My wife and I just got back last night from Cozumel and here is the Trip Report:
Dates: 29 March thru 1 April
We arrived at the Cozumel airport at 1030. It took us about 10 minutes to get bags once we cleared immigration. Then we went right through the customs check...green light this time...and right out to buy the van tickets. I fall for this one everytime. The guys from the tourist department are not there to help you get van tickets. Just go to the window on the right as you walk through the sliding doors and buy your van tickets. I don't know why, maybe they change shirt colors, but we always spend about 5 minutes talking to some guy in a festive polo shirt before we finally disengage and buy the tickets.
It took the van about 10 minutes to fill up, and they're not moving until literally every available seat is filled! We were at our hotel about 15 minutes later. Checked in, unpacked and ready to dive by about 11:45 or 12:00 ish.
We stayed at Villas las Anclas this time. http://lasanclas.com/
We walked through the gate and were immediately greeted by Eyal who invited us to sit in the "garden" area because Pedro was checking another couple in at the time. The Pedro came out and took us to our room (more like a small apartment). Pedro is a very soft spoken, gentle man, sort of like a monk in my opinion. He was polite and kind and told us to just come right over to his apartment if we needed anything.
The room was actually being cleaned while we were checking in and when we returned from our afternoon dive it was spotless. The rooms are designed so that downstairs is a small kitchenette with coffee pot, microwave, small fridge, sink, and table as well as living room with two couches and a television. Upstairs is a bed and tile bathroom. The bed was comfortable and the air conditioner worked great. Overall, las Anclas was comfortable and quite despite being in the heart of downtown. We were within five minutes walk of all the shopping, restaurants and most importantly the pier where we met the boat. We were also just around the corner (probably less than 100 yards) from Blue XT Sea, Christi and crew. www.bluextseadiving.com
OK, now the fun stuff: We made seven dives over three days, including one night dive. All dives were with Blue XT Sea and we had Arturo as our Dive Master on every dive.
Dive 1: Maracaibo. Max depth was 60 feet for 59 minutes total. This was a great warm-up dive that started out with a nice surprise. As soon as had made our descent, adjusted buoyancy and started towards the reef, a 5 or 6 foot nurse shark swam right next to us about 15 feet away. Looked like it was having a little lunch on something in the sand as it kicked up quite a bit of sand and then settled for a few seconds before swimming off. Then a few minutes later, Arturo found a huge moray eel right out in the open next to a coral head. It was laying on its side with its head up completely exposed! It was at least six feet long and looked to be approximately a foot wide from top to bottom. We watched this guy for a while and then a big barracuda around 5 feet long swam right next to us and the eel. This was a great dive with very little current.
Dive2: Paradise: Max depth on this dive was 40 feet for 51 minutes. Again it started out great, because we found a toadfish right after descent. It's one of my favorite fish so I would have been happy if we had stopped the dive right after that. We did a lot of finning this dive to just go check out different things, so we burned through our air pretty quick for the depth. We went to an area of turtle grass to search for sea horses, but didn't see any. Instead Arturo found a scorpion fish in the grass. This was the first time I had ever seen one, so again I was thrilled. When it was time to ascend, Arturo was inflating his SMB and when it started up, it snagged on his primary and started to drag him up. He managed to get disentangled and switched over to his alternate. No sweat....danger defeated for another day.
Dive 3: Palancar Bricks: Max depth 106 for 46 minutes. This was a beautiful wall dive for us. The huge coral formations and swim throughs were amazing. Lots of new coral is setting up shop and you can find some great stuff in the swim throughs with a light and some inverted time. We saw lots of fish, mostly various snappers, chromies, as we ascended for the multi-level portion of the dive, but nothing unusual.
Dive 4: Chankanaab: Max depth 51 feet for 62 minutes. We took our camera on this shallow dive and tried to get as many little fish in the lens as we could. Came away with a fine collection of fish butt pictures...we still need to practice. My wife did find another Toadfish and got some good shots of that critter. I'm beginning to think they're the best underwater photo models. Nice and still. Lots of little fish on this dive, some barracuda and a big dog grouper.
