I don't usually do these but I have some info to share you might find interesting if you're planning a trip. I have pix at Maui-Mark.com
I'll provide narrative for the pix further below...
The mission was to get my wife Mary certified by the world's best scuba instructor (me
)- in the world’s greatest diving mecca (Cozumel). It all started with a great flight from Denver to Coz on Frontier. We managed to get exit row isle seats. When we got to Coz, I stopped by the Avis booth to pick up the car and discovered why I couldn't get insurance online. The insurance would have cost 3 times the car rental price! Oh well - no car -- we used cabs. We did rent a car one day for a drive around the island (fully insured). More on that later.
We met SB member Ron Brandt and his student Brian at the Hotel Cozumel where we were all staying; and had breakfast Sunday morning in the hotel restaurant. Later we all took a cab to Hog Town - (villa Blanca). They have a good training site there that's outside the marine park. We got tanks and weights from Papa Hogs and did a couple of training dives each day on Sunday and Monday. I gotta really thank Ron for making this part of the trip easy. He knows all the right people and places - that's for sure! My wife Mary and Brian both finished their OW certs Monday afternoon. Most days after diving, we'd grab a brew at the hotel while rinsing the gear - then head downtown for some chow. What a life!
Food:
We did Panchos Backyard (twice!) -- boy is it great! The Lobster House up north was dissapointing - the service was terrible :mad1: and the lobster was real pricey and not all that good. Too bad - it used to be worth the drive and the price. The food at La Mission (divers version) was pretty good and reasonably priced (like the lobster). The new Italian restaurant - Sorrisi's is really good too. You'll have to forget your diet if you eat there! La Choza is great for traditional Mexican fare. Primera's Pizzeria gave us a great table, good food and good service. A note on all-inclusive - it was going to cost me $50 extra per day (for 2) and the food at the Hotel Cozumel leaves a lot to be desired. The margarittas are the worst on earth. I prefer to skip the all-inclusive at this price and eat what I want. You can get a bottle of pre-mix margs at Chedraui for $10. You can order breakfast via room service and it's cheaper than the buffet.
The Diving:
We dove with Pelagic Ventures and had a blast. Troy is great fun to dive with. He really mixed up the dives well both for the more experienced - as well as the newbies. His divemaster Alex is top notch and fun too. Mary wanted to stay shallow - and so we'd hang around the top of the reefs while others ventured deeper. Hey what can you say, I'm a Hawaii boy (transplant) and Cozumel has so much more color and life! We did Santa Rosa, Paradise reef, Palancar gardens, Tormentos, Palencar Deep, Dalila, Palancar horseshoes and Chankanaab. Also did a night dive on the shallow wall in front of the hotel. Saw all the usual suspects - nurse shark, Eagle ray or two, lots of Hawksbills and fish up the wazoo. I even remember the names of almost all of them. The best part of the dives is that we could pretty much go where we wanted (keep the divemaster in sight please) and stay down as long as air and NDL would allow.
If you look on my web site, it starts out with the Monday night dive in front of the hotel. I got to use my new macro lens. I love it! This was Brian's first night dive, and this is a great place to do it, being shallow and close to the shore. The yellow stingray was neat - but the octopus was awesome; not shy at all. The squid posed nicely too. The next few underwater pictures were taken Tuesday at Santa Rosa (turle, nurse shark), and Paradise reef (toadfish, seahorse). Mary was still a little nervous about jumping on the boat - so she sat those dives out. Brian did AOW dives with Ron. That afternoon, Mary and I did a shore dive in front of the hotel to help get her confidence up.
Wednesday we decided to rent a car and take the road around the island. We stopped by a cenote near Caleta harbor - then drove down to El Cedral. There's not really much to see there, but the trinket shops stay busy with a constant stream of tour buses - full of cruise ship folks I'm sure. There's a picture of Mary, Brian and Ron in front of a cross beside the old mission. The next picture is from Playa Palancar where we stopped for lunch and cervezas and a walk along the beach. It's interesting that I've been to coz three times before but never stopped there - and yet we came back to this exact spot by boat for a surface interval several days later. Mary poses beside the "conch tree". They grow wild there and are scattered by the wind along the beach
.
