Cozumel versus Roatan or Bonaire

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this thread is turning into nothing but an argument over which dive destination is "best". Silly.
Every dive destination has its Pros and Cons.

IMHO = Every dive in Cozumel gives me quality.... and I will take quality over quantity any day. My opinion. MY money. Cozumel works out to be cheaper overall dive trip for me.

I will continue to visit both Bonaire and Roatan, but I don't go there just for quantity of dives. I like them both for different reasons.

AND.... we refuse to go anywhere that we cannot get in 3 or more dives per day. We have always gotten in that many in Cozumel, and we have been there 8 times, dived with different ops, stayed at diff resorts.
 
If you're interested in the quantity of dives alone, then you can shore dive your brains out in Bonaire. If you want quality, however, Bonaire will NEVER be able to compete with Cozumel. We were so homesick for CZM the week we spent in Bonaire that it was disheartening. The reefs are beautiful in Bonaire but the marine life is sparse. As soon as I was feet wet again in Cozumel earlier this month, the first thing that went thru my mind was, "Holy crap - nothing compares to this!" Add to that the wonderful people in Cozumel and it just doesn't get any better in my opinion.
 
Miss you crgravitt :)
 
If you're interested in the quantity of dives alone, then you can shore dive your brains out in Bonaire. If you want quality, however, Bonaire will NEVER be able to compete with Cozumel. We were so homesick for CZM the week we spent in Bonaire that it was disheartening. The reefs are beautiful in Bonaire but the marine life is sparse. As soon as I was feet wet again in Cozumel earlier this month, the first thing that went thru my mind was, "Holy crap - nothing compares to this!" Add to that the wonderful people in Cozumel and it just doesn't get any better in my opinion.

Not to take anything away from Cozumel which has great visibility and amazing reef structure, but eight of the top ten reef sites for richness of marine species are in Bonaire. Bari Reef alone has almost 400 species, making it the richest location between here and Indonesia. If you missed Bari reef when you were in Bonaire you really need to go back and dive it. On the top 25 list, 16 of those are in Bonaire.
 
That's a helluva price Mike, $20 a tank. We dove with West End Divers, and if I remember correctly, they were not over priced. They were $40 a tank. We enjoyed the healthy reefs in Roatan, but the enjoyment stopped there. I was absolutely floored at the lack of fish there. Reef was great... but pretty barren of reef fish. Beyond that, the bugs alone are enough to keep us from ever going back to Roatan/Utila. I've lived in the tropics, and traveled extensivly my whole life in the tropics. Never have I been eaten alive like I was in Roatan, not even close! The vast majority off the tourists we saw were pretty well eaten up. Add to that, the cheapest flight we could find was through TACA (Take..A...Chance...Airlines), was not cheaper than Coz. Overall, comparing the 2? Coz is much nicer for us than Roatan. Roatan was not cheaper when it was all said and done. Bonaire, we haven't been so I can't do a comparison. Like others mentioned, you could do 4-5 tanks a day in Coz.
 
If all things are considered in the price, Cozumel is certainly the least expensive between it and Roatan. Can't speak to Bonaire, haven't been there but the airfare alone makes it more expensive to me. Cozumel for me is the best bang for the buck. I love Roatan but it is more expensive over all than Cozumel. The other thing about Cozumel is that it has a lot more to offer my non diving wife.
 
Sideways ---

Roatan is famous for the no-see-ems, they eat some people alive and hardly bother others. You find hundreds of posts discussing the different bug repellents in regard to Roatan. Not the safest place either. Can't even compare Cozumel and Roatan when it comes to that, I've explored a lot of the island, but I'm always feeling a little creeped out when you get back away from busy places in Roatan, never feel that way in Cozumel.

I believe Roatan has a major lionfish denial problem. Last time I was there I witnessed exactly what you saw on the west side, lack of fish compared to last time I was there. The frustrations grew and grew over my stay with conversation after conversation with divemasters with oblivious attitude to the lionfish, to dive shop owners with not a care in the world about the lionfish, even finding out that divemasters had been specifically told by shop owners not to kill lion fish on guided dives with guest because guest were complaining about the divemasters taking time away from their dive to kill them. :shakehead: Seems like they are oblivious to their livelihood being slowly eaten while they ignore it.

Apparently the south side is completely different story with the house reefs being patrolled by divemasters much like Cozumel and abundant fish life, but west side was definitely lacking in fish life on many reefs. One noticeable difference was on one dive we did around the point where the reef was buzzing with fish, and there was a grouper breeding taking place, never seen so many grouper all in one place!

Roatan is such a mixed bag, such a beautiful island, visually it makes Cozumel look like a desert wasteland, with Roatan having that Gilligan's Island look to it, but Roatan is really a head shaker. Last time I was there, witnessed locals standing on the shallow reef in water up to their waists! Ugh!

---------- Post added July 23rd, 2013 at 08:36 PM ----------

That's a helluva price Mike, $20 a tank. We dove with West End Divers, and if I remember correctly, they were not over priced. They were $40 a tank.

Mayan Divers and Bananarama without even looking to much are offering $28.00 dives on their websites right now.

We've dived with them many times. When we started diving with Mayan Divers, Anya the owner lead the dives and it was awesome, since then they've grown quite a bit and changed their focus so now we look to Bananarama as they will cater better to an advanced diver. Both are very well run dive operations, very safety conscious, very friendly, great staff and equipment, have boats on the south side in the winter for when the weather kicks up and kills all diving on the west side.
 
