morecowbells
Contributor
Since I have not read too many recent dive vacation reports, I thought I would write a trip report on our July dive trip to Cabo San Lucas, Cabo Pulmo and La Paz. We have been to Curacao, Cozumel, Saba, Grand Cayman and Roatan. Hubby and I thought we would try something a little different and dive the Sea of Cortez. I have never been to that part of Mexico before. Since I am an unfortunate sufferer of Mal de mar, we decided to do a land based trip versus a liveaboard. I will separately paragraph different portions of our trip to make it easier to read (aka skip over irrelevant/uninteresting details).
Lodging:
We could have not been more pleased with our decision to stay at Terrasol Condos. We booked our unit through VRBO. These are not time share condos, but individually owned. This was a huge bonus for us since we were never approached, hounded or badgered by time share reps on the property. Our unit was completely upgraded from the appliances, furniture to the tile. Keep in mind that being individually owned, some units are completely updated while others have not. Besides the crashing waves, it peaceful and absolutely free of any noise from roosters, cars, night clubs etc. Yet you are a 5-10 walk to the marina.
Restaurants:
We never had a bad meal. We used Tripadvisor as a resource. Other places were recommended by condo guests. Some of the places we visited:
-Solomon’s Landing: I have read about being approached by timeshare salesman while dining. We never encountered this problem. Wonderful chile rellenos and mojitos.
-Baja Brewing Company: Pristine views but hot. Limited shade on patio. My flat bread Margherita pizza was fab. I ordered another one to keep at the condo. Perfect snack when served cold after diving.
-The Office: This place was a big disappointment. The food was okay, not spectacular but very pricey. While a table closest to the beach may be initially appealing, it was a mistake us Cabo virgins made. Vendors would swarm around us and not leave us alone. We moved to a table further back and it was much better.
-Tres Gallos: This was perhaps my favorite restaurant visited during our trip. The ambiance was comfortable with an enchanting courtyard. Wonderful enchiladas. Drinks were somewhat pricey
-Salvatores: As soon as you walk into the courtyard you are overcome by the smell of garlic( I love that aroma, but not when sleeping next to a mouth breathing husband). Wonderful food and service. The lasagna portions are humungous! Typically I am not a sangria drinker, but these were so fresh and tasty.
-Hacienda: Probably the best view we encountered coupled with ambiance. It was recommended to us by a guest at Terrasol. I figured it would be a casual hang out like Tres Gallos. In retrospect, I wish we dressed up a little more. While not a stuffy or pretentious atmosphere, it was a lends itself to a more classy establishment than my jeans and tank top provided. The food was excellent and the prices fair, although the cost of drinks was expensive.
Diving:
We chose Sunshine Dive Charters as our dive op. They are located in the Marina behind the Wyndham Hotel. The main reasons we picked them as our dive op is the small boats and we never had more than 6 divers(even when diving the remote sites like Cabo Pulmo and La Paz). They also store, handle and rinse your gear. Dive masters and Captains were friendly, helpful and very safety conscious. While the pelagics and big guys are the crowd pleaser, Jonatan was amazing at pointing out the macro stuff.
Cabo Marine Park:
The visibility definitely was not optimal, ranging from 15-30 feet. I have encountered mild, subtle thermoclines in the Caribbean and was aware of their prevalence in Cabo. Nothing prepared me for what I endured. Not only were they dramatic temp wise but you could actually see them. The best way to describe it is as a ripple or oil and water appearance. I will admit that I am a total wuss when it comes to cold water. I wear my 5 mm wetsuit in 80 degree water. I HATE BEING COLD! I passed on purchasing or renting a 7 mm since they are a major PITA to put on-especially on a boat. Instead I wore my 5 mm and alternated with a Lavacore vest/hoodie and a 2.5 mm neoprene vest. I have to say the neoprene did a much better job at making the cold waters less miserable. When entering the cold thermoclines it was mind blowing. Every time I thought it couldn’t get any colder BAM! It did. After diving The North Wall (probably my favorite) I wanted to make sure I wasn’t losing my mind by checking my dive computer temps. In that dive alone the surface water temp was 83 degrees, and the coldest was 61 degrees. The men in our group found the cold waters “refreshing”(yeah, right), the women were still reeling from the frigid B-slap.
