Hooked4Life
Guest
August 5 13 Dive with Alison / Fiesta Americana
We flew into Cozumel and we couldnt get back soon enough. You could see the effects of Hurricane Emily. A lot of the palm trees were missing but it looked like they have worked quickly to clean things up. We made our way to Fiesta Americana. Overall we were quite pleased with the hotel. The all-inclusive food was much better then Hotel Cozumel (March 2005 Trip). You could also order from the menu. It was nice to have a canned beer compared to the water downed draft beer. Order the coconut ice cream ! They have it you just have to ask !
Cozumel Diving:
Now to the good part.. Diving! We chose Dive with Alison and it was definitely a good decision. Alison is an awesome dive master and runs a great dive op. We had multiple dives with 1 hour bottom times. The only disappointing thing was the viz. Instead of the 200 feet viz we saw in March we saw on an average 80 feet viz. The current was also rippin on some of the deeper dives like Santa Rosa, Columbia and Palancar Caves. Some of the dives looked like you were dropped into a blizzard. The sand was quite stirred around and it was evident that the sand was washed up on the corals. Some of the sponges, sea fans and gorgonians were damged by Emily, but overall I thought the reefs appeared to be in good shape. Towards the end of the week current was a starting to calm and the viz was a little better. Some of the highlights: 5 foot Green Moray Eel that was free swimming. I was swimming next to it to take a picture and we were all in amazement! We saw a few turtles, a sea horse, and a few nurse sharks. I took a nice picture of a Barracuda and probably got within 1-2 feet. Our best Cozumel dive this time had to be our night dive. We dove at Chakanaab and the current was similar to a pool. We saw so many lobsters I lost count, octopus, 3 spotted snake/eels, and to top it all off we had an hour of bottom time. We met a bunch of great folks while diving and overall it was a good week. We logged 18 dives in 6 days.
5 Foot Green Moray Eel that was free swimming! This picture does it NO justice.
Cenotes:
Now to the highlight of our trip.. Cenote Diving! We dove Dos Ojos in Playa Del Carmen with Dennis Weeks of Diablo Divers. Let me first say that Dennis is a great dive master and host. He picks you up at the Playa ferry and drives you out to the Centoes. In the mean time his knowledge and stories start to wear off on you. On the way to the Cenotes he asked our choice of tanks. Of course we chose low pressure Steel tanks. This was at no extra cost. Since we were using Steel tanks and diving with skin/3 mil shorties we dove with no weights. Dennis stressed proper buoyancy and cave diving etiquette. We did a giant stride entry and did a weight check. We demonstrated neutral buoyancy before we started the dive. At first it was a little intimidating, but once the nerves calmed down a bit the Cenotes were simply amazing! The freshwater was crystal clear to around 200 feet. Some of the areas had ambient light and looked too amazing for pictures. The dive was around 15 feet and the first dive was 50 minutes. We saw some awesome formations and half way though the dive we saw the Bat Cave. We didnt see any bats but there were a bunch of other divers in the cave. I didnt take my camera the first dive because I wanted to make sure my buoyancy was on par. The second dive that we did was very relaxing. Again the depth was around 15 feet and lasted 1 hour. Dennis was kind enough to take some awesome pictures of Becky and I with my C5050. The pictures that I took do not do the Cenotes justice. We will definitely be back again to dive with Diablo Divers. I was in awe the whole dive. If you want to find out some more info on the Cenote Diving check out http://www.diablodivers.com.
Eats (Becky):
We ate at La CoCay, Primas and Guidos
Primas was ok the seafood platter for two was good.
Guidos we got the margarita personal pizza ..Will and I have this thing about the margarita we try to see if it can be made anywhere else NO it cant . But for Mexico, its good
Lastly, La CoCay We went in there on Tuesday night (Wills b-day) ordered the tapas, and the tequila shrimp as appetizers Both were good Didnt finish the apps though wanted to save some room J..Will ordered the palantine fish of the day, and I ordered the tuna..After a little misunderstanding I ended up getting the fish of the day WOW there was a party in my mouth DELICIOUS !
On the boat we met another couple from WI who were visiting Coz for 3.5 weeks ! NICE Anyway, we convinced them to meet up with us for our last night at LaCoCay..I ordered the tuna, and will ordered the duck Both were VERY GOOD, but not as good as the fish of the day !!!! It was seriously out of this world !!YUM..A definate MUST !
