FrenziedFerret
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For anyone interested, here's a rundown of our trip to Cozumel from 10/14-10/22. I had to chop out 3/4 of what I wrote to get it to fit here, along with almost all my pictures. (grrrr)
The diving:
========
We chose Papa Hog's. They've got a nice, laid-back attitude. The fact that they exclusively use fast "6 pack" boats, have good prices, pick us up at our hotel pier, and let us choose where we want to dive was a perfect fit for us. They also let us dive our computers, which is a HUGE plus!
We asked to be included in an advanced dive group. My wife and I are both pretty good on air, buoyancy, and can move about without flailing our arms, kicking coral, or bumping into other divers. With a couple of exceptions, they did a good job of stocking our boat with people of similar abilities. In 6 days of diving, we only had 6 divers on the boat twice. The rest of the time we had 4 to 5 divers. Awesome!
at surface interval
At 8:30am each day we were picked up at our pier. They took care of all our gear for us, so the only things we had to haul to the beach were our own lazy butts. After a few greetings, the first question typically was "where do you want to dive today?" When I heard that the first time, the divemaster saw me picking my jaw up from the floor, and replied "you pay, you say." SWEET! Much of the time I was able to influence the group into doing relatively shallow dives (<80 feet), nice and slow, for as long as possible. After the first day of that, when the divemaster knew our abilities, and saw that we were all using computers, he would announce in the pre-dive briefing 1+ hour bottom times. Several times my wife and I had bunch of air left and no deco time, the divemaster let us stay down while the rest of the group were already in the boat. He just kept a casual eye on things while we finished our dive.
For Cozumel, the water visibility was quite poor (~40-50' at some sites) due to particulate matter in the water caused by runoff from the earlier rains. It improved later in the week to ~70-80'. The water temperature was about 80 degrees F.
blue land crab
We did our surface intervals on shore at various locations. Getting to explore new places is a real treat. One place Papa Hog's frequents is a pier that doesn't seem to have any resort nearby. It's just a pier, a beach, and jungle. I especially enjoy this location, since I can run around the jungle and catch blue land crabs to play with.
Each time I did this I came back with 5 new mosquito bites, but it was worth it. Right off that pier you can see small barracuda, needlefish, and various other little stuff, if you look for it. One of the divemasters said there are freshwater crocodiles that occasionally venture close to the area. I'm not sure I believe him. This is the same guy that told one of the guests that the school of chub that hang out at the Allegro pier are "Mexican piranhas." Heh.
We dove the Devil's Throat at Punta Sur after doing a "check out" dive at 140' the day before. [all details chopped] I guess some people consider Punta Sur a great dive, but for me it was just another long swimthrough; not much to look at, and very much lacking in marine life. It's cool to say we did it, though.
The divemasters were real characters. And despite their somewhat rough appearance, are great guys, and excellent at their jobs. Our favorite divemaster was Gabriel, who dives with a "do rag" on his head. Underwater, the two elongated ends of it floated upwards from behind his head. When he turned toward us, he looked like some kind of deranged underwater rabbit! Very funny. Of course I don't have an underwater camera. Yet. (Sigh.) Anyway, besides "do rags" and nicknames like "Buddha Belly" written on the front of their wetsuits, I could see that these guys enjoyed their jobs. At one point they mooned another Papa Hog's boat going the
opposite direction. Hilarious! All this done from a boat named "Brain Damage". :-D
Night dives:
============
We did 2 night dives with them. The 2nd night dive was probably the best night dive I've ever done. Shortly after descending and finding some cool stuff, I saw my wife wildly gesticulating about something. The divemaster was next to her, doing the same thing. Unable to decipher their motions, I went through the possiblities: 1) They had both lost their minds; 2) They had invented some kind of new underwater form of dance; 3) They had found something VERY interesting. Could it be more interesting than watching them make a spectacle of themselves? I decided to investigate.
