Palace Resorts question

[Dynasty]

I will be staying at the xpu-ha resort in a couple weeks. It is about 45 minutes south of Cancun. I want to go to cozumel and go diving a day or two of my trip. I was just wandering what are some of your favorite dive shops to go through there? Also what are the prices there to rent everything except goggles, fins, wet suit, boots, snorkel. Also a web site would be useful. This will be my first trip to mexico, what is the easiest way to get to cozumel from the yucatan peninsula? Also what are some good local dive places in Cancun and the surrounding area? Thanks

 

[ggunn]

I will be staying at the xpu-ha resort in a couple weeks. It is about 45 minutes south of Cancun. I want to go to cozumel and go diving a day or two of my trip. I was just wandering what are some of your favorite dive shops to go through there? Also what are the prices there to rent everything except goggles, fins, wet suit, boots, snorkel. Also a web site would be useful. This will be my first trip to mexico, what is the easiest way to get to cozumel from the yucatan peninsula? Also what are some good local dive places in Cancun and the surrounding area? Thanks

There is a ferry that runs more or less hourly between Cozumel and Playa del Carmen on the mainland; it's about 12 miles and takes about 45 minutes.

http://cozumel-diving.net/ is a good place to start. A two tank dive trip on Cozumel costs between 50 and 90 dollars US, depending on who you go with. Most ops charge an extra 10-15 bucks for BC and reg rental; tanks and weights are included in the price of the dive.

Cheers,

 

[pennypue]

Hi Dynasty,
Welcome to the board!!!
I stayed at Aventura Spa Palace last year in late May. Beautiful place, you should be equally as pampered at Xpu-Ha. Palace resorts have AquaWorld on site. You could arrange diving directly through them. They would make all of the arrangements to get you from Xpu-Ha to the dive site, including lunch. This is how I made my first dives (not just in Coz but first period). If you do choose this way, ask for Enrique, he is an instructor/DM and did a marvelous job with me. My instructor at the resort had requested him specifically for me. At the time, I didn't know the difference between a good DM and a bad one. I do now. He's in the really good category.

So if you like to be taken care of, not have to worry about your own logistics, and don't mind a large dive op, they are there. While they may be referred to as cattle boats, I did my dives in a group of four, including the instructor, so I was a bit spoiled. Not sure what your choice of dive sites would be, since I only did those first two dives with them. ANYWHERE was good with me.

If you're more adventuresome, you can arrange your own transportation up to Playa del Carmen. (Gordon, ggunn, would be great for that advice ) And take the ferry over on your own. I'm biased as hell on the dive ops in Coz, and I do not have the experience to be that biased. I love Christi and her op Blue XT Sea. She runs a very nice op. It's a great combination between serious diving and being pampered, I had thought the two were mutually exclusive, boy was I wrong. I've found a good thing, diving with BXTS, and I don't intend to mess with it.

Others here on the board can run down quite a few other excellent dive ops for you. But it really comes down to what type of diving do you want to do? And how much hand holding do you want, both above and below water?

Hope I helped. Now I'm going diving.........:lilbunny:

 

[bnajdrovsky]

I will be staying at the xpu-ha resort in a couple weeks. It is about 45 minutes south of Cancun. I want to go to cozumel and go diving a day or two of my trip. I was just wandering what are some of your favorite dive shops to go through there?

I stayed at the Xpu-Ha Palace a year ago. It's a very nice resort! It's a converted nature park, and they still herd groups of tourists there for a day of ogling at the aligators, flamingos, and snokling in the lagoon. The place is HUGE... be prepared to ride a bike around the resort or catch a ride on their golf cart trains. Their 'on-site' dive shop is Dive Aventuras, even though they're not really on site. They have a little shack over by the fresh water lagoon where an instructor shows up in the mornings to do a scuba demonstration for non-diver guests, but the main dive shop is located in Puerto Aventuras at the Omni restort, which is about 5 minute drive north of the Xpu-Ha Palace. They came and picked me up each morning at the front desk in a big red Suburban. I opted for their "Dive Aventuras Experience" package, which includes both blue water and cenote diving. I would highly recommend that you try the cenotes, especially since you're staying at Xpu-Ha which is almost 'across the street' from at least one of them. It's truely an awesome experience. Overall, I was pleased with the dive operator. I don't know if they run any trips over to Cozumel, but probably a better bet would be to get yourself over to Playa Del Carmen early one morning, take the ferry over to Coz, and dive with one of the numerous ops in Cozumel for a day and return in the evening.

BTW, the dive operator's website is http://www.diveaventuras.com/

 

[ggunn]

I stayed at the Xpu-Ha Palace a year ago. It's a very nice resort! It's a converted nature park, and they still herd groups of tourists there for a day of ogling at the aligators, flamingos, and snokling in the lagoon. The place is HUGE...

Is it the huge place near PA with what looks like about 1000 rooms on the water, kind of a gray color, 3 or 4 stories tall? I've only seen it from the water.

 

[bnajdrovsky]

Is it the huge place near PA with what looks like about 1000 rooms on the water, kind of a gray color, 3 or 4 stories tall? I've only seen it from the water.

No, the resort is huge area wise, but most of the property is actually jungle/mangroves. The guests stay in two story bungalows (2 rooms to a building) which are arranged in little 'villages'. You can see an aerial view of the resort here:

http://www.locogringo.com/maps/tour/129a-t.html

 

[pennypue]

Sorry for the apparent mis-info. I know that Moon Palace and Aventura Spa Palace both had AquaWorld onsite. I didn't realize that they would, or even could, have a different op at Xpu-Ha!!!

 

[ggunn]

No, the resort is huge area wise, but most of the property is actually jungle/mangroves. The guests stay in two story bungalows (2 rooms to a building) which are arranged in little 'villages'. You can see an aerial view of the resort here:

http://www.locogringo.com/maps/tour/129a-t.html

That's good. The place that we saw from the water (fishing) didn't look that attractive. Everything was raw concrete gray and close-packed.

That's a cool website, that aerial tour.

Cheers,