In all of my dives, I have to say that despite the poor visibility and lack of coral formations, Cabo beats the other destination hands down when it comes to sheer numbers and abundance of sea life. We saw large numbers of trumpet fish,grunts, puffer fish, morish idols, sea bass, bump head parrotfish, porkfish, stingrays, hogfish, goatfish and you couldn’t swing a belt around without hitting a green moray eel. We encountered several schools of snapper and grunts. This was the first time I have ever seen a Cortez angelfish, the unique variety of pufferfish or a Moorish idol. They are nothing short of majestic. As odd as it sounds, the colors seemed richer and more vivid than many of the fish I have encountered in the Caribbean. Currents were mild, surge was moderate. Unfortunately, there were no sea lions in the area during this time of year.
The Corridor/ Chileno Bay:
Several hundreds of miles away and far west of Cabo a hurricane was starting to develop. We never encountered any rain but the seas were getting rough starting the night before diving this area. When descending, the vis was awful, perhaps 10-15 feet. My husband decided to abort this dive and wait on the boat. The decision was a no brainer for me. Sitting on a stationary, pitching boat for an hour is a sure recipe for sea sickness, for me it is tantamount to Damien entering a church. I decided to buddy up with another couple we were diving with and endure the muck diving. We did see a turtle and a few eels but it was far from impressive. Instead of a second dive in the Corridor, our dive master decided that Pelican Rock in the Cabo Marine Park might yield improved visibility. It was improved but not great. The surge was kicking up a lot of sand and visibility was perhaps 20 feet.
La Paz:
No doubt that this is a decent drive. It took 1 ½-2 hours. The SUV’s were super comfortable, newer, clean and air conditioned. We arrived to a rather industrial harbor(not the main harbor) in La Paz which had some iffy looking bathrooms and a small snack food café. The beach here was absolutely gorgeous. White sand and the water was much calmer.
Our first dive was to the wreck El Salvaterra. This wreck was formed in 1976 and remains surprisingly intact. It lies at about 60 foot depth. Current was mild and vis was about 50 feet. There was a lot of coral forming around this wreck and a quite a few fish. Wreck was penetrable through many openings and in one cabin our dive master spotted a yellow seahorse. By the time I got to the critter he was nearly pummeled to death by another diver who was determined to get the perfect photo at any cost. Propellers were intact which were a lot fun to tool around. There was one exhaust looking pipe which had a unique looking eel in it. On top of the wreck were numberous Angel fish and puffer fish. Water temps were comfortable at 78 degrees.
Our next dive was my most anticipated one. From the wreck we headed over to Los Islotes (aka the Sea Lion Colony). It consisted to two rock formations with a narrow channel in between. There were a couple of boats out there with visitors getting a show from the pups swimming up to their boats. We were the only dive boat there. In our briefing our dive master warned us about the male ‘bull lions’ which can get territorial during the current mating season. I was hoping the pups would be in full play mode. While they would dive in the water and quickly glide by us, they did not nip at our fins or engage us in any play. Throughout the dive our dive master and my husband kept banging their tanks and pointing at me. I looked over my equipment and checked my air and could not figure out WTH they kept pointing at me. Later I found out that on several occasions a male bull was corkscrewing and doing summersaults over my tank and behind me. I think he was trying to stick it to me! We circumnavigated the rocks and found a tremendous amount of sea life. Lots of eels, a turtle, unique file fish and schools of sea bass. During the end of the dive the current was really kicking in. I was at the end of the tow line and it was a bear pulling forward especially with a camera. At this point a pelican plopped right down next to me-practically on my shoulder. I think he was waiting for me to keel over. Some of the sightseers on neighboring boats were getting a good laugh and picture opportunity of this pelican.