Turns out they found a HUGE lobster. I mean H U G E ! The antennae was about as long as my arm! I had no idea they got anywhere near that big. The expression in my wife and the divemaster's eyes told me they had similar thoughts. It looked about the size of our 40 pound dog! We couldn't find a way to get a collar and leash on it, so we just left it there. Then my wife, probably still stunned from her recent experience, practically ran into a sleeping barracuda when she rounded a corner. The two startled each other, and the big silvery creature shot into the darkness. Shortly after that we encountered an octopus out in the open. We gently played with it, and watched the colors and textures wildly changing in front of our eyes. It hit just about every pattern but plaid. Amazing. We saw about 4 total, along with plenty of lobster, some eels, a bunch of MASSIVE crabs, and a scorpionfish. Something that looked like a couple crevalle jacks loomed in the distance the entire dive, possibly drawn by our lights. Just when I thought we'd reached our limit of highlights, we spotted a splendid toadfish. And me without a camera!
Here are most of the dive sites we visited:
================================
San Francisco, Ciedro, Santa Rosa wall & top, Delaila, Chankanaab, Yucab, Punta Sur, Palancar Gardens, La Francesa, and a shore dive at the reef off Papa Hog's.
Common/obvious stuff we saw:
=======================
4+ varieties of parrots, blue chromis, grunts, wrasse, conch, hermit crabs, xmas tree worms, cowfish, trunkfish, blue tang, snapper, bicolor damsels, black damsels, gobies, trumpetfish, goatfish, whitespot filefish, black durgon, scrawled filefish (I think), blennies, gobies, squirrelfish, razorfish, wrasse, sgt major (including blue phase protecting eggs), porkfish, chrinoids, chub, doctorfish, surgeonfish, 3+ types of butterfly, rock beauties, gray angels, queen angels, brittle stars, bar jacks
Less common/had to look for stuff:
==========================
lobster, large crabs, octopus, splendid toadfish, nurse sharks (~5), unidentified shark (reef, maybe?), green morays, spotted morays, barracuda (~10 on 1 dive!), scorpionfish (~5), southern stingrays, electric rays, yellow stingray, turtles (4-5), ocean triggers, queen triggers, puffer, flying fish (saw them briefly underwater near the surface, also flying while on the boat), soapfish, several types of flounder, rainbow parrotfish, nassau grouper, some other kind of grouper, mutton snapper, black margate, shrimp, permit, needlefish, young almaco jacks, lizardfish (not sure, just saw its head sticking out of the sand), crevalle jack
"Lola"
Topside:
======
Weather: Daytime air temp ~80-90 F, nighttime ~70, humidity maybe 80+%. Plenty of mosquitos at dusk.
Allegro Resort:
==========
Before staying there, it was difficult for us to understand why it was rated as only a 2.5 star resort. We'd visited it 3 years ago while staying at the nearby Iberostar, and it looked very nice! Beautiful grounds, nice pools, swim-up bar, great beach, onsite dive operation, nice looking buildings, apparently lots to do. But after staying there, we discovered that the food was pretty good, but the service was poor to inconsistent at best. Part of the resort was sectioned off due to construction, and the noise was a bit annoying. The insides of the rooms were clean, but mediocre in quality. At least they had air conditioning.
What bugged us was more about the guests than the resort itself. Many of them were...how can I say this...they were the types you might see on a Jerry Springer show. I think at least 10% of them were named Bubba. The women, too! ;-) We weren't sure what attracted these folks to Cozumel, as opposed to maybe a place like Tijuana. I swear if there had been a greasy spoon diner in the area, it would have been packed with these folks.
Allegro's sports bar/dance club sucked. The snorkeling off the beach there also sucked. I have no space for further comments. :-\
One thing we really enjoyed at Allegro was seeing and feeding the wild iguanas. We also had fun playing with the abundant tree frogs, feeding the fish at the pier, and watching "Lola" local the stingray glide around the bottom near the fishing boats.
wild "iguana"
San Miguel:
========
I have no space to write about it. Let's just say we had fun.
Playa Del Carmen:
=============
Ditto. Better than San Miguel.
