La Paz dive shop recommendations?

Please register or login

Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.

Benefits of registering include

  • Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
  • A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
  • You can make this box go away

Joining is quick and easy. Log in or Register now!

goblinina

Registered
Messages
15
Reaction score
10
Hi all,

I'm headed to Cabo san lucas to dive and also want to hit La Paz. Does anyone have any dive shop recommendations? In researching it looks like Cortez Expeditions and Phocea Mexico are good options. Has anyone been with either of these, particularly Phocea Mexico? I think they are relatively new, but very good reviews on Tripadvisor.


Thanks for your help!
 
Haven't gone yet! Trip is over the holidays in a few weeks. I reserved with Phocea Mexico though. Not the most scientific way to pick a dive shop but they have good reviews on TripAdvisor, got back to my emails super quickly, have a cool website and if they're new I'm hoping they have new gear. I can post an update once I'm back.
 
I just went. I actually snorkeled with sea lions and whale sharks in La Paz. I think that's better than scuba. For scuba head to Cabo Pulmo, and if have time Cabo San Lucas and the corridor. There could some good sites in La Paz like the Chinese wreck, but didn't have time to dive everywhere.

If you want a guide or dive shop, I know a good one.
 
Hello all. Im looking for dive shops to use in Cabo. Its hard to sift threw all the online reviews. My daughter wants to go to Cano for her senior trip next year. I know nothing about Cabo. My wife and I have been going to Cozumel since 2011. Love it and dive with Blue Project. Lots of great dive shops in cozumel. Im hopping its the same in Cabo. Any help would be great.
 
Hello all. Im looking for dive shops to use in Cabo. Its hard to sift threw all the online reviews. My daughter wants to go to Cano for her senior trip next year. I know nothing about Cabo. My wife and I have been going to Cozumel since 2011. Love it and dive with Blue Project. Lots of great dive shops in cozumel. Im hopping its the same in Cabo. Any help would be great.

We took our first trip to Cabo this past November, and will be going back this November. Prior to this past trip, we had only dove the Pacific Coast twice, both times in the Guanacaste region of Costa Rica. All other diving had been somewhere in the Caribbean, with a lot of that in Cozumel.

We dove with Manta Scuba, and I can highly recommend them.
 
Hello all. Im looking for dive shops to use in Cabo. Its hard to sift threw all the online reviews. My daughter wants to go to Cano for her senior trip next year. I know nothing about Cabo. My wife and I have been going to Cozumel since 2011. Love it and dive with Blue Project. Lots of great dive shops in cozumel. Im hopping its the same in Cabo. Any help would be great.

To be honest I was very underwhelmed by the diving in Cabo San Lucas. I've also been to Cozumel and thought that was 100x better than Cabo San Lucas which was crowded and didn't have much life around corals by comparison. We dove there for 4-5 days in December when it was quite cold - we were prepared for cold water but topside was unusually cold <20C, so that didn't help the experience. One bonus that time of year was that from the boat we saw several whales breaching in the distance and could occasionally hear them underwater. We were also unlucky and had bad visibility and didn't see anything big - I understand it can be pretty amazing if you go the right time of year and get lucky enough to see schools of rays, sharks, etc. But for us - combining the cold, bad visibility, not a lot of life among the corals AND not seeing any larger life - it was underwhelming and expensive for the experience. Topside, the scenery is beautiful and our favourite part of the whole trip was driving through the desert and mountains. That and the food - we avoided the mainstream restaurants. Of course there are a lot of touristy things in Cabo San Lucas, they are just not our style and we much prefer the laid back and local vibes of Cozumel.

We also went to Cabo Pulmo and La Paz. Cabo Pulmo I think could be very nice but for us, again the visibility was too poor to tell. La Paz was extremely disappointing after everything I had read - we went to the closer sea lion colony and not one sea lion came underwater during our dive. Particularly bad because the dive shop (Phocea Mexico) had set very high expectations before we left saying "diving with sea lions is guaranteed". I understand that the dive shop has no control over whether sea lions decide to swim while we are diving, but perhaps they should consider not making those kind of "guarantee" claims and temper their customers' expectations to avoid massive disappointment. Then, we were signed up to snorkel with the whale sharks through the same dive shop but apparently the company Phocea contracts with did not properly sign up for the queue to enter the bay where the whale sharks are, so we waited around for an hour and then were told it wasn't going to happen. Super disappointing since that was a simple logistical thing both Phocea and the company they contract with should have been aware of and could have addressed. We were only there for a day and were very sad to have missed both sea lions and whale sharks. Hopefully Phocea Mexico has sorted out their logistics so they avoid disappointing people. (I should say that as a dive shop Phocea Mexico runs a good operation - new equipment, new boat, fun dive guides, attention to safety - no complaints there.)

