Cozumel report Dec 2019
I finished a couple of weeks of diving with friends staying here from Canada and dived from Dec 1 to 13 with a night dive at paradise. We dove with Bottomtimedivers.net. Many times it was the three of us diving but we did have a couple of other divers for a few days and several days with another single diver. I dove 19 dives and my friends dove 18 and 26 dives. Good weather, little rain. Good visibility except for a few days. There were quite a lot of jellyfish which I think are Moon Jellyfish but they did not sting much and were higher in the water column.
Wildlife:
Many Green Moray Eels, quite a lot of Spotted Moray Eels and a few Goldentail Moray eels. Many of the Green Morays were out swimming freely and slowly. We followed a few for 5 minutes or so on multiple occasions.
Many porcupine and Balloonfish
Less larger spotted drums but did find juvenile drums and a few miniscule juveniles so that my camera could not focus.
A lot of toadfish.
Many octopus on the night dive and a few found in holes during the day.
Less turtles than Sep/Oct and mostly hawksbill with one or two Green Turtles.
Many lobsters in the park.
The first few days had many large lionfish on La Francesa and Dalila. We can’t tell if they came up from deeper or from Palancar area sites. We took the lionfish to Pez Leon restaurant and they cooked them for the group.
The current was running slow to the North as opposed to earlier this fall with current running in many directions.
Dive sites: All sites from Palancar and south were still closed. They are due to re-open Dec 15 for those dive ops with proper permits. We did on occasion notice boats in the closed area but could not tell what they were doing. We dived sites from La Francesa to San Juan in the North including Villablanca and Paradise (night). We did stop by Eagle ray station but saw only a single Eagle ray so maybe they will start to school soon. Current in the North sites was slower.
We dived sites that we normally don’t spend much time on like Tunich wall, splitting reefs (half and half), spent some time up in the shallower sand sites looking for eagle rays, or other things like batfish and seahorses. We did see Eagle rays there but no batfish or seahorses.
Many of the sites like Santa Rosa and Cedral Pass had quite a lot of divers on them but normally they passed by or we cut over to different parts of the reef. We tried to leave earlier as well or chose sites on location that had fewer divers and boats. Many dive boats in the area with many large packed boats.
Balloonfish
Banded Butterflyfish
Black Grouper
Spotted Moray Eel
Clinging Channel crab
Conch
Flamingo Tongue
Foureye Butterflyfish
Green Moray Eel
Hawksbill Turtle
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I finished a couple of weeks of diving with friends staying here from Canada and dived from Dec 1 to 13 with a night dive at paradise. We dove with Bottomtimedivers.net. Many times it was the three of us diving but we did have a couple of other divers for a few days and several days with another single diver. I dove 19 dives and my friends dove 18 and 26 dives. Good weather, little rain. Good visibility except for a few days. There were quite a lot of jellyfish which I think are Moon Jellyfish but they did not sting much and were higher in the water column.
Wildlife:
Many Green Moray Eels, quite a lot of Spotted Moray Eels and a few Goldentail Moray eels. Many of the Green Morays were out swimming freely and slowly. We followed a few for 5 minutes or so on multiple occasions.
Many porcupine and Balloonfish
Less larger spotted drums but did find juvenile drums and a few miniscule juveniles so that my camera could not focus.
A lot of toadfish.
Many octopus on the night dive and a few found in holes during the day.
Less turtles than Sep/Oct and mostly hawksbill with one or two Green Turtles.
Many lobsters in the park.
The first few days had many large lionfish on La Francesa and Dalila. We can’t tell if they came up from deeper or from Palancar area sites. We took the lionfish to Pez Leon restaurant and they cooked them for the group.
The current was running slow to the North as opposed to earlier this fall with current running in many directions.
Dive sites: All sites from Palancar and south were still closed. They are due to re-open Dec 15 for those dive ops with proper permits. We did on occasion notice boats in the closed area but could not tell what they were doing. We dived sites from La Francesa to San Juan in the North including Villablanca and Paradise (night). We did stop by Eagle ray station but saw only a single Eagle ray so maybe they will start to school soon. Current in the North sites was slower.
We dived sites that we normally don’t spend much time on like Tunich wall, splitting reefs (half and half), spent some time up in the shallower sand sites looking for eagle rays, or other things like batfish and seahorses. We did see Eagle rays there but no batfish or seahorses.
Many of the sites like Santa Rosa and Cedral Pass had quite a lot of divers on them but normally they passed by or we cut over to different parts of the reef. We tried to leave earlier as well or chose sites on location that had fewer divers and boats. Many dive boats in the area with many large packed boats.
Balloonfish
Banded Butterflyfish
Black Grouper
Spotted Moray Eel
Clinging Channel crab
Conch
Flamingo Tongue
Foureye Butterflyfish
Green Moray Eel
Hawksbill Turtle
More follows