There are plenty of pictures on Scubastruck
We flew into Cozumel and we couldnt get back soon enough. You could see the effects of Hurricane Emily. A lot of the palm trees were missing but it looked like they have worked quickly to clean things up. We made our way to Fiesta Americana. Overall we were quite pleased with the hotel. The all-inclusive food was much better then Hotel Cozumel (March 2005 Trip). You could also order from the menu. It was nice to have a canned beer compared to the water downed draft beer. Order the coconut ice cream ! They have it you just have to ask !
Cozumel Diving:
Now to the good part.. Diving! We chose Dive with Alison and it was definitely a good decision. Alison is an awesome dive master and runs a great dive op. We had multiple dives with 1 hour bottom times. The only disappointing thing was the viz. Instead of the 200 feet viz we saw in March we saw on an average 80 feet viz. The current was also rippin on some of the deeper dives like Santa Rosa, Columbia and Palancar Caves. Some of the dives looked like you were dropped into a blizzard. The sand was quite stirred around and it was evident that the sand was washed up on the corals. Some of the sponges, sea fans and gorgonians were damged by Emily, but overall I thought the reefs appeared to be in good shape. Towards the end of the week current was a starting to calm and the viz was a little better. Some of the highlights: 5 foot Green Moray Eel that was free swimming. I was swimming next to it to take a picture and we were all in amazement! We saw a few turtles, a sea horse, and a few nurse sharks. I took a nice picture of a Barracuda and probably got within 1-2 feet. Our best Cozumel dive this time had to be our night dive. We dove at Chakanaab and the current was similar to a pool. We saw so many lobsters I lost count, octopus, 3 spotted snake/eels, and to top it all off we had an hour of bottom time. We met a bunch of great folks while diving and overall it was a good week. We logged 18 dives in 6 days.
5 Foot Green Moray Eel that was free swimming! This picture does it NO justice.
Cenotes:
Now to the highlight of our trip.. Cenote Diving! We dove Dos Ojos in Playa Del Carmen with Dennis Weeks of Diablo Divers. Let me first say that Dennis is a great dive master and host. He picks you up at the Playa ferry and drives you out to the Centoes. In the mean time his knowledge and stories start to wear off on you. On the way to the Cenotes he asked our choice of tanks. Of course we chose low pressure Steel tanks. This was at no extra cost. Since we were using Steel tanks and diving with skin/3 mil shorties we dove with no weights. Dennis stressed proper buoyancy and cave diving etiquette. We did a giant stride entry and did a weight check. We demonstrated neutral buoyancy before we started the dive. At first it was a little intimidating, but once the nerves calmed down a bit the Cenotes were simply amazing! The freshwater was crystal clear to around 200 feet. Some of the areas had ambient light and looked too amazing for pictures. The dive was around 15 feet and the first dive was 50 minutes. We saw some awesome formations and half way though the dive we saw the Bat Cave. We didnt see any bats but there were a bunch of other divers in the cave. I didnt take my camera the first dive because I wanted to make sure my buoyancy was on par. The second dive that we did was very relaxing. Again the depth was around 15 feet and lasted 1 hour. Dennis was kind enough to take some awesome pictures of Becky and I with my C5050. The pictures that I took do not do the Cenotes justice. We will definitely be back again to dive with Diablo Divers. I was in awe the whole dive. If you want to find out some more info on the Cenote Diving check out http://www.diablodivers.com.
Eats (Becky):
We ate at La CoCay, Primas and Guidos
Primas was ok the seafood platter for two was good.
Guidos we got the margarita personal pizza ..Will and I have this thing about the margarita we try to see if it can be made anywhere else NO it cant . But for Mexico, its good
Lastly, La CoCay We went in there on Tuesday night (Wills b-day) ordered the tapas, and the tequila shrimp as appetizers Both were good Didnt finish the apps though wanted to save some room J..Will ordered the palantine fish of the day, and I ordered the tuna..After a little misunderstanding I ended up getting the fish of the day WOW there was a party in my mouth
DELICIOUS !On the boat we met another couple from WI who were visiting Coz for 3.5 weeks ! NICE Anyway, we convinced them to meet up with us for our last night at LaCoCay..I ordered the tuna, and will ordered the duck Both were VERY GOOD, but not as good as the fish of the day !!!! It was seriously out of this world !!YUM..A definate MUST !
There are plenty of pictures on Scubastruck
Im thinking either Belize or Utila..We'll see, perhaps Jan. I'd really like to see different sea life then what we've seen in Coz, but I have a feeling we have to go to the pacific for that? (WWW) 