What happened to Cozumel?

[LVRAY]

This is the kind of stuff I find very useful.
Most of the time when I read about Cozumel it's some fanboi gushing about how great it is.
I really thought it should be a bucket list place to dive.
But I'm not going to take the time and pay the money to look at bare rock and coral ash.
Thank you for being honest.
When I get a chance to travel to dive someday I think based on what I'm reading, Cozumel is off the list.

Your loss.

 

[ggunn]

This is the kind of stuff I find very useful.
Most of the time when I read about Cozumel it's some fanboi gushing about how great it is.
I really thought it should be a bucket list place to dive.
But I'm not going to take the time and pay the money to look at bare rock and coral ash.
Thank you for being honest.
When I get a chance to travel to dive someday I think based on what I'm reading, Cozumel is off the list.

Bare rock and coral ash? Seriously? As a general description of Cozumel diving, that is patently ridiculous, but for someone like yourself who has never been there, I guess it could seem plausible just because "someone" said it. As a diver with more than 600 Cozumel dives over the past 30 years I can assure you that my firsthand observationally based opinion is very different.

Why someone who has never even been to Cozumel would choose to come on this forum and trashtalk the diving there is a bit beyond me, but suit yourself; if you choose to avoid Cozumel because of your erroneous opinion of what diving there is like, then so be it. If others choose to believe it as well and it makes for less crowding on the reefs there, I see that as a good thing for both the divers and the reef.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

Your loss.

I'm not sure yet if it is or not.
I suppose if you're from Las Vagas Nevada or Austin Texas or somewhere in Nebraska then Cozumel and it's diving might be a wonderful place. But I have an ocean close by and I love it dearly. Warm water and huge visibility is really nice but it's not mandatory for me. My cold water diving is an entirely different experience of "wild" and I have acclimated to it and I love it. Cold water diving and low vis is no deal breaker for me at all.

I have to look at total money spent in relation to the experience gained. My free time is very rare. I own a business and have a lot of responsibilities so escaping is very difficult for me, so if I get a chance and time to get out of here it better be for a damn good reason.
In my book, just because water is warm and vis is 200' and I get to look at a few features that are cool like some morays and some passing mantas and a few corals, cool!
But to be stuck with 35 other newbies and all I see is rototillers with hanging consoles smashing everything and dust outs from split fins and photogs hogging a spot for way too long with a camera rig bigger than my truck, and getting stuck with a 15 dive saucer eyed flailing instabuddy that blows through their air in 15 minutes, and then a DM with a cattle prod moving the heard along, that just doesn't sound like fun to me.
It sounds like there is more of that going on than being taken to a rarely dived spot that is for advanced divers only that really get to see some incredible stuff and being left alone to enjoy it.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

Bare rock and coral ash? Seriously? As a general description of Cozumel diving, that is patently ridiculous, but for someone like yourself who has never been there, I guess it could seem plausible just because "someone" said it. As a diver with more than 600 Cozumel dives over the past 30 years I can assure you that my firsthand observationally based opinion is very different.

Why someone who has never even been to Cozumel would choose to come on this forum and trashtalk the diving there is a bit beyond me, but suit yourself; if you choose to avoid Cozumel because of your erroneous opinion of what diving there is like, then so be it. If others choose to believe it as well and it makes for less crowding on the reefs there, I see that as a good thing for both the divers and the reef.

I read it on the internet, it HAS to be true!

 

[pauldw]

But to be stuck with 35 other newbies and all I see is rototillers with hanging consoles smashing everything and dust outs from split fins and photogs hogging a spot for way too long with a camera rig bigger than my truck, and getting stuck with a 15 dive saucer eyed flailing instabuddy that blows through their air in 15 minutes, and then a DM with a cattle prod moving the heard along, that just doesn't sound like fun to me.

OK, there's a description of a possible dive experience. But the OP said diving Coz wasn't up to GUE standards. So what was going on that's below GUE standards?

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

OK, there's a description of a possible dive experience. But the OP said diving Coz wasn't up to GUE standards. So what was going on that's below GUE standards?

I'm not GUE so I have no idea.

 

[Nemrod]

Again, and not just Cozumel, if a diver wants to dive GUE/DIR "standards" whatever all that entails, best bring your own kit and your own approved buddies. I am certain that if a large enough group, and large enough depends upon the resort/dive center, they will bend over backwards to accommodate. And even get you all on a boat to yourselves or split up with different DMs. If doing rebreathers or tri-mix then advance arrangements are going to have to happen with a facility that can support that type of diving.

A diver friend who just recently visited Roatan sent some pics to share on his drop box. I am not impressed with what I saw, mostly bluish green covered dead coral stumps and kind of hazy water. Perhaps it was just the photos did not show the coral or whatever or the strobes were not turned on or something. But there is plenty of color in Cozumel, 9/24:

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

Again, and not just Cozumel, if a diver wants to dive GUE/DIR "standards" whatever all that entails, best bring your own kit and your own approved buddies. I am certain that if a large enough group, and large enough depends upon the resort/dive center, they will bend over backwards to accommodate. And even get you all on a boat to yourselves or split up with different DMs. If doing rebreathers or tri-mix then advance arrangements are going to have to happen with a facility that can support that type of diving.

A diver friend who just recently visited Roatan sent some pics to share on his drop box. I am not impressed with what I saw, mostly bluish green covered dead coral stumps and kind of hazy water. Perhaps it was just the photos did not show the coral or whatever or the strobes were not turned on or something. But there is plenty of color in Cozumel, 9/24:

I'm not GUE but have had/have several GUE friends over the years and know enough about the system from them and reading/studying. The operator would have have 32% available and beyond that normoxic trimix past 100' to ? IDK.
Every one of them will have an O2 analyzer to know exactly what they're breathing.
But I can guarantee you one thing, you won't see any dangling consoles or second stages, or crap on stretched out retractors catching on things, and you won't see any silt outs and kicked up sand or broken/smashed coral, I can guarantee it.
Say what you want about them, but that much is true.

 

[ggunn]

But to be stuck with 35 other newbies and all I see is rototillers with hanging consoles smashing everything and dust outs from split fins and photogs hogging a spot for way too long with a camera rig bigger than my truck, and getting stuck with a 15 dive saucer eyed flailing instabuddy that blows through their air in 15 minutes, and then a DM with a cattle prod moving the heard along, that just doesn't sound like fun to me.
It sounds like there is more of that going on than being taken to a rarely dived spot that is for advanced divers only that really get to see some incredible stuff and being left alone to enjoy it.

But of course, those of us who dive Cozumel regularly, and there are a lot of us, know that Cozumel diving is not at all like that. That isn't to say that no one ever has a disappointing dive around Cozumel: just like anywhere else, stuff happens, but in 600+ dives there I have only had a handful of dives where I wished I had stayed ashore. It's not just the clear, warm water.

 

[ggunn]

I'm not GUE so I have no idea.

Me, either, and I literally (and I do know what "literally" means) could not care less.