Sea lions are a major pain to photograph-waaaay too fast!
Cabo Pulmo:
This was also a highly anticipated dive. Like the La Paz dive, we met at the dive shop at the ungodly hour of 6:45 am. It too was a long drive. People were either drinking coffee or snoozing. After several miles on a fissured, bumpy dirt road we arrived to Cabo Pulmo. I know this is a haven for hard core divers to stay during their entire vacation. I found it way too bucolic and isolated for my taste. This was one of the most unique boat entrances to the water that I have ever witnessed. The boat is parked on the sand with the engine facing the water. A heavy duty monster of a pick up truck gently backs into the bow of the boat and guns the engine. We all stood on the side of the boat to facilitate it’s entrance into the water and hopped on. The winds were strong and the white caps and swells were becoming larger and more frequent. We rode about 15 minutes to the dive site. Our dive master informed us that it is possible to spot a tiger or a bull shark. I was excited and nervous. We never saw a shark-not even a nurse shark. Current was strong and we quickly descended to about 60 feet. There were quite a bit of colorful coral formations, but it was muted by the poor vis which ranged from 20-30 feet. We encountered massive schools of fish. I can honestly say that I have never seen such densely packed fish, to the point of blocking out the sunlight. I saw some humungous scorpion fish and a lot of yellow jacks. We did our surface interval on the boat. Unfortunately, our dive op did not captain or own the boat. Apparently this is done through the Marine Park officials. The major down side to this is the boat engine was cut off and we sat for 50 minutes(which felt like an eternity)on a rolling, pitching boat on rough seas. Five out of six of us were horribly sea sick (no, I was not the lucky one). I could not enter the water fast enough for our second dive! It was even better than the first. We encountered a massive school of yellow grouper. In the middle of them came this black grouper that had to be the size of a VW Bug. I got all excited banging my tank when heading right near me was a huge school of equally massive grouper followed by a school of pork fish. I cannot count how many puffer fish I saw. Under one overhang I counted seven. My husband started banging his tank and pointed out a huge green moray eel free swimming. I turned to my side and saw another green moray also free swimming and hunting. If the visibility had been better, I would have to say this would be the best dive site I have yet encountered. By the time we returned to the boat, the swells made it difficult to hang onto the tow line and climb the boat ladder. Our boat captain was a saint by having us hand up our weights, bcd and fins to make it easier to flop into the boat.
On our drive back to Cabo I made the confession to my husband, friends and dive master that I would be cancelling the following day’s dive to Gordo Banks. After the rough seas and sea sickness, I could not imagine sitting on a boat for 1 ½ hours each way to dive into the open sea. I really, really wanted to see the big stuff-mainly the schools of hammerheads, but obviously it is not a guarantee, some divers hang onto the mooring line in the deep blue looking for anything. As our drive got us closer to Cabo our dive master got a phone call from the dive shop owner informing him that the Gordo Banks dive was completely cancelled due to weather, rough seas and an “incident” (http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/ne...ed/426777-divers-missing-off-gordo-banks.html).
Summary:
All in all we had a great trip. I would definitely return to Cabo, but perhaps I would wait until Oct. or Nov. for the warmer water and improved vis. I would definitely stay at the Terrasol again and dive with Sunshine Dive Charters. I think I will avoid walking the marina in the evening or at night. Not a crime issue but the time share sharks, tour salesman and vendors are so aggressive and pushy. It also seemed like more of a party scene than I prefer. Yes, I am sounding like an old biddy. There was some poor guy dressed as a pirate who had a gold-like spray paint all over. I thought it was a fake. My friends and I stood around watching for any movement. Not even a flinch when some genius came up and pretended to do a prostate exam on the poor soul. Just for enduring that treatment, I put some tip money into his bucket. Sure enough he succeeded in making me jump when he lurched forward. We all got a good lough out of that one. Another advantage to Cabo is the number of topside activities. My sister joined us on this trip. She is not a diver so while we were out on our excursions, she indulged herself in some kayaking, snorkeling and was an awesome surfer! The locals were always friendly and helpful.
