Diving Akumal Area...suggestions?

[Mike]

This question came up, do you really need a guide to dive some of the "beginner" centoes?

That's a good question. I'm sure you could find it out by googling the various cenotes around the Yukatan and making some inquiries. I can tell you that they vary tremendously in circumstances. Some are family owned and the families run them and you pay them an admission fee to access them with a lot of freedom. Some are run like Disney land with an onsight dive op and very regimented. Some are very accessible, you can park on the side of a road or walk across the street from your lunch at a beach bar and go swimming in one. Some allow no diving at all. Some require a very tiring trek through the jungle on foot carrying your gear. Some you drive to them and park at a big parking lot. Some have very delicate formations that they are sure to want to keep people from damaging and will control access, some are not decorated at all and there is little worry of damage. They vary tremendously from cenote to cenote.

As long as you stay within the guidelines of cavern diving and keep the entrance within 120 ft from you, and as long as you are open water certified you're technically certified to dive a cenote. I'm guessing you are going to find resistance to being able to dive yourself unguided, but I'm also guessing you can search enough and you'll find what you are looking to do.

 

[Ed Hatfield]

Correct me if I am wrong but I understand you must be CAVE CERTIFIED to dive the cenotes without a guide. The cenotes are private owned and you will not get onto the property without signing in and paying the fee plus showing proof of certification. The locals are very protective of the industry and don't tolerate bending the rules especially when tourists are involved. It's not like in Florida where you put your fee in a box, park your car in the lot and leave your Cert in the window.
Diving in Akumal, and it's been several years since I dove there, was not as good as PDC. The cream of the ocean diving is of course Coz. I don't know if Akumal diving has improved but I wouldn't waste the dive unless I had information otherwise. Snorkelling is another matter. The BEST snorkelling is in Akumal. I haven't been to Tulum or Xcalak yet for diving but I understand Xcalak in amazing. I understand it is similar to Belize.

 

[TSandM]

As long as you stay within the guidelines of cavern diving and keep the entrance within 120 ft from you, and as long as you are open water certified you'retechnically certified to dive a cenote.

I have no idea where you got this. An OW certification specifically states that you are not to go into deco, and not to dive in overhead environments. A cavern class and a cavern certification are required to be "technically" certified to dive in the caverns. (You can, of course, dive the open water portion of any cenote with an OW card.) As I said before, the cenote tours are controversial. Many cave divers and even some instructors do not think they are a good idea, but they are big business and they are not going to stop. But if the fact that you can do these tours with a properly qualified guide starts giving people ideas about being able to dive the caverns on their own, it may. All it would take would be a rash of diving deaths (and they WOULD happen -- even trained cave divers die down there from time to time) to restrict access for everybody.

Very few cenotes do anything about checking credentials. Cenote Eden and Dos Ojos are the only two that come to my mind.

 

[Mike]

I have no idea where you got this. An OW certification specifically states that you are not to go into deco, and not to dive in overhead environments. A cavern class and a cavern certification are required to be "technically" certified to dive in the caverns. (You can, of course, dive the open water portion of any cenote with an OW card.) As I said before, the cenote tours are controversial. Many cave divers and even some instructors do not think they are a good idea, but they are big business and they are not going to stop. But if the fact that you can do these tours with a properly qualified guide starts giving people ideas about being able to dive the caverns on their own, it may. All it would take would be a rash of diving deaths (and they WOULD happen -- even trained cave divers die down there from time to time) to restrict access for everybody.

Very few cenotes do anything about checking credentials. Cenote Eden and Dos Ojos are the only two that come to my mind.

"technically" as in technicality, not "technically" as in tech diver - as in technically you can drive a Porsche on the Autobahn at 175 mph since it will go that fast, but that doesn't mean you should.

Not sure what deco would have to do with it, in a cenote you could be 120 feet from the exit and be in 10 feet of water. As for over head, that's what the keeping yourself within the exit thing is about isn't it? Not considered 'over head' right?

