Coz Trip Report, lots of fluff included

[Foo]

This report is a little long, not only about diving... but the overall experience- probably most enjoyable for first-timers and new divers.

Cozumel Trip Report 06/26/04-06/30/04

DAY ONE
Most of the members of our party met in Dallas at DFW airport on Sat. the 26th, to catch our 9:00 am flight. My husband, myself, and our 17 yr. old daughter; my younger sister, b.i.l., and their two sons, aged 17 and 20; my cousin, his wife, and two children, aged 12 and 15. One of my husband’s coworkers and his wife joined us there, and my even-younger sister and her husband were due to fly out of New Orleans to meet us at the El Cozumeleno resort in Cozumel on Sat. afternoon. We had tried to do family trips like this before, but the closest we had ever come was last summer, when we went to Cancun with my cousin and his family (they are the other divers in the party.)

After a pleasant and uneventful flight, we checked in to our resort. Well, sort of checked in- our rooms wouldn’t be ready until between 2-3 pm and we got there a little before noon. Since it was an all inclusive resort, we got our i.d. wristbands and went to have some lunch and take a quick inventory of the grounds. Some of us had stayed on this property before, so we showed the others around, beginning with the all-important bar areas. Several changed into swimsuits and by the early afternoon when we got our rooms, we were all in varying repose in the beach area. My husband, cousin, and I visited with the dive shop on the premises, and after some discussion with Antonio, decided to do our diving with their shop. They use the Scuba-du operation, and the equipment man at the resort, Carlos, would handle all our gear for us between trips. The dive boat picked us up right there at the resort (which is on the far north end of the island- saved a lot of time and hassle with cabs, etc.). This was to be a fairly short trip, only 4 nights, so we scheduled private boat dives for the next two afternoons, leaving our last day free for optional morning diving. It was to be a speedboat with only our party of 6 divers, a divemaster, and boat captain. We had actually planned to try to dive on our first afternoon there, but the, uh… joviality and festival atsmophere (induced and enhanced by the muy grande, mucho bueno banana daquiris) took over, and it was too hard to resist. Don’t drink & dive, so we played on the shore together, sunned, and in general had a blast. For some, it was the first time ever in the crystal Caribbean. It was a delight to be there with them, and to share their first experiences. Dinner that night was good, with most of the group opting to visit the karoake bar later, after a fierce round of miniature golf.

DAY TWO
After a nice breakfast of fresh omelette, fruits and assorted muffins, we decided to do an equipment check by doing a shore dive right there at the resort. Good idea in theory, in practice it didn’t work so great for some of us. My cousin and his two children had preceded us to the shop, and were almost ready to enter the water when we arrived. To our dismay, the dive shop didn’t have any tanks for us, yet. They said they would have some for us in about 30 mins. (They didn’t). I knew they had free resort course scuba lessons in the pool around that time, so I presume that’s why there weren’t enough tanks. We watched as my cousin’s family entered the water in fairly light-moderate surf and amongst rocks. They did fine, making a few weight adjustments, etc., and then proceeded to do about a 20-30 min dive around the piers. We still didn’t have tanks when they returned, so we asked to use theirs. My daughter (freshly certified diver) was using an unfamiliar BC, and had never dived in salt water, so I wanted her to work out her weighting and pracice with the BC before we went out on the boat. Well, this was a rough, rocking and rolling dive- she got frustrated over a few issues, swallowed a little seawater, and started feeling sick. I also felt sick when we finished, much to my dismay. We tried to eat a light lunch, then went to lay down for a while before our boat was due to arrive. When it was time to go, neither of us could stomach (pun intended) the thought of being on a boat for the next 4-5 hours, so we sadly stayed behind and rested/slept.

The other 4 divers and another resort guest went on the boat and had two great dives, even though my husband also got sick at the end of the second dive. They went to Palancar Gardens and Columbia Shallows. They reported seeing a Toadfish, Brittlestars, lots of big Queen Angels, Starfish, a big Turtle, Parrotfish, lobsters, Grouper, a Stonefish and a 10” across Crab. The other family members snorkeled and played around the resort most of the day. One of the couples took the resort SCUBA course and she ended up doing a shallow dive, he didn’t really catch on that quick. But he enjoyed snorkeling during the rest of the trip, and wants to try SCUBA again. She plans to take classes when she returns home, after doing that resort course.

