Blue angel experience and Scuba Club questions.

[kcjon]

We just returned from 10 days at the Blue Angel. We had a good time and enjoyed the hotel. the staff was excellent. One downside is that there are many outside people who used the hotel facilities. My wife is a non diver so she noticed more than me, but it seems cruisers just wander in and use the pool/chairs and snag some free wifi which was very limited to the amount of people who could be online. Albatros charters also loaded daily trips on the BA dock so you would have groups waiting and taking over pool chairs. This kind of rubbed us wrong and the pool and chairs are pretty limited and several times hotel guests could not find spots while the cruiser/groups were there. The last day 5 drunk russian guys showed up and totally took over the pool area, yelling and jumping and splashing the entire ares. The staff didnt seem empowered to intervene with the nonpaying guests. We were a little disappointed as we were expecition a little more serenity at such a little hotel.

Ive also looked at Scuba Club and they have a guard at the front gate. For those of you that have stayed there, are they better at keeping the cruisers from coming in taking over.

 

[shardison]

Yes they are. You will not see anyone inside of SCC that does not room there.... The only exception I can think of where that would not be the case is (they will allow guests in of someone who is staying there, but they are not allowed in the rooms). I have not ever had or seen that happen though... Most of the guests are bringing their party with them.

SCC does not allow anyone else to use their dock either. So you won't have random people walking thru the resort all day. Nor will you see many/any cruisers at SCC... Dive boats leave the dock too early for cruisers to be on board.

My wife is a nondiver, and during the day when the "diving" guests are out, she has peace and quiet while laying in a hammock sipping on Cocktails.

 

[DeputyDan]

My non-diving wife really enjoyed SCC when the divers were off doing their (our) thing.
We enjoyed our stay there.

 

[robint]

SCC resort is dead quiet while the dive boats are out. Many of the non-diving spouses lay around the pool and read books or head into town to shop. It really is peaceful all day. The guards keep out the outsiders, which is another reason we love it.

 

[Karloss]

We have only been three times, twice at the first of October and the first time in May(I believe). This last trip in October I did notice what was described above as far as the crowd. It was somewhat bad for the early hours of the afternoon, from 1200 to around may be 3:00 pm. It didn't particularly bother me being that I tend to stay indoors when I can. What bothered me were the Europeans eating at the restaurant with no shirts, cultural thing I guess, the restaurant didn't turn them away. Well it wasn't an all day thing nor did it appear to be random, from what I observed it was done in a group setting with maybe three different intervals.

 

[pword]

We were just at Blue Angel last week for our first trip. The only day I didn't have a snorkel trip planned and sat under the palapa that morning by the pool there was a large, more than 20, group that docked there and went to the dive shop to get their equipment. They did not use the pool area and left after about 20 minutes. So yes the dock is being used now by other ops but it wasn't a big deal on this day. I saw no day tripper cruisers on that day. There were many ships in port all week and common areas seemed normal guests most of the time.

One poster mentioned people eating in the restaurant in their bathing suits. Yes we experienced this too and it was disgusting to see a naked fat belly while trying to eat. But this was isolated incidents.l

Road noise was not an issue with a/c running and bathroom door shut on our third floor room.

Food is outstanding and snorkeling around stingray city cage and out front is quite good. PM me if you have other questions.

 

[amoses]

SCC resort is dead quiet while the dive boats are out. Many of the non-diving spouses lay around the pool and read books or head into town to shop. It really is peaceful all day. The guards keep out the outsiders, which is another reason we love it.

Is town far from SCC? Did they walk? Get a taxi? Or did you have a rental car? I was thinking about bringing my non-diving wife, but I was worried she would be bored there, since it is more geared toward diving than anything else, and I really wanted to spend the majority of my days there diving. But she wasn't very happy that I am coming by myself though either.

 

[robint]

it is maybe a 15-20 min easy walk to town from SCC front gate. We usually walk to town, then taxi back which is about $5-6 depending where they pick you up.

 

[dima_ras]

If your primary goal is diving and you are beyond novice level I strongly recommend BA over SCC. I stayed in BA and dove with both them and SCC during the last week of July. SCC has big boat (Dive Cat) with many divers. On multiple occasions it stopped on a site crowded by other boats. I was diving with an instructor there, but my friends who were diving at the same time complained that they got separated on one occasion from the group since their DM wash not easily distinguishable in a crowd; on other occasion one of them got behind while taking a picture, was unable to catch up (and DM did not notice or did not put attention), and had to surface alone. They also were finishing all dives with 1000 -1500psi left. I was also finishing all dives with more than 1000 psi, but I was with instructor, and we mostly followed PADI course program.
My experience with BA (Dive master Jose) was quite different: They have small fast (very fast!) boats, so even the ride to the far away Punta Sur was no more than half an hour. We made the best from each dive. The dives were 40 min to more than an hour, and I never surfaced with more than 500 psi. There were just 5-7 divers in a group. Jose was amazing in spotting marine life that we overlooked, but at the same time he would immediately notice if something is going wrong with somebody (including the night dive). Also we always docked or moved to shallow water between the dives, and were served fresh fruit (melon&water melon) and baked goods. That was fantastic!

 

[JFS]

Blue Angel is great. Every shop has their quirks. If there is an advanced dive and you want it, make it known and they will take care of you. It may not be today or manana but they will try to accommodate. All divemasters ( Jose, JP, Norman, Matteo, Andreas...and others are very experienced) some are fantastic with the macro critters , some are great with deep dives and specialty stuff, but if you want something ....ASK and they will do their best to help you. Facilities are the best, staff is awesome, English no problemo. IMHO one of the the best in Cozumel.