Hearsay? I don't know. Just going by what I've been told by the guides and ops there. As long as you're within rec dive limits of the surface (substitute exit since it's a cenote) you're good to go. Certified might not be the right word, but what word would be correct? That's the guidelines the guides give for being able to take an OW diver on their cenote dives. They take an OW certified diver in and stay within those limits of the exit. More loosely they say it "as long as you can see the light of the exit at all times, you're good." Where do I have it incorrect exactly? I'm not saying whether it's wrong or right, whether it's foolish or not, only how it works. It's Mexico.

There are lots of cenotes, big ones and small ones, some as I said you can just walk over to and jump in if you want, there is one down south of Akumal I believe next to a bar on the road, where if you buy a beer, you can go in the cenote. Whole thing could be washed away from the last big tide by now for all I know.

When I first dived the cenotes, you couldn't even find anybody really doing it. I had to contact Dennis Weaks to take me, I think he had just moved down there at that time, still had non-mexican plates on his truck as I recall, and was just starting to guide people. Now I think he's the king of cenote diving isn't he?

 

[TSandM]

The definition of the cavern zone for most agencies is that depth and penetration should not exceed 130 feet, that is true. That does NOT mean that a person with only open water training is okay to dive to those limits. Those are the limits of the CAVERN zone, and to dive in caverns, one should either have a cavern certification, or be diving as part of an organized dive with a qualified guide.

Let me tell a story on myself. I have a Full Cave certification, which means that I am qualified to dive in the caves, and to do jumps and complex navigation. I love Grand Cenote, and my husband and I dive there quite frequently, and are very familiar with the cave. The cavern line there is so pretty that we often swim it on the way out of our cave dives, just for fun. One day, we did that, and at the end of the line, I decided to take a shortcut to the ladders. I could see open water from where I was, and I didn't want to swim the cavern line back. So I set off for the daylight, abandoning the line.

It turned out that you couldn't REACH the daylight I saw from where I was, because there were cave formations in the way. It was much further to open water than I had thought, and I had to turn away from the sunlight to reach an area where I could negotiate the formations and make progress toward my goal. I was unperturbed, because I know the cave and cavern, and I knew very well that I was not going to stumble into any cave passage from where I was, without swimming over gold line. But someone unfamiliar with the cavern (or carrying much less gas) could have made the same error and been far more upset, because the "you can't get there from here" feeling is not a comfortable one, when you have nothing but water and rock over your head.

I've been in other caverns (Pet Cemetery comes to mind) where it would be easy to be FAR more disoriented and confused, and potentially lost, even though you could see the glow of daylight in some direction. It isn't always somewhere you can easily reach. In fact, two cave certified friends of mine gave themselves a serious scare SNORKELING in NoHoch, because you can easily get out of view of daylight while still on the surface there -- and then which way is out?

There is a reason cavern training is recommended for cavern diving, and there is a reason people frown on the Mexican tours. It is NOT true that an OW certification is adequate for penetration to an aggregate total of 130 feet, and in some places, this really could be the last dive you did. Did you watch the video I linked to?

 

[Pez de Diablo]

As long as you stay within the guidelines of cavern diving and keep the entrance within 120 ft from you, and as long as you are open water certified you're technically certified to dive a cenote. I'm guessing you are going to find resistance to being able to dive yourself unguided, but I'm also guessing you can search enough and you'll find what you are looking to do.

Mike, Actually you are not certified to dive in caverns unless you have the appropriate overhead training, ie: cavern certification.

Without this training how is an open water diver to know what the guidelines of safe cavern diving are? For instance, you didn't even mention that fact that a special gas/air management plan needs to be put in place when diving in an overhead environment.... what other rules and guidelines are you missing?

After I do a body recovery and look at the dive that took place will I be able to mention the other rules that were broken and contributed to the death of an open water diver diving in a cavern without the proper training.