Dive 5: Paradise...again. Max depth was 39 feet for 58 minutes. This was our very first night dive and it was awesome! I was a little anxious about it at first, but we descended just as there was a little light left in the sky and it was absolutely beautiful at night. It's funny how the same place you see in the daytime is a whole new world at night. There were lots of eels poking around and what I think was a short-tailed eel. It looked exactly like a snake. There were several tube worms exposed and tiny plankton and other critters that came to our dive lights. We saw the biggest crab I've ever seen in my life. It was bigger than my 50 lb border collie for sure. Pinchers the size of baseball gloves. Great dive.
Dive 6: Palancar Bricks....again. Max depth was 85 feet this time for 50 minutes. We didn't go quite as deep this time around, but it was still a great wall dive. We spotted two different turtles. One that looked to be about 3 or 4 feet from head to tail and the other a bit smaller, maybe the size of a breakfast serving tray. There were a couple of swim throughs and some nice tall coral canyons.
Dive 7: Las Palmas. Max depth 59 feet for 52 minutes. I didn't really have a great time on this dive...for a number of reasons. First, there's not a lot of coral on this dive, it's made up primarily of several sponges sort of spread out on a mini-wall or more like a burm. There are lots of little fish to see, but it's not the grand formations that I like so much. Also, the current was not fast, but we had to constantly fin to stay on the wall while canted or yawed at about a 45 degree angle. I get spoiled to going with the drift so, this just sort of bothered me. Also, at one point I ascended to clear some sort of formation and got an ear block I couldn't clear. So, I spent the rest of the dive about 15 feet above everyone else who were hugging the bottom to see the little fish and stay out of the worst part of the current. It probably would have been more enjoyable if I could have cleared my ear and gotten down "in the weeds". We did see a puffer fish that was hiding out in some sort of hollow sponge.
That's it! We went for too few days and too few dives. The first day we started talking about when we would return and promised not to try and make a four day trip to Coz ever again. You just need more time.
Dates: 29 March thru 1 April
We arrived at the Cozumel airport at 1030. It took us about 10 minutes to get bags once we cleared immigration. Then we went right through the customs check...green light this time...and right out to buy the van tickets. I fall for this one everytime. The guys from the tourist department are not there to help you get van tickets. Just go to the window on the right as you walk through the sliding doors and buy your van tickets. I don't know why, maybe they change shirt colors, but we always spend about 5 minutes talking to some guy in a festive polo shirt before we finally disengage and buy the tickets.
It took the van about 10 minutes to fill up, and they're not moving until literally every available seat is filled! We were at our hotel about 15 minutes later. Checked in, unpacked and ready to dive by about 11:45 or 12:00 ish.
We stayed at Villas las Anclas this time. http://lasanclas.com/
We walked through the gate and were immediately greeted by Eyal who invited us to sit in the "garden" area because Pedro was checking another couple in at the time. The Pedro came out and took us to our room (more like a small apartment). Pedro is a very soft spoken, gentle man, sort of like a monk in my opinion. He was polite and kind and told us to just come right over to his apartment if we needed anything.
The room was actually being cleaned while we were checking in and when we returned from our afternoon dive it was spotless. The rooms are designed so that downstairs is a small kitchenette with coffee pot, microwave, small fridge, sink, and table as well as living room with two couches and a television. Upstairs is a bed and tile bathroom. The bed was comfortable and the air conditioner worked great. Overall, las Anclas was comfortable and quite despite being in the heart of downtown. We were within five minutes walk of all the shopping, restaurants and most importantly the pier where we met the boat. We were also just around the corner (probably less than 100 yards) from Blue XT Sea, Christi and crew. www.bluextseadiving.com
OK, now the fun stuff: We made seven dives over three days, including one night dive. All dives were with Blue XT Sea and we had Arturo as our Dive Master on every dive.