We finished this night with dinner at the resort and the cursory visits to both Carlos & Charlies and Senor Frogs. Remember, we had 5 teens with us- it wouldn’t have been a trip to Mexico without going there. Everyone had a great time and we finished up the night by sitting by the ocean and talking, back at the resort.


TO BE CONTINUED....

 

[Foo]

DAY THREE
The next day, several went to town shopping in the morning, while the others were either lazy at the resort, or snorkeling & kayaking. When it came time for our afternoon dives, I felt much better. I also wore a seasickness patch this time. My daughter decided that she wasn’t confident about going out on the boat to dive, so we promised to take her on a shore dive at Chankanaab park the next morning, and she stayed at the resort to play while we went diving.

After studying the horizon intently on the boat ride out, our first dive was Palancar Horseshoe. It was awesome, of course. This was my first time to backroll off a boat, I found that I liked it better than giant stride. I forgot about feeling sick as soon as the dive began. The first thing I saw was a large starfish on the bottom, when I put my mask in the water. Awesome. I made a couple of classic newbie mistakes- our DM told us to stay at 60’, I went to 71’. My cousin came beside me and motioned to me to ascend, but I thought he wanted me to go all the way to the surface, and I couldn’t understand why? I ascended a little, and then he moved away again, as we continued the dive. Later, he told me that the DM had been motioning at me to come up some, but I thought he meant to keep moving. Anyway, after that I had good buoyancy control, the safety stop went fine, and the dive was so much fun. We got to swim between tall coral mountains, saw a big Jewfish, grouper, lots of angelfish and I got to see a BIG turtle, which was the main thing I had hoped to see! Highlight. My mask did leak a bit toward the end of the dive, cleared it several times.

After our surface interval (water, fresh pineapple and watermelon slices), we did our second dive at Tormentos Reef. I was feeling very well by now. As soon as we descended, our DM motioned for us to wait, and he rested in the sand, as did we. He made the sign for “eel”, and there was another dive group ahead of us, all perched around a reef, looking intently underneath. I honestly didn’t know the sign for eel before this dive, but when he made those biting motions with his hand, I decided to mind. Hehe. When the other group moved off, we finned over to the reef, and WOW, this guy was about 5-6 feet long and about 12 inches diameter. No wonder everyone stopped in their tracks to look at it. I think it was a green Moray although it looked very gray under the coral. We saw another spotted Moray later. This dive was different, not the mountainous coral swim-thrus of Palancar, but patchy coral, with a lot of animals. Our DM coaxed a toadfish out of his hole, and we saw Princess Parrotfish, another turtle, big French Angelfish and one wonderful gray Queen Angelfish followed us for about 5 minutes, being extremely friendly. There was a stronger current on this dive, I loved drifting along. The dive was 50 ft., I was careful not to get too deep this time, no mask issues this time, and safety stop was fine. My only regret was that I now knew what I had missed the day before…

Back at the resort, there was entertainment during the open-air dinner that night- silly games and then a trio of very talented Cuban musicians. The teens at the resort had all formed a tight-knit group of compadres, by this time, and they loved hanging out together in the lobby, by the pool, or by the ocean. The adults had a nice, quiet night together, out by the ocean, telling tall tales and enjoying on another’s company.

DAY FOUR
Our last full day there! Since we were due to fly out at 12:30 the next day, we decided to dive in the morning. About half of our group took the taxi to Chankanaab Marine Park to snorkel and dive, while the other half rented jeeps and went on a tour of the other side of the island. We went to the same dive shop inside the park that we had used last Feb., on my first salt-water dives. We found Eduardo, the same divemaster who had taken me, and signed up with him to take us, along with our daughter for her first salt-water experience. This was the perfect place to take a somewhat nervous diver- she needed a little self-confidence, and this was the place to get it. Nice shallow diving, lots of life, plenty of stuff to see under fairly easy conditions. Although I did tell her later, that my boat dives were actually easier than this shore dive- drift diving was very little effort, we had to fin a bit on the shore, beginning into the current. The DM buddied with her, and showed her lots of things, and she had no issues, did great and had a blast. I knew she was relaxed when she started pointing out things to me, about halfway thru the dive. The dive was 65 mins long, which made us all tired, but we’re very glad we went there.

