter - washing some tropical fish up to New England where they don't survive winters. Then it continues over to the UK keeping those islands much warmer than they would be without it, before veering back south to Africa again. Also creates the Saragossa Sea: Oceanic gyre - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Don you are having a "harsh" week. Negative comments about a posters photo size, aloha girls generosity and now currents. FWIW, I have never heard of a North Atlantic Subtropical Gyre current either. Thats not your usual style. Having a bad week????
No I was not harsh about the other poster's photo size, but I withdrew the comments anyway.

To answer your question, I have bad days. Mostly I am just blunt by nature, altho I try to be polite about it - sometimes failing.
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Day 7

Today started with a search for a 2450 battery for my dive computer. Per the suggestion of fin59 on scubaboard we tried the hotel Cozumel gift shop followed by Dive Paradise across the street from out hotel They had a battery in stock but at $12USD. Anywhere else that would be highway robbery here I am happy to find it. Total search time 20 minutes.

We then walked up to Isis rental cars they were charging $30 for a hard top VW including insurance. We picked up the bug which was in surprisingly good condition and headed around the island.
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We stopped at Punta Sur. Saw the alligator “Max”,
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then went up the light house. Some real nice views from up there.
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Then over to the beach area. We laid around in the hammocks, read a book, went for a walk along the beach, laughed at the people from the cruise ships with their snorkel vests on (with the strap between their legs pulled nice and snug).
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We then drove over to the natural bridges. This was pretty cool with neat formations and real jagged rocks everywhere.
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I am sure there have been lots of vacations ruined here with a sliced open foot or ankle. We were getting hungry so we split a coconut from one of the vendors with chili and limon. Yummy. Then it was up to Coconuts for a late lunch,
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The prices were surprisingly cheap for being pretty isolated and with the gorgeous views. The wife had shrimp ceviche and I had the fish tacos. It was her first time with ceviche and I think she is now hooked.
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Then it was back to the hotel were we laid by the pool, read a book met a couple from Austin, Texas talked with them for a couple hours, The wife does the same job as we do but for our competitor.

We wanted to try Blue Truck tacos for dinner (across from the cruise ship terminal) since we had a car but it looks like they are a lunch only place. We stopped at the cruise terminal got some nice sunset pics with the carnival imagination in the background.
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Then the wife had to check out the shops big difference in prices from downtown vanilla was almost twice the price but the bullwhips she wanted were almost half price here, so she bought 2 for her nephews.

Dinner was Los Otates, we changed our order a little getting the gringas, pastor and pezole.
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This was the wifes first time with pezole. It was very good to excellent. Then drove over to the mega for some cash from the ATM. Also stopping for an ice cream from the shop downstairs “La Michocan”. My Strawberry and cream and the wifes caramel were very good. 16 peso for a scoop compared to 30 downtown or 20 across the street. They also have chocolate covered bananas that I will have to try sometime later.

The wife ran around getting everything ready for tomorrows dive so she wouldn't have to run around getting everything ready in the morning, she doesn't like mornings. Then it was to bed around 10, then up at 2:30 to write the report.
 
Day 8
We got up early to return the rental car. We had to it up first which was kind of a pain. You can only get in from the north west side of the station on 30th and juarez, which we didn't realize until we drove down 30th and realized you can't get there from here so we spiraled in we got our gas making sure the pump was zeroed and counting the money out to him. We had been cheated over in playa when we didn't count the money out , oh well lesson learned. Then on to Isis on 5th and 2nd. The return went well no dings or scratches found by the very thorough inspection given.

It was only 8:00 so we walked back to Sergio's instead of catching a cab. The boat had 9 of us to day with 2 DM. We took the spare video housing to test it today and about 50 ft the front glue joint started leaking. Oh well I thought it might as I had tried to repair it once already. The first dive was at Bricks It was a nice dive but it was the first time I have felt crowded underwater We stayed as one group and when we tried to take pictures going through swim threws it was a mess people running into each other and a lot of sad being stirred up. This was also the first time we had run into other dive ops. At one point there was a large lobster sitting out in plane sight the other group was there first and a couple of people took shot of it with one guy that took at least 6 or 8. I “patiently” waited my turn snapped a couple shots then raced to catch back up to the group. I think we passed 3 different groups on this dive. We had a nice surface interval again. The Dms have all seemed impressed with my housing and have been asking questions about it, to make there own. So we spent most of the interval talking about where to find parts. And Sergio who has been doing this for 30 years was giving tips and telling me how to design a hydro chamber to test the housings at home. Using an old tank and a bicycle inner tube. The second dive was a nice shallow drift got a few decent photos. The butterfly fish were really posing nice to day.

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We managed to schedule a night dive tonight. So we ran over to MEGA for batteries they were onsale buy 2 get one free fortunately, because they were 54 peso for a 2 pack. I think they are about 5 bucks for a 12 pack back home. It was getting late so we went to the mall behind Chedraui by the cinema to a place recommended by someone. Well it was fast and relatively cheap but we won't be going back. I had a combo of Bistek, charro beans, and horchatta, the wife had 4 pastor tacos and horchata for around $10. The beans were very good but the problem was the food was tough, very chewy. Then it was of to Caletta, taxi fare was 90 peso.

When we got to the boat waiting to take off we saw a large 8-10 salt water croc swimming around the harbor then heading out to sea. There were 6 divers plus Sergio Jr. What an incredible dive It started with a monster lobster. Then it got better we saw at least 6 octopus, a ton of lobster and crab, 3-5 moray out swimming, a nice small puffer, several rays. It was an incredible dive.
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The end of the dive is the only time I have felt uncomfortable diving with Sergio. I usually last 15+ minutes longer than the next longest diver. So like on this mornings dive Sergio went up to 15-20 feet and watched from there. On tonight's dive Sergio jr did the same thing, but this was at night and while he had his light pointing down I could keep track of him with no problem but when he pointed his light up to signal the boat I had a hard time locating him and with the difference in currents plus stopping to take photos being able to locate people is important. So I decided to head up with 1200psi still in my tank. I learned tonight that this video camera keeps the same zoom when you turn it off and back on so the whole dive I was stuck with it zoomed in about ½ way. Still got some nice video just using the flashlights. We are definitely going to have to invest in new lights the ones people rented from the shop were so much better, brighter with a wider beam. We got back to the room and had to watch the video it was pretty cool and very enjoyable. I bed by 11 and a full 8 hrs sleep later its day 9.
 
DiverDownAZ:
laughed at the people from the cruise ships with their snorkel vests on (with the strap between their legs pulled nice and snug).
:rofl3::rofl3::rofl3::rofl3::rofl3::rofl3::rofl3:
 
Originally Posted by DiverDownAZ
laughed at the people from the cruise ships with their snorkel vests on (with the strap between their legs pulled nice and snug).
That's the way I wear mine and taught my family. :confused:
 
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