Coz recos wanted, please!

[JPG]

Sharky,

You're right on. The "shallow" dives are still worth seeing and I generally get more out of them than the deep dives. Kind of like the swim throughs. Those are fun do to every now and then but, one after another is generally a waste of gas.

I just came back from getting married down there and we dove with Scuba Du. It was okay. Huge difference from one day to the next/ one DM to the next. We used them because they ran the op at the hotel our crowd was staying with. My only real gripe was that the profiles were too short.

My picks:

Dive with martin
Blue XT sea

But I've heard too many good things about too many of the ops to rule anyone out really.

JPG

 

[cowboyneal]

Personally, I stay at Casa Mexicana (the last 4 trips, love it) and have been diving with Dive Paradise since its inception (I am talking for almost 20 years now): Apple always goes out of her way to make sure you'll (well, at least I will...ha) be happy, and they also have so many different available trips and boats it's hard to go wrong there. I have also dove (dived, diven?) with a few other ops on island just for a change of pace or because I felt like it (or someone wasn't making me pay most likely...ha), and all were excellent...

I don't have a lot of needs; just get me out to a good site in a decent, seaworthy boat and get me back safely and I'll take care of everything else in between...some people need something just south of a cruise ship on which to go diving...

My usual mantra: As an instructor, I tell anyone who asks and my students that when going to Coz, decide what kind of diving you want to do first - then you'll be able to find any one or more excellent Cozumel dive operators to cater to it by using generally available information, this board, specific experience of your instructor, his or her friends, whichever...

Beware of people saying this one or that one is "the best" or "better than all" or "the worst" because most people don't really have a clue at all (sorry, but really it's true), and unless they have dove (dived? diven?) with every operation at least once in every conceivable set of conditions and then with every single crew member and dive master of that operation, again in every single set of conditions, and have done it regularly enough to make a valid comparison (now we are talking about the impossible - thousands of permutations and combinations) then they can't really say.

I also wouldn't go with the actual recommendation of the tourist diver, because chances are they have only dove (dived, diven?) with one operator, so what do they know? (no offense intended)...

In the end, again, the type of diving you want to do and whether or not the op meets all of the rest of your needs will define what will be good for you.

CN

 

[ggunn]

Beware of people saying this one or that one is "the best" or "better than all" or "the worst" because most people don't really have a clue at all (sorry, but really it's true), and unless they have dove (dived? diven?) with every operation at least once in every conceivable set of conditions and then with every single crew member and dive master of that operation, again in every single set of conditions, and have done it regularly enough to make a valid comparison (now we are talking about the impossible - thousands of permutations and combinations) then they can't really say.

I also wouldn't go with the actual recommendation of the tourist diver, because chances are they have only dove (dived, diven?) with one operator, so what do they know? (no offense intended)...

Well said. While I don't hesitate to recommend (for example) Blue Angel because of the long string of excellent experiences I have had with them and the fact that they fill the bill nicely for the kind of experience I want, I never tout them as the best on the island or even better than any other op in particular. I have only dove (dived, diven...) with five or six different ops on Cozumel, and none of the others recently. And that's another entry, by the way, for your list of reasons why it's hard (impossible?) to pick "the best" op. It's a moving target; things change. One would have to have also dove (dived, diven...) with them all recently to have any basis for comparison.

 

[Mawg]

Scuba Du? Did you stay at the Presidente? I'm curious if it has re-opened. Can you give us a report on the new and better hotel?

 

[docmartin]

Scuba Du? Did you stay at the Presidente? I'm curious if it has re-opened. Can you give us a report on the new and better hotel?

i just got off the phone with intercontinental in mexico and they told me that it is already open.

 

[Christi]

They opened yesterday...sort of.

200 rooms available, but still alot to do.

 

[Mawg]

They opened yesterday...sort of.

200 rooms available, but still alot to do.

Thanks Christi. I assume you viewed the hotel from the water. Have they made the beach usable again, put the palapas back, and have they restored the restaurant out on the beach? I'll be there May 2nd. for a week and hope it will be usable by then. They took an awful pounding.

 

[paulmila]

Check out Alison Dennis. She is a great operator, uses a small boat and is very accommodating. Her site is www.scubawithalison.com
Check her out and say Paul Mila referred you.

 

[Jinjer]

Check out Alison Dennis. She is a great operator, uses a small boat and is very accommodating. Her site is www.scubawithalison.com
Check her out and say Paul Mila referred you.

I will second that recommendation. We dove with her the the weekend of October 20th. She does a great job and her crew is fantastic!!! We have already booked with her to dive in February.

Also, she can get a larger boat if you have a bigger group.

 

[MrClod]

We dove with Dive House back in August of this year from Fiesta Americana. Nice place and decent outfit. They did not have much of a shop per se, but they were busy with construction to provide that back in August. That is probably in place by now.

The only complaint I had was with the unlimited shore diving. Others complained that there was not much to see, but I was able to find all sorts of stuff from eels and octopi in the limited "landscape", however, when the 2 knot currents kicked up on shore, I got more exercise than I had intented.

A buddy of mine swears by Aquatica divers.