Our ratings (out of 5):
================
Allegro Resort ***
Papa Hog's *****
American Airlines *****
Mexicana Airlines
Playa Del Carmen experience *****
San Miguel experience ***
The diving:
========
We chose Papa Hog's. They've got a nice, laid-back attitude. The fact that they exclusively use fast "6 pack" boats, have good prices, pick us up at our hotel pier, and let us choose where we want to dive was a perfect fit for us. They also let us dive our computers, which is a HUGE plus!
We asked to be included in an advanced dive group. My wife and I are both pretty good on air, buoyancy, and can move about without flailing our arms, kicking coral, or bumping into other divers. With a couple of exceptions, they did a good job of stocking our boat with people of similar abilities. In 6 days of diving, we only had 6 divers on the boat twice. The rest of the time we had 4 to 5 divers. Awesome!
at surface interval
At 8:30am each day we were picked up at our pier. They took care of all our gear for us, so the only things we had to haul to the beach were our own lazy butts. After a few greetings, the first question typically was "where do you want to dive today?" When I heard that the first time, the divemaster saw me picking my jaw up from the floor, and replied "you pay, you say." SWEET! Much of the time I was able to influence the group into doing relatively shallow dives (<80 feet), nice and slow, for as long as possible. After the first day of that, when the divemaster knew our abilities, and saw that we were all using computers, he would announce in the pre-dive briefing 1+ hour bottom times. Several times my wife and I had bunch of air left and no deco time, the divemaster let us stay down while the rest of the group were already in the boat. He just kept a casual eye on things while we finished our dive.
For Cozumel, the water visibility was quite poor (~40-50' at some sites) due to particulate matter in the water caused by runoff from the earlier rains. It improved later in the week to ~70-80'. The water temperature was about 80 degrees F.
blue land crab
We did our surface intervals on shore at various locations. Getting to explore new places is a real treat. One place Papa Hog's frequents is a pier that doesn't seem to have any resort nearby. It's just a pier, a beach, and jungle. I especially enjoy this location, since I can run around the jungle and catch blue land crabs to play with.
Each time I did this I came back with 5 new mosquito bites, but it was worth it. Right off that pier you can see small barracuda, needlefish, and various other little stuff, if you look for it. One of the divemasters said there are freshwater crocodiles that occasionally venture close to the area. I'm not sure I believe him. This is the same guy that told one of the guests that the school of chub that hang out at the Allegro pier are "Mexican piranhas." Heh.We dove the Devil's Throat at Punta Sur after doing a "check out" dive at 140' the day before. [all details chopped] I guess some people consider Punta Sur a great dive, but for me it was just another long swimthrough; not much to look at, and very much lacking in marine life. It's cool to say we did it, though.
The divemasters were real characters. And despite their somewhat rough appearance, are great guys, and excellent at their jobs. Our favorite divemaster was Gabriel, who dives with a "do rag" on his head. Underwater, the two elongated ends of it floated upwards from behind his head. When he turned toward us, he looked like some kind of deranged underwater rabbit! Very funny. Of course I don't have an underwater camera. Yet. (Sigh.) Anyway, besides "do rags" and nicknames like "Buddha Belly" written on the front of their wetsuits, I could see that these guys enjoyed their jobs. At one point they mooned another Papa Hog's boat going the
opposite direction. Hilarious! All this done from a boat named "Brain Damage". :-D
Night dives:
============
We did 2 night dives with them. The 2nd night dive was probably the best night dive I've ever done. Shortly after descending and finding some cool stuff, I saw my wife wildly gesticulating about something. The divemaster was next to her, doing the same thing. Unable to decipher their motions, I went through the possiblities: 1) They had both lost their minds; 2) They had invented some kind of new underwater form of dance; 3) They had found something VERY interesting. Could it be more interesting than watching them make a spectacle of themselves? I decided to investigate.
