On your first cenote tour, please......!

[cavew0man]

For someone who is planning on diving a Cenote this coming May your information is first rate. Thanks so much for the post. I'm sure i'll have many more question as the months get closer.
All best,
Brad

You are going to love it! There's nothing else quite like it.

Well put. I haven't done 50 cenote dives, only 2. But I also was in the back, with only one person between me and the guide. Still saw some fun stuff!! What a wonderful experience though!! can't wait to do it again.

You see, this is how we entrap you, brainwash you, and create new cave divers...

nice rant, cavewoman....... so who do you dive with?

Whoever will have me.... My buddies are mostly freelance guides.

 

[cavew0man]

Amen.

When my wife and I did a few cenote dives the guide knew I was a CD and had tech training. He put me on "tail-end-charlie" for a bit of clean up diving.

Cavewoman is so right. I saw half of what she mentioned in that short time. And I never did see the "crystal clear" diving in there. A couple ahead in the group were diving vertically (kicking more downward than horizontally) due to a lack of understanding of what that funny BCD-thing they were wearing was for.

I also noticed the significant damage to the ceiling. Not pleasant.

All of you divers on SB out there: please, no one expects everyone to be a perfect diver. But know your capabilities and limitations. If you can't hold yourself horizontal in the water (without kicking) maybe you should should stick to OW type of diving fo the time being. No insult intended, but a suggestion.

Anyway, I would really like to get back to the cenotes and try it again. Perhaps something a bit more challenging that won't be filled with divers too new to try this type of dive.

That's really too bad you didn't get the full experience with the viz mucked up. There's quite a few locations that have permanent cavern lines, many of them definitely more challenging (and less populated) that you might want to check out.
If there's any guides on here, correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems we have an unofficial agreement to use two main dive sites for newbie dives. And yes, they get pretty banged up, but they are still a pretty awesome experience when it's your first time in. (Of course, assuming you can see!).

 

[wedivebc]

having now done Chac Mool something like 50 times.)
.

If you see a few guys/gals in megalodons at Chac Mool in the next couple of weeks come over and say hi. My buddy wants to see the monster fang.
We leave the snow and ice behind tonight

 

[cavew0man]

You are listing issues that reference the lack of basic skills required for OW certification. These divers should be screened and not allowed in there, end of story! Most of these divers are once a year vacation divers, go scare the fish in Cozumel instead.....or, get the basic training that allows you to control your buoyancy at least, is that too much to ask?

On this point I will have to respectfully disagree with you. In general, what I am describing is a diver in a new environment that - due to anxiety, or nerves, or excitement - just stops thinking. Or in some cases chooses to disregard their instructions. As divepro says, they ARE screened, to the extent they can be. And the number of dives in your logbook (or the title on your c-card) says absolutely nothing about how you are going to perform your first time in a new environment, and also says nothing about what attitude you are going to bring to the dive.

I don't think we can expect the Mexicans to enforce this issue, due to the almighty dollar, so maybe we can do our best as divers to save the Cenotes.

"The Mexicans". are the ones who have put a guide certification system in place, and "The Mexicans" are the people allowing you onto their private land to gain access to the systems in the first place. Many of "the Mexicans" (not to belabour the point) are just as interested as you in conservation and preservation of the cenotes, whether the motivation be environmental concern, future income, or protection of the peninsula's water supply.

Well I can tell you that US MEXICANS, and in most dive shops I know in Cancun and Playa del Carmen, we do check on divers skills, at least have them do an ocean non deep dive first if they have not dove in a while, and Cavern guides wich are generally experienced Instructors (FULL CAVE DIVERS) do provide briefings that cover this issues, unfortunately we get many divers saying and even proving hundreds of dives that do not pay attention to briefings, and at least in our shop we do prefer to recommend not diving overhead environment if there is lack of experience, we also offer bouyancy clinics, Cavern private courses etc. We Mexicans like to keep the cavern system as it is so we can keep getting the almighty dollar from the grandsons of todays divers. Also OW certification skills are one thing but CaverN diving skills or overhead environment diving are a whole different deal it is hard to screen every single diver before a Cenote dive so we provide all the facts and issues about it.
CAVEWOMANS POST IS GREAT. ALL I COULD ADD IS ....PAY ATTENTION TO BRIEFINGS, POSTIONS ETC.

