share your Cozumel & Grand Cayman experience

[::Nitro:fish]

I am thrilled to be going on my first cruise in August. What is even more exciting is to have the chance to dive in Cozumel and Grand Cayman. This is the chance of a lifetime for me so I'm pretty sure I can fit in both dives. In the off chance I only have enough time for one dive, which one should I do?

1. Grand Cayman, two tank dive. We will be diving the West Wall with an average depth of 80ft. The second dive will be either a coral reef dive or a shipwreck

2. Cozumel, two tank dive. Two dives between 50ft and 80ft, captains choice.

Tell me about your experiences....

 

[rivers]

I am thrilled to be going on my first cruise in August. What is even more exciting is to have the chance to dive in Cozumel and Grand Cayman. This is the chance of a lifetime for me so I'm pretty sure I can fit in both dives. In the off chance I only have enough time for one dive, which one should I do?

1. Grand Cayman, two tank dive. We will be diving the West Wall with an average depth of 80ft. The second dive will be either a coral reef dive or a shipwreck

2. Cozumel, two tank dive. Two dives between 50ft and 80ft, captains choice.

Tell me about your experiences....

In Cozumel, I would book with an outside op. While the ships op is okay (the DMs are great), you're going to have very limited bottom times. If you check out the Cozumel forum, there are many ops out there that are fine with cruise ship divers joining them on a boat.

 

[caymaniac]

I would book both outside ops, also one of your dives should be StingRayCity on GC if you've never been before.
On GC (if possible) choose an op to take you to the north wall with the second dive at SRC
The west side of GC can be not too great in some areas, towards Trinity Caves and north is better.

Coz can have some ripping currents so just be prepared for it and stick with your group especially with the lower number of dives you've listed as your experience.

 

[::Nitro:fish]

two good posts. thanks guys. I will certainly look into local dive groups.

good point about currents. I only have one logged Drift Dive in the Niagara River which was pretty cool. It was neat just drifting along. The DM had us duck down into a shelf and we were able to see two things; debris above us drift by, and a few fellow divers in the class spinning in circles!

 

[ScubaSteve]

I have to issue a warning against using off-ship ops. I am not saying do not do. DO make sure that you have absolutely more than enough time to get there, dive and get back onto the ship. The ship ops are more expensive however booking with them, they guarantee you will make it back to the boat or they will hold the boat (or this was the case with the last cruise I was on). With an outside operastor, if something happens and you are not back in time, you are ":turd:-out-of-luck".

Again, I only urge you to make sure you have more than enough time for anything that could happen (reverse currents causing delays on the surface, motor issues etc.). But then, maybe I am too cautious.

 

[FishOutUvH2O]

I'm going to have to echo the "go with an outside dive op" in Cozumel recommendation. Cozumel is not a one cruise ship town. In fact I've seen as many as nine cruise ships berthed in one day. So, the non-cruise-contracted dive ops know how to deal with the cruise ship divers very well. You'll just need to do a little more work in arranging your dives. Many have fast boats that will not only be able to offer a wider variety of dive locations, but won't limit your bottom time and will still be able to get you back in more than enough time to get on the ship. In fact you'll probably be done with 2-tanks and back in time to be able to go out and do some "touristy" things (get a little borracho, have a balloon hat made, etc.).

 

[tomboyy]

I took take of my arrangements in GC and went with Off The Wall Divers .. walked there had a great time. Been diving on cruising vacations 4 times and always arrange my own dives and have gotten back to the boat on time... that said there were a couple close calls

 

[Garrobo]

At 70 years old, I'm still not old enough to do the cruise thing. I'll wait a while.

 

[webjr]

Do NOT use the ships ops unless you like cattle boats. a private boat is the only way to go. Also, if you're doing the normal 7 day trip then don't forget Jamaica has very good diving also.

 

[diver 85]

Too many to list----maybe you can tell from pics/videos(now saying this, we have not been back to GC since about '93--too many people & cars, lol)...but went back to Little Cayman in '07......you can tell the locations by the titles in the albums listed on the left side of the link---Little Cayman has LC in the album names, Cozumel has CZM in their album titles.....

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Oh, forgot to say, book with Aldora for diving @ CZM, you'll never regret it...