On to Punta Sur. The panorama (as the other pictures) will open full resolution in another window if you click on the image. A little further up the road we had a live demonstration of why you want the insurance. The road has wicked shoulders in this section and it's easy to be bounced clean off if you're attention wanes. There's a lot of visual distractions too. The beaches are beautiful on the east side of the island. One fellow set up a huge string of kites - very colorful. The last stop before heading back to San Miguel was Mezcalito's. This is an interesting bar full of colorful folks enjoying cool beverages just off the beach. After we got back to the hotel we did one more afternoon shore dive and Mary decided that she was ready for the boat.
Thursday I got no underwater pix, as I was taking good care of Mary. We did Palancar Gardens and Tormentos. Beautiful as usual. Lots of turtles and lobsters. Mary finally got to see what it's all about.
Friday Mary took the day off diving, so I took my trusty Nikonian dive buddy. We did Palancar deep and Dalila. Palancar is always great for those classic shots with vertical formations on one side and divers on the other. The surface interval was at....Playa Palancar! Dalila was a nice dive too.
Saturday, sadly Ron and Brian had a return flight to Regina. We'll miss them, but not enough to miss the boat! Mary was back onboard, and we headed out to Palancar Horseshoes. Another great dive! On the last dive, Mary allowed me to take the camera to one of my all-time favorite reefs - Chankanaab. You can see from the pix why I love this place! At the end of the dive, Troy and I were the last out - hanging on the line doing our 3M flipping through the pictures from the week.
The rest of the pix are sights about town – shopping, the famous Mezcal worm, hotel pool, famous brass leaping dolphins, moped line-up, Jimmy’s place, Jeannies waffle house, Jimmy’s seaside, barfing eel, Mary in front of Chedraui (Wal-Mart clone), the new Cozumel Palace, and the local prison for neer-do-well dolphins.
All in all a wonderful trip! We really enjoyed diving with Ron, Brian, Troy and Alex. One thing I find interesting is all the Canadians you see in Coz these days (Ron, Brian, Troy and most of the divers on the boat). I couldn’t help notice that they list the nationality on the check-in cards at the hotel and the majority are canucks. We get a ton of Canadians in Maui. My best friend there is from BC. Great folks!
Mark
I'll provide narrative for the pix further below...
The mission was to get my wife Mary certified by the world's best scuba instructor (me
)- in the world’s greatest diving mecca (Cozumel). It all started with a great flight from Denver to Coz on Frontier. We managed to get exit row isle seats. When we got to Coz, I stopped by the Avis booth to pick up the car and discovered why I couldn't get insurance online. The insurance would have cost 3 times the car rental price! Oh well - no car -- we used cabs. We did rent a car one day for a drive around the island (fully insured). More on that later. We met SB member Ron Brandt and his student Brian at the Hotel Cozumel where we were all staying; and had breakfast Sunday morning in the hotel restaurant. Later we all took a cab to Hog Town - (villa Blanca). They have a good training site there that's outside the marine park. We got tanks and weights from Papa Hogs and did a couple of training dives each day on Sunday and Monday. I gotta really thank Ron for making this part of the trip easy. He knows all the right people and places - that's for sure! My wife Mary and Brian both finished their OW certs Monday afternoon. Most days after diving, we'd grab a brew at the hotel while rinsing the gear - then head downtown for some chow. What a life!
Food:
We did Panchos Backyard (twice!) -- boy is it great! The Lobster House up north was dissapointing - the service was terrible :mad1: and the lobster was real pricey and not all that good. Too bad - it used to be worth the drive and the price. The food at La Mission (divers version) was pretty good and reasonably priced (like the lobster). The new Italian restaurant - Sorrisi's is really good too. You'll have to forget your diet if you eat there! La Choza is great for traditional Mexican fare. Primera's Pizzeria gave us a great table, good food and good service. A note on all-inclusive - it was going to cost me $50 extra per day (for 2) and the food at the Hotel Cozumel leaves a lot to be desired. The margarittas are the worst on earth. I prefer to skip the all-inclusive at this price and eat what I want. You can get a bottle of pre-mix margs at Chedraui for $10. You can order breakfast via room service and it's cheaper than the buffet.