The End!
Lodging:
We could have not been more pleased with our decision to stay at Terrasol Condos. We booked our unit through VRBO. These are not time share condos, but individually owned. This was a huge bonus for us since we were never approached, hounded or badgered by time share reps on the property. Our unit was completely upgraded from the appliances, furniture to the tile. Keep in mind that being individually owned, some units are completely updated while others have not. Besides the crashing waves, it peaceful and absolutely free of any noise from roosters, cars, night clubs etc. Yet you are a 5-10 walk to the marina.
Restaurants:
We never had a bad meal. We used Tripadvisor as a resource. Other places were recommended by condo guests. Some of the places we visited:
-Solomon’s Landing: I have read about being approached by timeshare salesman while dining. We never encountered this problem. Wonderful chile rellenos and mojitos.
-Baja Brewing Company: Pristine views but hot. Limited shade on patio. My flat bread Margherita pizza was fab. I ordered another one to keep at the condo. Perfect snack when served cold after diving.
-The Office: This place was a big disappointment. The food was okay, not spectacular but very pricey. While a table closest to the beach may be initially appealing, it was a mistake us Cabo virgins made. Vendors would swarm around us and not leave us alone. We moved to a table further back and it was much better.
-Tres Gallos: This was perhaps my favorite restaurant visited during our trip. The ambiance was comfortable with an enchanting courtyard. Wonderful enchiladas. Drinks were somewhat pricey
-Salvatores: As soon as you walk into the courtyard you are overcome by the smell of garlic( I love that aroma, but not when sleeping next to a mouth breathing husband). Wonderful food and service. The lasagna portions are humungous! Typically I am not a sangria drinker, but these were so fresh and tasty.
-Hacienda: Probably the best view we encountered coupled with ambiance. It was recommended to us by a guest at Terrasol. I figured it would be a casual hang out like Tres Gallos. In retrospect, I wish we dressed up a little more. While not a stuffy or pretentious atmosphere, it was a lends itself to a more classy establishment than my jeans and tank top provided. The food was excellent and the prices fair, although the cost of drinks was expensive.
Diving:
We chose Sunshine Dive Charters as our dive op. They are located in the Marina behind the Wyndham Hotel. The main reasons we picked them as our dive op is the small boats and we never had more than 6 divers(even when diving the remote sites like Cabo Pulmo and La Paz). They also store, handle and rinse your gear. Dive masters and Captains were friendly, helpful and very safety conscious. While the pelagics and big guys are the crowd pleaser, Jonatan was amazing at pointing out the macro stuff.
Cabo Marine Park:
The visibility definitely was not optimal, ranging from 15-30 feet. I have encountered mild, subtle thermoclines in the Caribbean and was aware of their prevalence in Cabo. Nothing prepared me for what I endured. Not only were they dramatic temp wise but you could actually see them. The best way to describe it is as a ripple or oil and water appearance. I will admit that I am a total wuss when it comes to cold water. I wear my 5 mm wetsuit in 80 degree water. I HATE BEING COLD! I passed on purchasing or renting a 7 mm since they are a major PITA to put on-especially on a boat. Instead I wore my 5 mm and alternated with a Lavacore vest/hoodie and a 2.5 mm neoprene vest. I have to say the neoprene did a much better job at making the cold waters less miserable. When entering the cold thermoclines it was mind blowing. Every time I thought it couldn’t get any colder BAM! It did. After diving The North Wall (probably my favorite) I wanted to make sure I wasn’t losing my mind by checking my dive computer temps. In that dive alone the surface water temp was 83 degrees, and the coldest was 61 degrees. The men in our group found the cold waters “refreshing”(yeah, right), the women were still reeling from the frigid B-slap.