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FWIW, I'm an average guy and we do average stuff - there are cheaper ways, and more expensive ways to do everything we like, but moderation seems to work for us. Considering this, my two cents.....

We just got back from Bonaire, and were missing Cozumel by the end.

We LOVED Bonaire and we did 21 dives in 6 days but since we added 6 boat dives (Klein, Northern and East Coast) and two guided night dives (to get to tricky shore entrances and dive sites that weren't just out and back), it was in no way cheaper than Cozumel. This is even considering in Coz we ALWAYS dive at least 3 boat dives daily (usually 4 or 5) and add those extra dives ala carte. I'd love to see nitrox available and cheap (free) on Coz, but I don't think I see myself paying for more than a tank or two of nitrox per trip.

I know we could have stuck to diving from shore by ourselves the whole time and it probably would have been close cost wise (on Bon, food is more expensive and not as good IMHO, and a $200pp higher airfare would balance out against added tanks in Coz). However, I don't think we would have had as much variety as we had on Bonaire without adding Klein, northern and eastern sites all of which costs extra. I don't know where he found $50 two tank trips (if you have an unlimited air package, boat dives are around $25 but they only do single tank trips) Even though we added a lot of variety with our boat dives, there was a repetitiveness to the reefs in Bonaire. You just don't have the option to enjoy the geography of Palancar, then Columbia Shallows, then Maracaibo, then Punta Tunich or Yucab all in one week on Bonaire.

I will say that I found Bonaire to be INCREDIBLY FISHY!! The sheer volume and species of fish on display at nearly every dive site was staggering, and if I was a macro photog guy, I think Bonaire would be heaven! It's just everything is fairly small and from fish to structure, nothing in Bonaire is as dramatic as Cozumel to me! After a week, I feel like I've seen the best of what Bonaire has to offer, and after 4 trips to Cozumel, there are still places I want to see that are at least rumored to have something unique!

Also, I agree with Christi that $75 +/- for a two tank dive (given how far the boats go, and how long the trips take) is a great deal and those guys can't be clearing much money at this price point (TIP THESE GUYS PLEASE!)

Never been to Roatan, but in pricing it out at Coco View, the package was much more expensive than Bonaire, (but air was cheaper) and in hind sight, the all inclusive plus 4 boat dives a day would have more than balanced out all of the additions and food we bought in Bon. That will probably be the next place we try but always in between trips to Coz.

We only had minor trouble in Coz with bugs (and mostly at the cenotes) but in Bonaire we were lathering up in DEET every night or getting chewed! FWIW, my buddy said that bugs were his biggest pet peeve in Roatan.
 
For me Coz has about everything I could want, plus it just feels like home. From Texas it is very convenient and direct, it is reasonable with plenty of variety, it is a safe place to visit, and the diving isn't bad either. Don't get me wrong, Roatan and Bonaire have great things about them as well (love Roatan), but for my money Cozumel is pretty hard to beat overall. There are a few ops on the island that use larger steel tanks; might give them a try next time. Two or three 80-90 minute dives per day are plenty for most.
 
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I hate to see threads like this go on and on.... EVERY dive destination has its Pros and Cons.

For me Cozumel has the best fishlife of those 3 (Coz, Bonaire, Roatan) as it has big and small, huge schools and such. Bonaire has lots of schools and lots of smaller fish, but you aren't going to have the Big stuff like Cozumel. Roatan has tons of small stuff (on the southside) including seahorses, but it is not in the ballpark with either Cozumel or Bonaire in sheer numbers.

airfare --- it is now more expensive for us to go to Cozumel, but it is still cheaper than both Bonaire and Roatan.

Food --- Bonaire you can get room with kitchen and fix sandwiches and cook meals, which helps, but you still have to go to a grocery store and buy the stuff (expensive since it is an island and all has to be brought in by boat), or eat at restaurants which are very expensive. We do all-inclusives at Cozumel the past 3 trips, and our 2 trips to CCV. Food downtown in Cozumel is very cheap, and good quality though.

People --- Cozumel locals are fabulous, would give you the shirt off their back to make you happy. Roatan locals stay in their area, no real mixing except the DMs and staff at resorts, who are all nice. Bonaire locals are rude and arrogant and I could live without them. The "natives" and Venezuelans are nicer than the Dutch for sure, but the Dutch superiority attitude has run off several of our friends who swear they will never return. Yeah, there may be exceptions, but overall I have found that to be a real factor in going there.

Bugs --- Cozumel has mosquitos, most hotels spray for them. We don't have a problem at SCC for that reason. If you go downtown at dusk you will need spray. Roatan has noseeums, there is spray for it. We never found it to be a problem as we were religious about spray. Bonaire has mosquitos and they are much worse than Cozumel IMHO. They are not deterred by sprays.

Fish on reefs --- the ONLY reason that Bonaire reefs get in those Top 25 best reefs ratings is that they hand out those ReefID cards and ask people to turn them in after diving. The headquarters for this is right AT Bari Reef!!! Of course it makes the top of the list as "fishiest" reef, thousands of people do those surveys. It is easy diving, very little current, so you can count fish for hours underwater there, anyone from beginners to advanced divers. Think about it.... How easy is it to count fish on a Cozumel drift dive? Not very!

FYI -- my husband and I both said we got bored at Bonaire last trip and missed Cozumel. It wasn't for lack of fish, it was for lack of variety. Cozumel has a variety that can't be beat.

okay.... rant off.

ALL MY OPINION.

I love all 3 locations, will continue to visit all 3 locations. I see no reason to limit myself to just 1.

robin
 
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