The Diving:
We dove with Pelagic Ventures and had a blast. Troy is great fun to dive with. He really mixed up the dives well both for the more experienced - as well as the newbies. His divemaster Alex is top notch and fun too. Mary wanted to stay shallow - and so we'd hang around the top of the reefs while others ventured deeper. Hey what can you say, I'm a Hawaii boy (transplant) and Cozumel has so much more color and life! We did Santa Rosa, Paradise reef, Palancar gardens, Tormentos, Palencar Deep, Dalila, Palancar horseshoes and Chankanaab. Also did a night dive on the shallow wall in front of the hotel. Saw all the usual suspects - nurse shark, Eagle ray or two, lots of Hawksbills and fish up the wazoo. I even remember the names of almost all of them. The best part of the dives is that we could pretty much go where we wanted (keep the divemaster in sight please) and stay down as long as air and NDL would allow.
If you look on my web site, it starts out with the Monday night dive in front of the hotel. I got to use my new macro lens. I love it! This was Brian's first night dive, and this is a great place to do it, being shallow and close to the shore. The yellow stingray was neat - but the octopus was awesome; not shy at all. The squid posed nicely too. The next few underwater pictures were taken Tuesday at Santa Rosa (turle, nurse shark), and Paradise reef (toadfish, seahorse). Mary was still a little nervous about jumping on the boat - so she sat those dives out. Brian did AOW dives with Ron. That afternoon, Mary and I did a shore dive in front of the hotel to help get her confidence up.
Wednesday we decided to rent a car and take the road around the island. We stopped by a cenote near Caleta harbor - then drove down to El Cedral. There's not really much to see there, but the trinket shops stay busy with a constant stream of tour buses - full of cruise ship folks I'm sure. There's a picture of Mary, Brian and Ron in front of a cross beside the old mission. The next picture is from Playa Palancar where we stopped for lunch and cervezas and a walk along the beach. It's interesting that I've been to coz three times before but never stopped there - and yet we came back to this exact spot by boat for a surface interval several days later. Mary poses beside the "conch tree". They grow wild there and are scattered by the wind along the beach
.On to Punta Sur. The panorama (as the other pictures) will open full resolution in another window if you click on the image. A little further up the road we had a live demonstration of why you want the insurance. The road has wicked shoulders in this section and it's easy to be bounced clean off if you're attention wanes. There's a lot of visual distractions too. The beaches are beautiful on the east side of the island. One fellow set up a huge string of kites - very colorful. The last stop before heading back to San Miguel was Mezcalito's. This is an interesting bar full of colorful folks enjoying cool beverages just off the beach. After we got back to the hotel we did one more afternoon shore dive and Mary decided that she was ready for the boat.
Thursday I got no underwater pix, as I was taking good care of Mary. We did Palancar Gardens and Tormentos. Beautiful as usual. Lots of turtles and lobsters. Mary finally got to see what it's all about.
Friday Mary took the day off diving, so I took my trusty Nikonian dive buddy. We did Palancar deep and Dalila. Palancar is always great for those classic shots with vertical formations on one side and divers on the other. The surface interval was at....Playa Palancar! Dalila was a nice dive too.
Saturday, sadly Ron and Brian had a return flight to Regina. We'll miss them, but not enough to miss the boat! Mary was back onboard, and we headed out to Palancar Horseshoes. Another great dive! On the last dive, Mary allowed me to take the camera to one of my all-time favorite reefs - Chankanaab. You can see from the pix why I love this place! At the end of the dive, Troy and I were the last out - hanging on the line doing our 3M flipping through the pictures from the week.
The rest of the pix are sights about town – shopping, the famous Mezcal worm, hotel pool, famous brass leaping dolphins, moped line-up, Jimmy’s place, Jeannies waffle house, Jimmy’s seaside, barfing eel, Mary in front of Chedraui (Wal-Mart clone), the new Cozumel Palace, and the local prison for neer-do-well dolphins.
All in all a wonderful trip! We really enjoyed diving with Ron, Brian, Troy and Alex. One thing I find interesting is all the Canadians you see in Coz these days (Ron, Brian, Troy and most of the divers on the boat). I couldn’t help notice that they list the nationality on the check-in cards at the hotel and the majority are canucks. We get a ton of Canadians in Maui. My best friend there is from BC. Great folks!
Mark
