Cozumel January 2020 Advice

[mikeycanuk]

@BradStyle My wife and I (also escaping the cold and rain in Portland) will be in Coz 12/29-1/5 and diving with Aldora. Hopefully we see you on or in the water!

we will be diving aldora on dec 29 and 31 (our last 2 diving days). Did maraciabo on the 31st last year

 

[GirlonFire]

I don’t know if you’ve booked lodging yet but if you are still considering Casa Mexicana, I just booked an ocean view room there and it was cheaper on their site than on booking engines. $100/nt for the first week in January.
Ymmv

 

[bradStyle]

Hey everybody, my girlfriend and I wrapped up our trip to Cozumel the other day. The advice here was invaluable and I thought I'd let you know what we did and what we'd do again.

To start I'll say that we enjoyed our stay so much that now we're planing to return to Cozumel next winter for a month. It's an amazing island, and the people and local businesses are so friendly. After a while we got to know a lot of people around town. It's a lovely community.

We LOVED diving with Aldora. It was our first time diving stainless 120s. We're converts. We'll definitely use them next time we come through, despite them being the most expensive game in town with no discounts available. I did two dives a day with them, seven days a week, except for one day when a strong norte blew in, and one other day doing the bookwork for the PADI Rescue Diver class we did with them. Overall I did forty two dives with Aldora. My poor GF got sick mid-trip and was only able to do about half the dives she'd planned to.

We also really enjoyed staying at Casa Mexicana, despite a few hiccups along the way. We'd probably prefer an AirBNB for the next visit, but there aren't a ton of good options for us close to the Aldora pier, which is our most important location criteria (makes for an easy commute in the mornings for diving and puts us close to a ton of great restaurants). One of the only frustrating tradeoffs about CM's great location is being on the front road along the water meant that we were constantly solicited by dozens of shopkeepers trying to sell to the cruise ship passengers. We're pretty polite people generally, but after weeks and hundreds of unwanted offers we stopped making eye contact and completely ignored them. Even being one block east of the waterfront would solve this, though in that process we'd lose the *lovely* view. Ahhh, troubles in paradise...

As far as restaurants go we ate at twenty two different spots. Kinta, Kondesa, Nuevo Especias, and Del Sur were our favorite dinner places and Los Otates, Lobster Shack, La Bendicion, and Le Chef were our favorite lunch spots. Other names visited include... Azul Madera, Guidos, Al Pie de Carbon, Hemingways, El Cielito, Buccanos (awful experience here, check out my review on Yelp if you want a laugh), Los Sera's, El Moro, Rolandi's, the Thirty Cougar, Colores & Sabores, Mar y Juana, Costa Brava (terrible), Machete, and La Choza.

After returning from a two dive morning, around 13:30-14:00 generally, I'd have a quick lunch and then Mondays through Fridays head to an hour of Spanish language tutoring (arranged through SEA Cozumel), and from there to Ego Fitness Gym where I got a cheap short term membership. Then it was time for a shower and prep to head out for dinner. This made for great days.

I'm sure there's plenty more I'm leaving out, but these were the highlights.

COZUMEL. *Great* place, can't wait to return!

Thanks SB

 

[divingjd]

Thanks for letting us know how you liked everything. I am one of the few that would agree with your assessment of Buccanos. We had a different experience (see my review on TripAdvisor from a few years ago) but also found management haughty and strangely unconcerned about customers. I also worked in restaurants when I was young and knew when they were not being totally forthcoming. I have also had much better experiences at Kinta and liked the food more.

I would suggest that you consider Villa Aldora, but it might be pricey for a month.

It’s good to hear that you enjoyed it.

 

[DandyDon]

One of the only frustrating tradeoffs about CM's great location is being on the front road along the water meant that we were constantly solicited by dozens of shopkeepers trying to sell to the cruise ship passengers. We're pretty polite people generally, but after weeks and hundreds of unwanted offers we stopped making eye contact and completely ignored them.

Yeah, I guess so. The only time I venture onto Melgar is on the way to & from the boat while carrying my backpack & suit, so they didn't treat me like pod people. I probably growl around those people too.

from there to Ego Fitness Gym where I got a cheap short term membership. Then it was time for a shower and prep to head out for dinner. This made for great days.

Gawd, you have entirely too much energy. There are some cautions about working out on a dive trip you might look into.

 

[bradStyle]

I would suggest that you consider Villa Aldora, but it might be pricey for a month.

For a while there I was on the fence between Casa Mexicana and Villa Aldora, but for such a long stay we decided that proximity to restaurants would be a better use of our time each day. If we were coming for just a week or so there would be no question, we'd stay at Villa Aldora. We did the first half of our Rescue Diver training there and it's a *beautiful* facility.

Gawd, you have entirely too much energy. There are some cautions about working out on a dive trip you might look into.

Good point. That had not gone overlooked. In most cases I was diving Nitrox, didn't push my NDL too hard on any dive (except for that one at Devil's Throat), always had a solid four hours on the surface before the gym, and did almost entirely weight training (I need a trainer standing over me with a whip to do heavy cardio). I do have a lot of energy, but it's only because I go to the gym religiously