Thanks, dive pro - I think you can distill all of my rantings down into one simple instruction - pay attention, and think. I see the same thing as you - the overwhelming majority of shops have minimum requirements to do the cenote tours. As you obviously know, the credentials don't say a thing about how the diver is going perform when they get in the cavern.
I think that "you Mexicans" have done a pretty good job of coming up with a sort of industry self-regulating approach to the tours. My opinion is that the APSA guidelines provide for a reasonable safety margin, while still accommodating tourism, and the common practice of keeping to two primary dive sites with new divers at least contains the inevitable damage.

To be very clear, I am absolutely pro-cenote tour. Without the income generated by it, we wouldn't have the access and facilities we have at the sites, and the choice of world-class training that we do.

And if I hadn't been talked into going on one a few years ago (and it took some convincing, believe me!) I wouldn't be a cave diver today.

 

[cavew0man]

If you see a few guys/gals in megalodons at Chac Mool in the next couple of weeks come over and say hi. My buddy wants to see the monster fang.
We leave the snow and ice behind tonight

Yay! Bring me some snow? I will definitely keep an eye out - if there's an orange Chevy Colorado in the parking lot, that's me. We were actually planning on going to the fang before my partner got a booking the day of the rant. Funny.

 

[Pez de Diablo]

That's really too bad you didn't get the full experience with the viz mucked up. There's quite a few locations that have permanent cavern lines, many of them definitely more challenging (and less populated) that you might want to check out.
If there's any guides on here, correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems we have an unofficial agreement to use two main dive sites for newbie dives. And yes, they get pretty banged up, but they are still a pretty awesome experience when it's your first time in. (Of course, assuming you can see!).

Because we (guides) cannot always do a check out dive with a potential cenote diver we do take the divers to a more forgiving environement when in doubt of thier skills. At my shop (and many other shops) the guide/instructor that does an openwater dive will pass on information about the potential cenote diver before we leave. If we don't think the diver has the skills to dive in a cenote in a manner that will protect the environment and the safety of the guide and diver we will nicely tell them that they are not ready for the dive. We have never had some one tell us that we are wrong in our opinion, most thank us for the information and seek tips on bettering their skills on the next openwater dive they do with us.

Dennis

 

[robint]

Because we (guides) cannot always do a check out dive with a potential cenote diver we do take the divers to a more forgiving environement when in doubt of thier skills. At my shop (and many other shops) the guide/instructor that does an openwater dive will pass on information about the potential cenote diver before we leave. If we don't think the diver has the skills to dive in a cenote in a manner that will protect the environment and the safety of the guide and diver we will nicely tell them that they are not ready for the dive. We have never had some one tell us that we are wrong in our opinion, most thank us for the information and seek tips on bettering their skills on the next openwater dive they do with us.

Dennis

So how do you assess people like us, who will probably be coming down this spring just to do the cenotes for a few days? Are you going to check our logbooks and see that my hubby is an MSDT instructor with 500+ dives, me just Rescue diver but almost 400 dives? Are you going to take our word for it that we do most of our diving (here in NM or in Calif) in 60 degree water, sometimes drysuits, good vis and sometimes <10' vis? Or are you going to insist we do an ocean dive first so you can assess us yourselves? Just wondering.

robin

 

[Pez de Diablo]

So how do you assess people like us, who will probably be coming down this spring just to do the cenotes for a few days? Are you going to check our logbooks and see that my hubby is an MSDT instructor with 500+ dives, me just Rescue diver but almost 400 dives? Are you going to take our word for it that we do most of our diving (here in NM or in Calif) in 60 degree water, sometimes drysuits, good vis and sometimes <10' vis? Or are you going to insist we do an ocean dive first so you can assess us yourselves? Just wondering.

robin

Robin,

We will ask you about your dive experience and yes take your word for it. I never insist that you do an ocean dive first if you are a diver that has your credentials, but if you are a diver with less than 20 dives then yes, I will suggest that you do a dive or two in the ocean to insure your skills are there. Typically within the first 2 minutes in the water we (guides) can tell how the dive will go.

Dennis

 

[Peter Guy]

Typically within the first 2 minutes in the water we (guides) can tell how the dive will go.

Dennis, I'm sure glad I checked out for you then! You had me in the open water for almost two hours before you agreed to take me into the Cenotes.

 

[Grafbirddog]

Hola Miguel,

Well said!