Cozumel Trip July 28-Aug 4, 2007

[editmojo]

Cozumel Trip July 28-Aug 4, 2007

First let me get this out of the way. WOW OH WOW OH WOW!!! Now for the report...

Being new to scuba we did the trip through Smith Diving, our local shop. We had 2 instructors, 2 master divers, 2 AOWs. 5 new OWs and my wife, the only non-diver.. Myself and 2 sons were 3 of the 5 newbs.

Trains planes and automobiles from Minneapolis to Dallas to Cancun, bus to PLaya del Carmen, ferry to Cozumel, taxi to hotel. Long travel day but worth it. Try to miss the Cancun airport at noon on Saturday. It took an hour plus, to get through customs.

Stayed at Village Tan Kah, just south of Casa Del Mar. Nice, clean, helpful staff, cheap. Roberta, the owner (and owner of Scuba Shack, Eco Divers, and Blue Bubble) was very gracious and took us on several gastronomic adventures.

That afternoon ,after a quick snack at Ernesto's, we did a 40 min. shore dive From Scuba Shack to check buoyancy. Saw mostly hurricane rubble but a few coral spires survived and wetted our appetites. Dinner at Carlos and Charlies. Beware the Tequila conga line.

Sunday: The YucabII picked us up at 8:30 and an hour later dropped us onto Yacub Reef. The experienced divers went with DM Juan and us newbs went with "The Other Juan". We dropped onto a sand flat at 40 ft and played for about 10 minutes until Juan was satisfied with our buoyancy. Then he lead us east to a valley in a coral wall.

I will never forget this moment. As we passed through the valley the sea floor dropped away. Off to the east was empty sea and to the west were the most amazing coral structures I had ever seen. We were in a slight northerly current and just watched this display past by. We saw several hawksbill turtles and tons of fish to numerous to name.

Dive 2 was Tormentos with a bit more current, lots more fish and a few more turtles.

And that set up our week. We hit: Palancar Caves and deep, Columbia Deep, Paseo del Cedral(my favorite shallow dive), Paradise, Santa Rosa Wall. Overall visibility was 50-75ft, down from previous weeks because of some recent storms and the full moon. (Our DM swears the full moon hurts visibility) Light currents except for Santa Rosa. It felt like looking out a train window (maybe 2-3 knots). Fun but hard to get a good look at anything.

Wednesday some of the group did the Whale Shark trip. I included some of those pictures but we did not go. We rented a car and went to Punta Sur park and drove up the east side. Had a Snack at Coconuts. Fun place.

Most of the pictures are from my little Cannon A510 and housing as the other 2 cameras on the trip (Sea&Seas I believe) flooded on the first day. I usually would start the dive with my camera. After 20 minutes or so, one of the other photographers in the group would tug my fin and I wouldn't see my camera till the end of the day, but they got some great shots.

Eating:
Carlos and Charlies-- Very good
Casa Dennis-- Very good
Ernesto's--good
Casa Del Mar restaurant--Very good
Coconuts-- very good
French Quarter-- Very good
La Parrochia -- Very very good and inexpensive.

Pics:
http://flickr.com/photos/9739245@N08/sets/72157601238659454/show/



Would I go Again? As soon as the credit card is payed off. I'm just worried that future dive vacations will not live up to this experience, but I'm willing to risk it.


Joe, Adam and Matt (now with 13 hours of bottom time each)

 

[ggunn]

Sunday: The YucabII picked us up at 8:30 and an hour later dropped us onto Yacub Reef. The experienced divers went with DM Juan and us newbs went with "The Other Juan". We dropped onto a sand flat at 40 ft and played for about 10 minutes until Juan was satisfied with our buoyancy. Then he lead us east to a valley in a coral wall.

I will never forget this moment. As we passed through the valley the sea floor dropped away. Off to the east was empty sea and to the west were the most amazing coral structures I had ever seen. We were in a slight northerly current and just watched this display past by. We saw several hawksbill turtles and tons of fish to numerous to name.

The same thing happpens to me on Cozumel and I don't know why; my sense of direction gets crossed up. I'm pretty sure that from the sand flat the DM led you west, not east, and off to the west (not east) later on was the empty sea. All those dive sites you mentioned (and virtually all the sites at Cozumel) are along the west coast, and the abyss is to the west of them.

Sounds like you had a great time. I can hardly wait for my next Coz trip.

 

[editmojo]

You're absolutly right. Reverse all my directions except for ther north current. Must be rapture of the semi-deep and middle-aged.

joe

 

[Tigerman]

Oh man.. Im SOOO looking forward to leaving for Mexico this monday
Sadly I dont have a UW cam, nor any experience whatsoever using one tho

 

[alcina]

Excellent you had such a fabulous time! Nice report

 

[Glen@SC]

Welcome to diving! Coz was my first dive trip also, 2 years ago(did 17 dives in 7 days). Tuesday Aug 14, I leave for the 4th trip in Coz. All with Robert and Roberta. Great people, good DMs; small boats. You won't be disappointed when you return to Coz.

 

[editmojo]

It's just Roberta now. Some kinda of falling out happened a while ago. But customer service was great. Juan , her fulltime DM, is excellent.

joe

 

[editmojo]

Oh man.. Im SOOO looking forward to leaving for Mexico this monday
Sadly I dont have a UW cam, nor any experience whatsoever using one tho

I just got the cheapest Cannon I could find with a housing (about $300 total investment) and started playing around last year on a snorkel trip. After a few days I was getting acceptable pictures (fewer fish butts and more fish heads). It was easier scuba diving because I had more time to compose shots and the fish seemed less afaid. Plus with digital, just snap away and delete the bad ones. The only downside is I found it harder to just enjoy the dive when I was taking pics and air consumption went up a bit.



joe

 

[Glen@SC]

I had a Canon s30 with u/w housing. It bit the dust on dive trip in Feb(completely my fault). Just picked up a Canon A570IS with DC-12 housing. Get to rtry it out in 2 days.

With experience(you have less than 24 dives) you'll find you'll be able to both enjoy the dive and shoot photo's. Air consumption rate will drop with experience; you are probably using more air to get in position, or hold position, for the shot. It will come with time.

 

[pennypue]

Glad you had a great time. LOVED the captions on your pictures!!!