In Coco de Playas now?

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Who could know better about the local dive sites than a local diver?
My favourite spots are from north to south:
Palmares (can be done in one dive with Narizonas, which is just the deepest rock of Palmares) for it's underwater "land"-scape: steep rocks, canyons but also for it's schools of eagle rays and then the surface interval at playa huevos.
Virador for the white-tip reef sharks, the nice topography, scholing fish
Monkey Head for being the place with the biggest amount of fish (that can also suddenly not be there), the gentle slope is not very exciting though...
Mero a shallower dive on a series of rocks to see all the small critters (nudibranches, frog-fish, Sea-horses, octopus surrounded by schooling grunts and snapper
Sorpresa for it's depth and common sighting of schooling big-eye and amber jacks which are rare to see on other sites
Argentina for the sharks, it's topographie, the sting-rays (sometimes dozens) eagle rays and occasional turtles, loads of fish, excellent for a night dive as well
Tortuga for the Wreck and the shallow part with it's coral
Punta Gorda for it's surprises: it's the only site where I have seen a whale-shark, a huge 5ft/1.5m Barracura and schooling blue spotted Jacks (about 2ft/60cm each), common eagle rays, sea horses, a baby shark cave and the nicest coral garden far around
Tiburones for it's depth that always atracts open sea fish on cleaning stations and the impressive rock perfect for a multilevel dive by circling around it to the top...
My favorite at the Bat's: Bajo Negro for it's wall to "hang" in and watch the fish pass: millions of grunts, jacks, snappers and dozens of eagle rays. I had a seasoned diver who put it in his top ten (out of about 5'000 dives). It's also an exciting trip through the open sea where you feel so small (accompanied by dolphins and occasional whales)
My favorite at the Cat's: The Wall (Northwest drift) and Punta Catalina (the point) for it's drift, the manta rays and to give me a change...the trip along the coast is also fantastic.
We do all the sites regularly and make sure that nobody dives the same site twice, unless you ask for it! Of course you can dive every site hundreds of times and still discover new staff, but every dive site has its high-lights that we want you to discover!
Check out OUR photos
 
Hopefully we will see you there, RallyFord. We will be there from the 2nd-6th, diving with Rich Coast and staying at Hotel Villa Casa Blanca. We're only diving for a few days and then taking off to explore the rest of the country. Very Excited!!
 
First of all, let me apologize for the inconvenience you experience. Our boat was scheduled to go out the end of September, but due to the many divers in town we had to re-schedule. We tried the best we can and worked very hard to get our boat back in the water as soon as possible. In the mean time we did not want to send our divers away, so we placed you on the boat of deep blue. As far as we know they are pretty good and friendly and they have skilled staff. I am sorry you felt the way you do, however, I am happy you had a good time. With our own boat we take divers who dive multiple dives to different spots. I am sorry they took you to the same spot more than once but we were happy they helped us out.
I know it was an hectic week and I remember apologizing to you a couple of times. I will make it all up to you when you plan to come back to Costa Rica, because like you said, the diving is great here. As for Summersalt. His story is maybe a sales story, because the waters are getting too cold for the bulls, and believe me we've rented bigger boats last year for divers who really wanted to go, and there were no bull sharks. He is right about the waves though, we tried a trip last week and had to cancel because of the heavy winds. We are busy going up to the Catalina's to spot the manta's
This year the bullsharks were very scares anyway. We tend to blame it on the fishing. We have started a petition, and now the Bat islands are closed for fishing and we need to pay a $10 fee to enter the waters around bats, but eh, I think it's worth it if we save these creatures by doing so! Hopefully the population of the bulls has grown again by next season. Happy diving!
 
I've been meaning to post a glowing review of my experience with Rich Coast Diving that I should have posted months ago... but this video should be sufficient proof that I had a pretty damn good time diving with them - Julian and Jamie were excellent guides - as you'll see in the video there is an amazing amount of life in the waters off Playa del Coco.

The two of them managed to find me just about everything there was to find on the near islands. My pos camera didn't work for a few of the dives, hence you don't get to see the 5 large white tips, an eel the size of my leg, the seahorses, and the 3ft long bumphead parrotfish sleeping in the reef at night, but it shows enough to make most divers want to put CR on their short list of places to dive next.

Another Iowa diver was kind enough to post this video on his site:

http://www.beneathwater.com/reef.htm

Gracias Jaime & Julian!
Dankevel Brenda & Martin!

Happy Diving!

RF
 
This review is waaaaayyyy overdue, but it is well deserved! For the record, we had a GREAT time diving with Rich Coast Diving. We saw reef sharks on every dive, huge string rays, eels, scorpion fish, puffer fish, turtles, octopus, an eagle ray, seahorses, and to top it all off - a Giant Manta on one of the Catalina dives. Our divemasters Julian & Jaime were great -- as were Brenda & Martin. Would definitely dive with you guys again if I ever go back!

RallyFord - was great meeting you & your family too while we were there!
 
I am glad you guys had a good time. The diving is still great, we had a big school of spotted eagle rays yesterday and the whales are back again and this season has been top with mantas both with the Catalinas and the Bats.

happy diving

Brenda
 

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