Dennis Weeks

 

[Pez de Diablo]

Not sure what deco would have to do with it, in a cenote you could be 120 feet from the exit and be in 10 feet of water. As for over head, that's what the keeping yourself within the exit thing is about isn't it? Not considered 'over head' right?

Deco has a lot to do with it. Open water divers follow there computers and when the no stop time approaches 4 or 5 minutes they start their assent to the surface, gaining bottom time as the ascend.

Cavern divers don't have that ability, they need to plan the dive so they are back at the surface from the furthest point of penetration within the no stop or deco limits. This is a big difference between open water and cavern certified divers.

Hearsay? I don't know. Just going by what I've been told by the guides and ops there. As long as you're within rec dive limits of the surface (substitute exit since it's a cenote) you're good to go. Certified might not be the right word, but what word would be correct? That's the guidelines the guides give for being able to take an OW diver on their cenote dives. They take an OW certified diver in and stay within those limits of the exit. More loosely they say it "as long as you can see the light of the exit at all times, you're good." Where do I have it incorrect exactly? I'm not saying whether it's wrong or right, whether it's foolish or not, only how it works. It's Mexico.

Mike, you have it incorrect in so many different ways. For you to really understand, take a cavern course or come back to Mexico and listen to the full guided cavern dive briefing so you have a fresher outlook on the hazards of cavern diving.

We have mentioned rules/guidelines for safe cavern diving but haven't even mentioned the fact that open water divers on these tours are following trained cavern guides. The guides are there to remind the divers of the rules while on the dive and to insure that the rules are not broken, bringing back all the divers safely to the surface.

There are lots of cenotes, big ones and small ones, some as I said you can just walk over to and jump in if you want, there is one down south of Akumal I believe next to a bar on the road, where if you buy a beer, you can go in the cenote. Whole thing could be washed away from the last big tide by now for all I know.

When I first dived the cenotes, you couldn't even find anybody really doing it. I had to contact Dennis Weaks to take me, I think he had just moved down there at that time, still had non-mexican plates on his truck as I recall, and was just starting to guide people. Now I think he's the king of cenote diving isn't he?

There were many experienced guides leading cavern dives when I started working in this area in 2003, I didn't invent anything, in fact the water sport association of the Riviera Maya had a training program in place to train open water dive masters or instructors that were fully cave trained to safely guide cavern dives. Again that program was in place when I got here.

Though I kinda like the title of King of cenote diving... I don't deserve the title if I left the impression with you that any open water diver could dive in the caverns without the proper training or a trained cavern guide.

Dennis

 

[Mike]

Thanks for helping clear things up a bit.

So how about you guys clear up the confusion -

An OW diver can dive in a cenote with a proper guide - Yes/No

An OW diver can dive a cenote by himself without a guide - Yes/No

And further when you answer can or can't, what exactly does that really mean? Will somebody actually stop or deny him entry at some/all cenotes if he tried to without a guide?

I'm guessing that MC could dive some cenote somewhere without a guide.

 

[Pez de Diablo]

Thanks for helping clear things up a bit.

So how about you guys clear up the confusion -

An OW diver can dive in a cenote with a proper guide - Yes/No

An OW diver can dive a cenote by himself without a guide - Yes/No

And further when you answer can or can't, what exactly does that really mean? Will somebody actually stop or deny him entry at some/all cenotes if he tried to without a guide?

I'm guessing that MC could dive some cenote somewhere without a guide.

Yes, an open water diver (though advanced certification is recommended) can dive in a cenote with a proper guide.

No an open water diver cannot dive in a cenote by himself without a guide.

Many cenotes will not let you in without a recognized guide. World wide over 400 open water divers have died because they entered the overhead environment without proper training and I am sure none of them planned on killing themselves when the set out on the dive. Could some one dive a cenote without the proper training or without a guide? Yes they could, but they risk their life when doing so.

Dennis

 

[Mike]

Thanks Dennis, it doesn't get much clearer than that!