Cenote Diving and Cavern Certification

[Dirty-Dog]

I'm all set for 4 days of diving with Nicolas. I have a full 3mm wetsuit - will this be warm enough for the Cenotes?

As always with questions of this sort, the answer is a resounding "it depends"... people vary too much in their tolerance of temperature variations to give any simple answer.

Last May, I dove Chac Mool (70-72F) in a 5mm jacket and was fine. My wife, on the other hand, dove in a 3mm full with a 5mm jacket layered over it and was still colder than she prefers. I think most people use a 5 or 7mm full suit in the cenotes, but you know your tolerances better than anybody else can.

 

[Graeme Tolton]

A cavern class will be of great benefit to any open water diver. First of all, it introduces you to the other side of diving, by showing you new skills to work on. Secondly, you will see and feel things that you never have before. For me, taking the cavern class (with German) was where I started to make the jump from recreational diving to technical diving, and am REALLY glad that I did.

 

[rongoodman]

I'm all set for 4 days of diving with Nicolas. I have a full 3mm wetsuit - will this be warm enough for the Cenotes?

It might be OK for a single dive, but if you end of taking a class you might be in the water for several hours at a time--the instructors often just do the debriefing in the water. If you're going to take it, I'd at least bring a hooded vest along too. I wore a 5mm suit in my classe last year and was OK, but I'm expecting longer dives for the Full Cave class this spring, and am considering bringing a dry suit.

 

[Peter Guy]

I did Cavern/Intro/Cave in a 5mm with hooded vest. In my last (?) Full Cave class, I got so cold during the final exercises (after an 80 minute dive) that I was shivering and thumbed it even though German had a few more things he wanted to do. 90+ minutes in 78 degree water takes a lot of heat out of you.

 

[jbird71]

Thanks for the input everyone... I think I'm going to put a 3mm shortie over my regular 3mm suit for warmth, and buy an underwater toque.