profmason
Registered
Diving in Colombia from July 24 - Aug 10. I haven't seen much information about this so I thought I would share. I dove with a colombian dive guide in Mexico who highly recommended the area around Santa marta as a mellow dive destination with good coral.
I flew in to Santa Marta which is easy from LA with a stop in Panama on Copa airlines. A 40 minute taxi ride to Taganga (the diving village that borders the tayrona national park.
Day 1. Sidemount class pool instruction
Day 2: Sidemount skills at Solidero and calichan off isla de la aguja. Training sites some some sandy bottom but nice brain and staghorn coral. A fair sampling of reef fish. Visibility 70 ft water temperature 82
Day 3: Sidemount skills at Solidero and calichan off isla de la aguja. See above. Visibility 70 ft water temperature 82
Day 4: Diving Paso Del Angel, la Traversa to Morrito Largo. It was a good trek with some current with an eager young DM. Morrito Largo is a seperate island that you fin to during la traversa. It is a nice wall and drops off deep (limited by the MOD of N32). Nice formations. Visibility 70 ft water temperature 82
Day 5: El corito and el Coro, got a fair bit of wind and chop which limited visibility. Visibility 40 ft, water temperature 82.
Day 6: Punto de Granate: Had some juniors on the boat so dropped of here and then headed out deep off solidero, really spectacular staghorn coral. Visibility 80 ft temperature 82
Two nights of shore dives off Taganga beach. In both cases was out 70 - 80 minutes in 25 ft of water. You can swim out from the beach about 10 minutes to reach decent coral and lots of usual night life, crustaceans etc. Octopus were playful. Night time water temperatures were the same 82 and air temperature was in the mid 70s.
Several more days of diving much like the above.
In summary good visibility, warm water, nice coral, OK reef fish. It is very easy convenient diving. I stayed at a AirBNB for $18 / night with a great terrace overlooking the ocean. It was an easy 5 minutes walk to the dive shop and then another 5 minute walk to the beach (your gear and tanks are delivered to the boat) . I dove with german owned posideon dive center which after looking at a lot of other boats would argue has the nicest boat. (custom build catamaran with dual yamaha 150s and and easy step in entry and a nice dive ladder. Many of the other ops have you taking BCDs off and climbing over the side of the boat. Diving prices were about $85/ 2 tanks at the high end (where I was) to $60 / 2 tanks. Ops are full service. Classes are inexpensive with lots of folks going through open water at $230 total(at the low end). My 3 day private sidemount course was $360 all inclusive with an excellent instructor. It was easy to keep to a budget of $150 per day including diving.
Visiting Rosario Islands off Cartegena. I booked with Diving Planet (who was sidemount friendly). They have a slip at the navy pier. It is about an hour boat ride to the island. We did two dives off the east side if isla grande. The first dive I enjoyed good visibility 90ft and 86 degree surface temperatures with a thermocline to 80 degrees at 8-12 feet. The first dive had a nice wall and Coral was in good condition with noticably more reef fish then in Taganga. I started to have sinus problems and called the second dive after 55 minutes due to sinus pressure which meant I was in no shape to appreciate the diving. I had booked two nights on the island to get in 7 dives, but it was not to be. I took the boat back to cartegena the next day and 4 days recovering from cold symptoms with my diving cut short. Diving planet was a fine operation (though not at the level of posideon) running 10 people on fast boats with 2-3 DMs separated by skill level. Time to dive sites was only 10-15 minutes from the island at diving planet picks up at all the docs on the island. The ride back to cartegena was 70+ minutes with lots of wind and chop bouncing the boat around.
With direct flights from miami to cartegena under 3 hours, it seems like the Caribbean side of colombia should be a solid low key warm water relaxing dive destination on the cheap. Likewise from LA to Santa Marta was an easy jump. There was little to no sign of US tourists, though I met many lovely folks from the netherlands, germany and spain.
I flew in to Santa Marta which is easy from LA with a stop in Panama on Copa airlines. A 40 minute taxi ride to Taganga (the diving village that borders the tayrona national park.
Day 1. Sidemount class pool instruction
Day 2: Sidemount skills at Solidero and calichan off isla de la aguja. Training sites some some sandy bottom but nice brain and staghorn coral. A fair sampling of reef fish. Visibility 70 ft water temperature 82
Day 3: Sidemount skills at Solidero and calichan off isla de la aguja. See above. Visibility 70 ft water temperature 82
Day 4: Diving Paso Del Angel, la Traversa to Morrito Largo. It was a good trek with some current with an eager young DM. Morrito Largo is a seperate island that you fin to during la traversa. It is a nice wall and drops off deep (limited by the MOD of N32). Nice formations. Visibility 70 ft water temperature 82
Day 5: El corito and el Coro, got a fair bit of wind and chop which limited visibility. Visibility 40 ft, water temperature 82.
Day 6: Punto de Granate: Had some juniors on the boat so dropped of here and then headed out deep off solidero, really spectacular staghorn coral. Visibility 80 ft temperature 82
Two nights of shore dives off Taganga beach. In both cases was out 70 - 80 minutes in 25 ft of water. You can swim out from the beach about 10 minutes to reach decent coral and lots of usual night life, crustaceans etc. Octopus were playful. Night time water temperatures were the same 82 and air temperature was in the mid 70s.
Several more days of diving much like the above.
In summary good visibility, warm water, nice coral, OK reef fish. It is very easy convenient diving. I stayed at a AirBNB for $18 / night with a great terrace overlooking the ocean. It was an easy 5 minutes walk to the dive shop and then another 5 minute walk to the beach (your gear and tanks are delivered to the boat) . I dove with german owned posideon dive center which after looking at a lot of other boats would argue has the nicest boat. (custom build catamaran with dual yamaha 150s and and easy step in entry and a nice dive ladder. Many of the other ops have you taking BCDs off and climbing over the side of the boat. Diving prices were about $85/ 2 tanks at the high end (where I was) to $60 / 2 tanks. Ops are full service. Classes are inexpensive with lots of folks going through open water at $230 total(at the low end). My 3 day private sidemount course was $360 all inclusive with an excellent instructor. It was easy to keep to a budget of $150 per day including diving.
Visiting Rosario Islands off Cartegena. I booked with Diving Planet (who was sidemount friendly). They have a slip at the navy pier. It is about an hour boat ride to the island. We did two dives off the east side if isla grande. The first dive I enjoyed good visibility 90ft and 86 degree surface temperatures with a thermocline to 80 degrees at 8-12 feet. The first dive had a nice wall and Coral was in good condition with noticably more reef fish then in Taganga. I started to have sinus problems and called the second dive after 55 minutes due to sinus pressure which meant I was in no shape to appreciate the diving. I had booked two nights on the island to get in 7 dives, but it was not to be. I took the boat back to cartegena the next day and 4 days recovering from cold symptoms with my diving cut short. Diving planet was a fine operation (though not at the level of posideon) running 10 people on fast boats with 2-3 DMs separated by skill level. Time to dive sites was only 10-15 minutes from the island at diving planet picks up at all the docs on the island. The ride back to cartegena was 70+ minutes with lots of wind and chop bouncing the boat around.
With direct flights from miami to cartegena under 3 hours, it seems like the Caribbean side of colombia should be a solid low key warm water relaxing dive destination on the cheap. Likewise from LA to Santa Marta was an easy jump. There was little to no sign of US tourists, though I met many lovely folks from the netherlands, germany and spain.
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