We saw a toadfish on this dive, Stingrays, Longspine Squirrelfish, Trunkfish, Damselfish, Coneyfish, and lots more. We went through the mouth of the ceynotes (opening visible at all times), and saw thousands and thousands of “sardines”? at the mouth of the cavern. There was a very visible halocline, from all the rains of the previous week, and you could stretch your hand up to feel the cool fresh water mixing with the salt water.

We finished up the day by having lunch and snorkeling, walking the botanical gardens, and enjoying a few cervezas under the palapa by the sea. After our taxi ride back to the resort, some rested and got ready for the last supper… we had reservations in the “fancy” restaurant at the resort at 8:00. Our entire group met for this meal, two tables, and several courses. It was a very nice meal, finished by Baked Alaska- however, when my BIL mentioned that the crème de menthe reminded him of Scope, I was no longer able to enjoy my dessert. LOL. My husband and I taxied to town to do some last minute shopping after dinner, our trip was just too short! We spent another night wandering between the karaoke bar and the beautiful ocean breezes and chatting… all in all, a very enjoyable time.

DAY FIVE
Hardly enough time to call it whole day, we spent the morning packing, having breakfast, saying goodbye to the new friends we had all met, trip to the airport, had every pocket of every bag searched, customs, etc., and an occasionally turbulent trip home.

The best part of arrival was to find our 4 month grandson waiting for us and rewarding us with beautiful smiles when we got there. Okay, I love Cozumel, but I guess there’s no place like home!

 

[teamheatwave]

Great report! Thanks for sharing.

 

[sealskin98]

Sounds like you had a great time! Next time will be the 8days/7nights thing, huh?

 

[Tim Ingersoll]

DAY THREE
We went through the mouth of the ceynotes (opening visible at all times), and saw thousands and thousands of “sardines”? at the mouth of the cavern.

I'll never forget the dive at Palancar Gardens where I had the same experience with schooling fish. Unbelievably dense.

 

[Foo]

Tim,
I have been wondering how you are doing since your experience with DCI in Coz. Thank you for writing- I read your story again the other day, it was an important one to share. I honestly didn't remember not to exercise prior to diving until I read your report. You have probably helped countless numbers of divers out because you shared this info, even if that's all a person gets from it. Anyway, I hope you are doing great, and have been able to resume diving? Thanks again,
Foo

 

[Tim Ingersoll]

First trip back to Coz in January, 2005. Can't wait. Fully recovered. No residual weakness. Plan to dive Nitrox on air tables and hydrate the hell out of myself. I came away really believing that hydration is the most important thing you can do to avoid the bends. Drink til it hurts.

 

[5615mike]

First trip back to Coz in January, 2005. Can't wait. Fully recovered. No residual weakness. Plan to dive Nitrox on air tables and hydrate the hell out of myself. I came away really believing that hydration is the most important thing you can do to avoid the bends. Drink til it hurts.

More water and less wine huh Tim? Glad to hear your doing better. Hope your getting wet soon. What, no T&C trip planned this year?

 

[Foo]

We'll be in Coz diving, on Jan. 3 & 4 (my birthday also), during port stops on a cruise, set up by our LDS. Any chance you'll be there either of those dates?

 

[Tim Ingersoll]

More water and less wine huh Tim? Glad to hear your doing better. Hope your getting wet soon. What, no T&C trip planned this year?

The wife wants a pool and I have been told that I have to sacrifice for it. It hurts baby. . .it hurts! I'm still hoping but I have to pay off the credit cards, pay for the pool and then schedule the trip so it may be a last minute deal. C'est la vie!