My family and I spent the last week of November diving in Puerto Vallarta. This was our first visit to the area and most of our dives were with PVScuba, under the excellent guidance of Ramses. We stayed well south of town at the Barcello Mismaloya, with hopes of doing shore dives, at our leisure, with the on-site Chicos Dive Shop, in addition to boat dives with PVScuba. Lets just say that Chicos does not seem cater to experienced divers who only want to rent tanks and weights. We did manage to rent from them one day and get a couple of nice shore dives in, including a nice deep dive (104) with plenty of rays. They totally let us down on the last day there, after we told them the day before that we would want tanks and weights and told them when we would be there to get them. We arrive at the shop the next day, gear in hand, just to be told they had no tanks for us. (I had read on SB before of others who had this problem with Chicos. I can confirm that they can NOT be counted on. I just thought confirming with them the day before would avoid this problem.) PVScuba, on the other hand, did everything they said they would do for us, plus much more. Alex is a very professional operator who knows how to run a business. Ramses is a guide who knows how to get along with everyone and knows every inch of the dive sites. Their boat, the Manta is perfectly laid out for divers, there is plenty of room for gearing up, the boat is the fastest dive boat in the bay, it rides like a dream and the captain is excellent.
As we were staying at Mismaloya, all our diving was in the south, being picked up right at the beach by the Manta. Though the visibility cant compare to Maui, the diving was still excellent with fun rocky structure. We always had a good fifty feet of visibility and saw a great variety of life; multiple types of eels, angels, wrasse, bonito, turtles, eagle rays, and even two days with mantas. You also get extras with PVScuba that you cant put a price on. If you go to Los Arcos more than once, you get a new spot to explore. If they spot whales on the way, they take the extra half hour to get up close and personal with them. If they are diving Chimo, they will take to boat over to a small fishing village (sorry no tourist shops in it) and you can visit a real village between dives. They also use steel 100s! What a great operation in a fun diving location. We will be using PVScuba on our next visit and would recommend them to divers of any experience level, as they cater to you, not the other way around.
