AOW, Stay and General Advice for Cozumel/Cancun?

[whaleshark112]

Hi, I am a new diver, have my OW and ~10 dives after that. Going to Cancun/Coz this Dec. I def want to do AOW during this trip, and already leaning towards doing it in Cozumel. Any recommendations for dive shops to do AOW/ general advice is appreciated as this will be my first time in Cancun/Coz and Mexico in general. I already reached out to Scuba Tony and they dont have availability in that week. I saw a lot of folks here mention Scuba with Alison, not sure if she teaches AOW - reached out to her and waiting for a response as well.

Here's what I am thinking:
day 1: arrive in cancun
day 2: do MUSA + reef 2 tank dive in cancun to get myself used to diving again - any recommendations for dive shops (and stays)? Wondering if I should directly select the one offered by MUSA or some other operator? I will definitely need a DM esp since I will be the sole diver on my trip.
day 3: travel to Coz and other chill things around Cancun
Day 4/5/6 - AOW + fun dives in Coz - dive shop and instructor recommendations? stay recommendations? Booked a placeholder at Casa Mexicana looking at some of the other divers in the Nov/Dec roll call; looked like a decent place, is that area relatively safe?
Day 7/8/9: back to playa, possible cenote diving - any recs?
Day 10: travel back

I generally dont book packages but if there is a more economical way to do this via a package I am open to suggestions as well.

 

[scrane]

Try Tres Pelicanos. My friend just got his AOW there. Casa Mexicana is very safe as long as you don't fall down the escalator. Tres Pelicanos can book Casa Mexicana as part of a package.
Cozumel is very safe in general. I've never had or seen a problem there.

 

[NDL_Diver]

Skip diving MUSA and travel direcly to Cozumel and do a referesher than your AOW. Diving Cancun does not compare what you will see in Cozumel.
Contact Aldora divers or Tres Pelicanos and ask about dive and stay package at Casa Mexicana. Good inexpensive hotel with a great breakfast included.
Aldora will be more expensive but they use steel 120 cf tanks vs 80 cf for longer dives. You can pay extra for 100 cf tank with 3P. Aldora has 6 boats and groups people to skill and air consumption for a more enjoyable experience.
Dive with Martin will probably be the least expensive since they offer free gear rental (if you don't have a dive kit) vs paying extra for equipment.
Many other dive shops available.

 

[boulderjohn]

I had an excellent experience doing my AOW in Cozumel, but that was a long, long time ago, and a lot has changed, so anything I recommend form that experience would involve people long gone. I will try to make things a little more generic.

I did my AOW with a dive shop (Dive with Martin) located right on a beach next to what was then the International pier. I was the only AOW student in the class, and I got great individual attention and learned far more than the courses called for. Being right on the shore was a real plus. We did several dives as shore dives, which is otherwise hard to do in Cozumel. That was a real bonus for the navigation dive--it's tough to do the navigation requirements on a drift dive. The night dive was wonderful--we walked in one shore and explored the nearby airplane, after which I used my new navigation skills to get us back to the entry point in the dark. We then did the other dives off the boat.

So I would favor a dive operator with good shore access, and there are more than a few, including the aforementioned Aldora.

 

[ggunn]

I have two suggestions which may or may not be controversial:

If you must fly into Cancun, get to Cozumel as quickly as you can; there is nothing, diving-wise, that you will find around Cancun that will compare to what is at Cozumel, and nothing about Cancun is "chill". The Cancun hotel zone is several miles north of the airport, and Playa del Carmen (where you will catch the ferry to Cozumel) is south. If diving is the point of the vacation, head south from the airport.

Get more experience diving before going for an AOW certification. Getting AOW with only 10 dives after OW certification will not make you an advanced diver, and in some places showing an AOW card with that little experience might expose you to situations for which you are not prepared. There is plenty of great diving to be had around Cozumel for the novice (which you are), and Cozumel ops will typically judge your skills by how you handle yourself in the water rather than what card you show them.

 

[nodakdive]

Ditto on going to Cozumel immediately. It sounds like you want to do some diving. MUSA was kinda "meh" in the opinion of a friend who is a bronze artist. The cenotes (which we did prior to the museum on the same day) were the bomb in his opinion. Maybe combine cenotes and the museum later in your trip?

Imo, doing the AOW with 10 dives or 2 dives or 20 dives depends on the diver. The course would be called "Advancing on Open Water" if I ran the circus. In addition to some navigation skills, it adds task loading and the chance to experience a deep dive, all under the guidance of an Instructor. With an OW card only, you still may be faced with doing the first dive of a trip to, say, 80 feet, which may be beyond the limits of your training. heh. It doesn't make one an advanced diver, of course.

Assuming the OP has taken to diving fairly well, I'd suggest:
Day 1 - Get to Cozumel
Day 2 - Do two shore dives, one possibly a refresher or a fun dive, the other the Navigation Dive.
Day 3 - Do the two morning boat dives. Pay the extra $50-$60 for a private DM.
Day 4 - Do the Deep dive and another AOW dive, like a photography dive.
Day 5 - Finish the AOW. When I did it, we did a twilight wreck and a night dive.

By this time, you'll have some experience with Cozumel diving and some of "the ropes", all of which will have been done with nearly private training and guidance if not completely private training and guidance. Not a bad introduction to a new locale. Though your training dives may be covered with regard to insurance, get dive insurance anyway, prior to your trip.

 

[EdC]

Get more experience diving before going for an AOW certification. Getting AOW with only 10 dives after OW certification will not make you an advanced diver, and in some places showing an AOW card with that little experience might expose you to situations for which you are not prepared. There is plenty of great diving to be had around Cozumel for the novice (which you are), and Cozumel ops will typically judge your skills by how you handle yourself in the water rather than what card you show them.

I agree, just go to Cozumel, relax, dive, work on getting perfect buoyancy and have fun. You will go to the same sites as you would with AOW and you can get more comfortable for when you eventually complete AOW.

I started my AOW on my very first salt water dive, the first dive after OW. I can tell you I had few brain cells available to learn much from it, I was busy trying to not drown. Of course I passed, but I had to teach myself navigation later, as well as buoyancy.

 

[scrane]

Get the ticket. It will open a lot of doors.

 

[ggunn]

Get the ticket. It will open a lot of doors.

Not necessarily. I have been diving Cozumel for more than 25 years on an OW cert, and I have never been asked to show an AOW card in order to dive anywhere I want to go. The ops on Cozumel know that there are lots of AOW card holders who are not experienced divers and lots of OW card holders who are. If they don't know you they typically will take you on easy dives at first to see how you handle yourself in the water.

 

[EdC]

Get the ticket. It will open a lot of doors.

What doors are those? And what’s the hurry? It’s not a race.

Also to OP, Barracuda is a decent enough place, food close, and a pier onsite for pickup.