Dive 1: Maracaibo. Max depth was 60 feet for 59 minutes total. This was a great warm-up dive that started out with a nice surprise. As soon as had made our descent, adjusted buoyancy and started towards the reef, a 5 or 6 foot nurse shark swam right next to us about 15 feet away. Looked like it was having a little lunch on something in the sand as it kicked up quite a bit of sand and then settled for a few seconds before swimming off. Then a few minutes later, Arturo found a huge moray eel right out in the open next to a coral head. It was laying on its side with its head up completely exposed! It was at least six feet long and looked to be approximately a foot wide from top to bottom. We watched this guy for a while and then a big barracuda around 5 feet long swam right next to us and the eel. This was a great dive with very little current.
Dive2: Paradise: Max depth on this dive was 40 feet for 51 minutes. Again it started out great, because we found a toadfish right after descent. It's one of my favorite fish so I would have been happy if we had stopped the dive right after that. We did a lot of finning this dive to just go check out different things, so we burned through our air pretty quick for the depth. We went to an area of turtle grass to search for sea horses, but didn't see any. Instead Arturo found a scorpion fish in the grass. This was the first time I had ever seen one, so again I was thrilled. When it was time to ascend, Arturo was inflating his SMB and when it started up, it snagged on his primary and started to drag him up. He managed to get disentangled and switched over to his alternate. No sweat....danger defeated for another day.
Dive 3: Palancar Bricks: Max depth 106 for 46 minutes. This was a beautiful wall dive for us. The huge coral formations and swim throughs were amazing. Lots of new coral is setting up shop and you can find some great stuff in the swim throughs with a light and some inverted time. We saw lots of fish, mostly various snappers, chromies, as we ascended for the multi-level portion of the dive, but nothing unusual.
Dive 4: Chankanaab: Max depth 51 feet for 62 minutes. We took our camera on this shallow dive and tried to get as many little fish in the lens as we could. Came away with a fine collection of fish butt pictures...we still need to practice. My wife did find another Toadfish and got some good shots of that critter. I'm beginning to think they're the best underwater photo models. Nice and still. Lots of little fish on this dive, some barracuda and a big dog grouper.
Dive 5: Paradise...again. Max depth was 39 feet for 58 minutes. This was our very first night dive and it was awesome! I was a little anxious about it at first, but we descended just as there was a little light left in the sky and it was absolutely beautiful at night. It's funny how the same place you see in the daytime is a whole new world at night. There were lots of eels poking around and what I think was a short-tailed eel. It looked exactly like a snake. There were several tube worms exposed and tiny plankton and other critters that came to our dive lights. We saw the biggest crab I've ever seen in my life. It was bigger than my 50 lb border collie for sure. Pinchers the size of baseball gloves. Great dive.
Dive 6: Palancar Bricks....again. Max depth was 85 feet this time for 50 minutes. We didn't go quite as deep this time around, but it was still a great wall dive. We spotted two different turtles. One that looked to be about 3 or 4 feet from head to tail and the other a bit smaller, maybe the size of a breakfast serving tray. There were a couple of swim throughs and some nice tall coral canyons.
Dive 7: Las Palmas. Max depth 59 feet for 52 minutes. I didn't really have a great time on this dive...for a number of reasons. First, there's not a lot of coral on this dive, it's made up primarily of several sponges sort of spread out on a mini-wall or more like a burm. There are lots of little fish to see, but it's not the grand formations that I like so much. Also, the current was not fast, but we had to constantly fin to stay on the wall while canted or yawed at about a 45 degree angle. I get spoiled to going with the drift so, this just sort of bothered me. Also, at one point I ascended to clear some sort of formation and got an ear block I couldn't clear. So, I spent the rest of the dive about 15 feet above everyone else who were hugging the bottom to see the little fish and stay out of the worst part of the current. It probably would have been more enjoyable if I could have cleared my ear and gotten down "in the weeds". We did see a puffer fish that was hiding out in some sort of hollow sponge.
That's it! We went for too few days and too few dives. The first day we started talking about when we would return and promised not to try and make a four day trip to Coz ever again. You just need more time.