In all of my dives, I have to say that despite the poor visibility and lack of coral formations, Cabo beats the other destination hands down when it comes to sheer numbers and abundance of sea life. We saw large numbers of trumpet fish,grunts, puffer fish, morish idols, sea bass, bump head parrotfish, porkfish, stingrays, hogfish, goatfish and you couldn’t swing a belt around without hitting a green moray eel. We encountered several schools of snapper and grunts. This was the first time I have ever seen a Cortez angelfish, the unique variety of pufferfish or a Moorish idol. They are nothing short of majestic. As odd as it sounds, the colors seemed richer and more vivid than many of the fish I have encountered in the Caribbean. Currents were mild, surge was moderate. Unfortunately, there were no sea lions in the area during this time of year.
The Corridor/ Chileno Bay:
Several hundreds of miles away and far west of Cabo a hurricane was starting to develop. We never encountered any rain but the seas were getting rough starting the night before diving this area. When descending, the vis was awful, perhaps 10-15 feet. My husband decided to abort this dive and wait on the boat. The decision was a no brainer for me. Sitting on a stationary, pitching boat for an hour is a sure recipe for sea sickness, for me it is tantamount to Damien entering a church. I decided to buddy up with another couple we were diving with and endure the muck diving. We did see a turtle and a few eels but it was far from impressive. Instead of a second dive in the Corridor, our dive master decided that Pelican Rock in the Cabo Marine Park might yield improved visibility. It was improved but not great. The surge was kicking up a lot of sand and visibility was perhaps 20 feet.
La Paz:
No doubt that this is a decent drive. It took 1 ½-2 hours. The SUV’s were super comfortable, newer, clean and air conditioned. We arrived to a rather industrial harbor(not the main harbor) in La Paz which had some iffy looking bathrooms and a small snack food café. The beach here was absolutely gorgeous. White sand and the water was much calmer.
Our first dive was to the wreck El Salvaterra. This wreck was formed in 1976 and remains surprisingly intact. It lies at about 60 foot depth. Current was mild and vis was about 50 feet. There was a lot of coral forming around this wreck and a quite a few fish. Wreck was penetrable through many openings and in one cabin our dive master spotted a yellow seahorse. By the time I got to the critter he was nearly pummeled to death by another diver who was determined to get the perfect photo at any cost. Propellers were intact which were a lot fun to tool around. There was one exhaust looking pipe which had a unique looking eel in it. On top of the wreck were numberous Angel fish and puffer fish. Water temps were comfortable at 78 degrees.
Our next dive was my most anticipated one. From the wreck we headed over to Los Islotes (aka the Sea Lion Colony). It consisted to two rock formations with a narrow channel in between. There were a couple of boats out there with visitors getting a show from the pups swimming up to their boats. We were the only dive boat there. In our briefing our dive master warned us about the male ‘bull lions’ which can get territorial during the current mating season. I was hoping the pups would be in full play mode. While they would dive in the water and quickly glide by us, they did not nip at our fins or engage us in any play. Throughout the dive our dive master and my husband kept banging their tanks and pointing at me. I looked over my equipment and checked my air and could not figure out WTH they kept pointing at me. Later I found out that on several occasions a male bull was corkscrewing and doing summersaults over my tank and behind me. I think he was trying to stick it to me! We circumnavigated the rocks and found a tremendous amount of sea life. Lots of eels, a turtle, unique file fish and schools of sea bass. During the end of the dive the current was really kicking in. I was at the end of the tow line and it was a bear pulling forward especially with a camera. At this point a pelican plopped right down next to me-practically on my shoulder. I think he was waiting for me to keel over. Some of the sightseers on neighboring boats were getting a good laugh and picture opportunity of this pelican.
Sea lions are a major pain to photograph-waaaay too fast!