Turns out they found a HUGE lobster. I mean H U G E ! The antennae was about as long as my arm! I had no idea they got anywhere near that big. The expression in my wife and the divemaster's eyes told me they had similar thoughts. It looked about the size of our 40 pound dog! We couldn't find a way to get a collar and leash on it, so we just left it there. Then my wife, probably still stunned from her recent experience, practically ran into a sleeping barracuda when she rounded a corner. The two startled each other, and the big silvery creature shot into the darkness. Shortly after that we encountered an octopus out in the open. We gently played with it, and watched the colors and textures wildly changing in front of our eyes. It hit just about every pattern but plaid. Amazing. We saw about 4 total, along with plenty of lobster, some eels, a bunch of MASSIVE crabs, and a scorpionfish. Something that looked like a couple crevalle jacks loomed in the distance the entire dive, possibly drawn by our lights. Just when I thought we'd reached our limit of highlights, we spotted a splendid toadfish. And me without a camera!
Here are most of the dive sites we visited:
================================
San Francisco, Ciedro, Santa Rosa wall & top, Delaila, Chankanaab, Yucab, Punta Sur, Palancar Gardens, La Francesa, and a shore dive at the reef off Papa Hog's.
Common/obvious stuff we saw:
=======================
4+ varieties of parrots, blue chromis, grunts, wrasse, conch, hermit crabs, xmas tree worms, cowfish, trunkfish, blue tang, snapper, bicolor damsels, black damsels, gobies, trumpetfish, goatfish, whitespot filefish, black durgon, scrawled filefish (I think), blennies, gobies, squirrelfish, razorfish, wrasse, sgt major (including blue phase protecting eggs), porkfish, chrinoids, chub, doctorfish, surgeonfish, 3+ types of butterfly, rock beauties, gray angels, queen angels, brittle stars, bar jacks
Less common/had to look for stuff:
==========================
lobster, large crabs, octopus, splendid toadfish, nurse sharks (~5), unidentified shark (reef, maybe?), green morays, spotted morays, barracuda (~10 on 1 dive!), scorpionfish (~5), southern stingrays, electric rays, yellow stingray, turtles (4-5), ocean triggers, queen triggers, puffer, flying fish (saw them briefly underwater near the surface, also flying while on the boat), soapfish, several types of flounder, rainbow parrotfish, nassau grouper, some other kind of grouper, mutton snapper, black margate, shrimp, permit, needlefish, young almaco jacks, lizardfish (not sure, just saw its head sticking out of the sand), crevalle jack
"Lola"
Topside:
======
Weather: Daytime air temp ~80-90 F, nighttime ~70, humidity maybe 80+%. Plenty of mosquitos at dusk.
Allegro Resort:
==========
Before staying there, it was difficult for us to understand why it was rated as only a 2.5 star resort. We'd visited it 3 years ago while staying at the nearby Iberostar, and it looked very nice! Beautiful grounds, nice pools, swim-up bar, great beach, onsite dive operation, nice looking buildings, apparently lots to do. But after staying there, we discovered that the food was pretty good, but the service was poor to inconsistent at best. Part of the resort was sectioned off due to construction, and the noise was a bit annoying. The insides of the rooms were clean, but mediocre in quality. At least they had air conditioning.
What bugged us was more about the guests than the resort itself. Many of them were...how can I say this...they were the types you might see on a Jerry Springer show. I think at least 10% of them were named Bubba. The women, too! ;-) We weren't sure what attracted these folks to Cozumel, as opposed to maybe a place like Tijuana. I swear if there had been a greasy spoon diner in the area, it would have been packed with these folks.
Allegro's sports bar/dance club sucked. The snorkeling off the beach there also sucked. I have no space for further comments. :-\
One thing we really enjoyed at Allegro was seeing and feeding the wild iguanas. We also had fun playing with the abundant tree frogs, feeding the fish at the pier, and watching "Lola" local the stingray glide around the bottom near the fishing boats.
wild "iguana"
San Miguel:
========
I have no space to write about it. Let's just say we had fun.
Playa Del Carmen:
=============
Ditto. Better than San Miguel.
Our ratings (out of 5):
================
Allegro Resort ***
Papa Hog's *****
American Airlines *****
Mexicana Airlines
Playa Del Carmen experience *****
San Miguel experience ***
