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Hi, We spent 4 diving days last week at Scuba Club Cozumel. Prior to the trip I had asked here what the shore diving was like and got some great responses. Well now that I have spent several hours underwater there, I have some idea and can share my shore diving experiences with you. I may write separately about the boat diving.
First, the resort, Scuba Club Cozumel is very quiet and at no time were we ever crowded. Shore diving is done on your own time. You pick up some tanks and jump in. If you want to dive after 6PM, when the dive shop closes, grab some tanks before 6 and put them in your locker near the on-site dive shop. Easy.. about as easy as it was for us at Den Lamen in Bonaire. You can get into the water either by a 3 foot 'giant' step from the pier or walk down a ladder into a small pool and then swim through a sheltered area. When you get in you will see the damage that was done to the island by the hurricanes. It is safe to say that a lot of the rubble you see are the remnants of old piers. You can even see the imbedded scuba tanks in the concrete. This rubble and the shore rock is a great place to start looking for creatures. There were plenty of creatures to see. I have put some pictures of the creatures on the web at http://delargy.com/2009_04_Cozumel/cozumel_2009.htm
(These pictures include boat dives as well as shore dives)
In addition to the rubble, there are some concrete shapes that have been put there to create habitat for the creatures. There are what look like gates, upside-down cones and other sundry shapes. There is even a replica of a Mayan pyramid!
We did 8 shore dives in the 4 days we were there and saw something new on each one. It is not a 'close to shore' reef system like Bonaire has, so you don't see the number and the variety of fish that you will see there. No large schools of Wrasse feeding all around you. You will see plenty of juveniles and the usual damsels, angels, puffer fish, porcupine fish, grunts, tangs, drums, scorpion fish, high hats, soldierfish, bigeyes, etc. We saw a lot of juvenile filefish on every dive. At night we saw at least 3 octopi on each dive. Plenty of eels were out hunting as well. I saw my first slipper lobsters there. I hear that they are even better eating than the Caribbean spiny lobsters, but eating what I am taking pictures of isn't my thing.
I have put together a 10 minute video that shows some of the shore diving we did as well as a general overview of Scuba Club Cozumel.
We loved Cozumel. It was our first trip there and we felt the folks were very friendly and personable, given that we are just another tourist to them. We were there when the cruise ships stopped coming in and it was a pleasure walking around downtown without the crowds. Other than the occasional request to sit down and eat dinner or drink beer and tequilla at 10 in the morning J we were mostly left to ourselves.
It was a short walk to town. No taxis needed.
Scuba Club Cozumel was easy to just hang out at, especially when you come back at 1 from your morning dives, have lunch and then start your shore dives. The food was fine, I didn't order anything that I didn't finish.. that is probably just me though J. If you do eat later then they will likely be out of your choice for dessert.
I would go back again. It is a great value. The diving was good, the food was good, the island was good. Now if I could just get there on a non-stop flight from Boston.. I would be there a lot.
Last edited by under water; May 8th, 2009 at 09:59 AM.
Reason: clarification
Men are like fine wine. They start out as grapes, and it's up to the women to stomp the crap out of them until they turn into something acceptable to have dinner with.
The conch image has two "bumble bee shrimp" in the picture
Your ??? is a cowrie.
The sphere is a "sea pearl" aka "sailor's eyeball" - a one-celled algae
The last image "what is this" is a worm.
Thanks Jim for those IDs. I'll update the captions to reflect the new knowledge :-)
Any idea what kind of worm that last thing is? I haven't really cracked open the books yet to ID them.
Is it possible that the conch at a 'cleaning station' ? I see another bumble bee shrimp hanging out in the background.
Nice report and I'm glad to hear you enjoyed the trip. Do you mind if I use/link to your You Tube video to show our group what SCC shore diving is like? Heading out in 65 days.
Nice report and I'm glad to hear you enjoyed the trip. Do you mind if I use/link to your You Tube video to show our group what SCC shore diving is like? Heading out in 65 days.
Thanks Jim for those IDs. I'll update the captions to reflect the new knowledge :-)
Any idea what kind of worm that last thing is? I haven't really cracked open the books yet to ID them.
Is it possible that the conch at a 'cleaning station' ? I see another bumble bee shrimp hanging out in the background.
The worm is a sabellarid, tube-dwelling polychaete worm.
The bumble bee shrimp are usually found with sea cucumbers, but there's no reason they can't hide and travel with a conch.
Nice report and I'm glad to hear you enjoyed the trip. Do you mind if I use/link to your You Tube video to show our group what SCC shore diving is like? Heading out in 65 days.
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Originally Posted by jlyle