Cabo Pulmo:
This was also a highly anticipated dive. Like the La Paz dive, we met at the dive shop at the ungodly hour of 6:45 am. It too was a long drive. People were either drinking coffee or snoozing. After several miles on a fissured, bumpy dirt road we arrived to Cabo Pulmo. I know this is a haven for hard core divers to stay during their entire vacation. I found it way too bucolic and isolated for my taste. This was one of the most unique boat entrances to the water that I have ever witnessed. The boat is parked on the sand with the engine facing the water. A heavy duty monster of a pick up truck gently backs into the bow of the boat and guns the engine. We all stood on the side of the boat to facilitate it’s entrance into the water and hopped on. The winds were strong and the white caps and swells were becoming larger and more frequent. We rode about 15 minutes to the dive site. Our dive master informed us that it is possible to spot a tiger or a bull shark. I was excited and nervous. We never saw a shark-not even a nurse shark. Current was strong and we quickly descended to about 60 feet. There were quite a bit of colorful coral formations, but it was muted by the poor vis which ranged from 20-30 feet. We encountered massive schools of fish. I can honestly say that I have never seen such densely packed fish, to the point of blocking out the sunlight. I saw some humungous scorpion fish and a lot of yellow jacks. We did our surface interval on the boat. Unfortunately, our dive op did not captain or own the boat. Apparently this is done through the Marine Park officials. The major down side to this is the boat engine was cut off and we sat for 50 minutes(which felt like an eternity)on a rolling, pitching boat on rough seas. Five out of six of us were horribly sea sick (no, I was not the lucky one). I could not enter the water fast enough for our second dive! It was even better than the first. We encountered a massive school of yellow grouper. In the middle of them came this black grouper that had to be the size of a VW Bug. I got all excited banging my tank when heading right near me was a huge school of equally massive grouper followed by a school of pork fish. I cannot count how many puffer fish I saw. Under one overhang I counted seven. My husband started banging his tank and pointed out a huge green moray eel free swimming. I turned to my side and saw another green moray also free swimming and hunting. If the visibility had been better, I would have to say this would be the best dive site I have yet encountered. By the time we returned to the boat, the swells made it difficult to hang onto the tow line and climb the boat ladder. Our boat captain was a saint by having us hand up our weights, bcd and fins to make it easier to flop into the boat.
On our drive back to Cabo I made the confession to my husband, friends and dive master that I would be cancelling the following day’s dive to Gordo Banks. After the rough seas and sea sickness, I could not imagine sitting on a boat for 1 ½ hours each way to dive into the open sea. I really, really wanted to see the big stuff-mainly the schools of hammerheads, but obviously it is not a guarantee, some divers hang onto the mooring line in the deep blue looking for anything. As our drive got us closer to Cabo our dive master got a phone call from the dive shop owner informing him that the Gordo Banks dive was completely cancelled due to weather, rough seas and an “incident” (http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/ne...ed/426777-divers-missing-off-gordo-banks.html).
Summary:
All in all we had a great trip. I would definitely return to Cabo, but perhaps I would wait until Oct. or Nov. for the warmer water and improved vis. I would definitely stay at the Terrasol again and dive with Sunshine Dive Charters. I think I will avoid walking the marina in the evening or at night. Not a crime issue but the time share sharks, tour salesman and vendors are so aggressive and pushy. It also seemed like more of a party scene than I prefer. Yes, I am sounding like an old biddy. There was some poor guy dressed as a pirate who had a gold-like spray paint all over. I thought it was a fake. My friends and I stood around watching for any movement. Not even a flinch when some genius came up and pretended to do a prostate exam on the poor soul. Just for enduring that treatment, I put some tip money into his bucket. Sure enough he succeeded in making me jump when he lurched forward. We all got a good lough out of that one. Another advantage to Cabo is the number of topside activities. My sister joined us on this trip. She is not a diver so while we were out on our excursions, she indulged herself in some kayaking, snorkeling and was an awesome surfer! The locals were always friendly and helpful.
The End!
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