As for dive shops in Cabo, I researched several and all of the main ones seem like professional and well-run operations and have positive feedback on this forum as well - Dive Nautilus, Manta Scuba, Dive Cabo, Dive Ninja - doubt you can go wrong in that regard. Happy diving and hope you have better fortune than we did!
 
We took our first trip to Cabo this past November, and will be going back this November. Prior to this past trip, we had only dove the Pacific Coast twice, both times in the Guanacaste region of Costa Rica. All other diving had been somewhere in the Caribbean, with a lot of that in Cozumel.

We dove with Manta Scuba, and I can highly recommend them.

I'll add that one of the reasons we chose November was based on our research that both water temperature and visibility are optimized at that time of year. Additionally, having dove in Costa Rica, we were pretty well prepared for the unique structure of Pacific Coast diving.

I would also add that we did the La Paz whale shark/sea lion trip (all the way out to Los Islotes). Have to say, after having dove with dozens of Whale Sharks off Isla Mujeres, the one or two we say on our La Paz trip were a disappointment; however being face to face with dozens of sea lions is an unforgettable experience. We did not go to Cabo Pulmo (chose La Paz instead).
 
I'll add that one of the reasons we chose November was based on our research that both water temperature and visibility are optimized at that time of year. Additionally, having dove in Costa Rica, we were pretty well prepared for the unique structure of Pacific Coast diving.

I would also add that we did the La Paz whale shark/sea lion trip (all the way out to Los Islotes). Have to say, after having dove with dozens of Whale Sharks off Isla Mujeres, the one or two we say on our La Paz trip were a disappointment; however being face to face with dozens of sea lions is an unforgettable experience. We did not go to Cabo Pulmo (chose La Paz instead).
To be honest I was very underwhelmed by the diving in Cabo San Lucas. I've also been to Cozumel and thought that was 100x better than Cabo San Lucas which was crowded and didn't have much life around corals by comparison. We dove there for 4-5 days in December when it was quite cold - we were prepared for cold water but topside was unusually cold <20C, so that didn't help the experience. One bonus that time of year was that from the boat we saw several whales breaching in the distance and could occasionally hear them underwater. We were also unlucky and had bad visibility and didn't see anything big - I understand it can be pretty amazing if you go the right time of year and get lucky enough to see schools of rays, sharks, etc. But for us - combining the cold, bad visibility, not a lot of life among the corals AND not seeing any larger life - it was underwhelming and expensive for the experience. Topside, the scenery is beautiful and our favourite part of the whole trip was driving through the desert and mountains. That and the food - we avoided the mainstream restaurants. Of course there are a lot of touristy things in Cabo San Lucas, they are just not our style and we much prefer the laid back and local vibes of Cozumel.

We also went to Cabo Pulmo and La Paz. Cabo Pulmo I think could be very nice but for us, again the visibility was too poor to tell. La Paz was extremely disappointing after everything I had read - we went to the closer sea lion colony and not one sea lion came underwater during our dive. Particularly bad because the dive shop (Phocea Mexico) had set very high expectations before we left saying "diving with sea lions is guaranteed". I understand that the dive shop has no control over whether sea lions decide to swim while we are diving, but perhaps they should consider not making those kind of "guarantee" claims and temper their customers' expectations to avoid massive disappointment. Then, we were signed up to snorkel with the whale sharks through the same dive shop but apparently the company Phocea contracts with did not properly sign up for the queue to enter the bay where the whale sharks are, so we waited around for an hour and then were told it wasn't going to happen. Super disappointing since that was a simple logistical thing both Phocea and the company they contract with should have been aware of and could have addressed. We were only there for a day and were very sad to have missed both sea lions and whale sharks. Hopefully Phocea Mexico has sorted out their logistics so they avoid disappointing people. (I should say that as a dive shop Phocea Mexico runs a good operation - new equipment, new boat, fun dive guides, attention to safety - no complaints there.)

As for dive shops in Cabo, I researched several and all of the main ones seem like professional and well-run operations and have positive feedback on this forum as well - Dive Nautilus, Manta Scuba, Dive Cabo, Dive Ninja - doubt you can go wrong in that regard. Happy diving and hope you have better fortune than we did!
Thanks for your help. Its hard to try new places but good or bad it makes us better dives and appreciate it all.
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/peregrine/

Back
Top Bottom