July 10 to 17 trip report
In short, had a great time.
Ok here are some of the highlights and details for those of you who want to read a long trip report.
Arrived in Cozumel at the SCUBA Club Cozumel at lunch time with a group of 22 other divers, had a quick bite to eat before donning my scuba gear in preparation of helping two instructors certify 8 new divers Open water divers. My certification level is PADI rescue diver, getting ready to go for the Divemaster training. The instructor let me watch as the students demonstrate their skills. My job was to herd the students together and help stop anyone if they decided to bolt towards the surface. There was a little current so the herding wasnt too bad. I would have liked to have seen the students in during the pool sessions so I could have seen their tendencies, either way it seemed a little overwhelming and was an eye opening to what I can expect as a Divemaster.
The food at SCC was much better than expected. It is a sit down style, and you dont have the all you can eat buffet style I was expecting. Met with Choppersrule, his wife Melissa and Diverg his girlfriend had some flight delays and had to hear about the missing camera housing. I expected a larger group, and was hesitant to introduce myself to the group. Amazing how beer works as a social lubricant. DiverG sorry didnt find your camera housing while diving, it didnt make a lap around the island, so obviously there is some lucky kid or diver in Cuba.
The first day of boat diving was great, we were on the Reef Cat with 21 other divers, the groups were broken down to about 5 or 6 people each, Geiser was the Divemaster in our group and did an outstanding job, probably the best divemaster Ive seen. Geiser would always give a very good predive report, and let my buddy and I have a little more bottom time we understood that he has to dive every day they also let people stay down if you have plenty of air and no decompression time with the aluminum 80s. SCC is the best dive operations Ive dove with are Paradise divers twice and Aqua Safari once.
I would have to rank the Scuba Club as the most organized and overall best dives. Our package included two dives a day, the C-53 shipwreck and the night dives were extra, also had to pay extra for the Punta Sur dive on the last day, since diving was not included on that day.
Some of the highlights while diving were Tormentos where Geiser found 4 Scorpion fish, with a male and a female together, also 3 reef sharks along with a splended toad fish all the way out of its little hole. Chacanab where we saw the Atlantis submarine, I was so close I could have grabbed onto it and went for a ride, and thought about it, but didnt think the captain of the sub or our DM would appreciate it, so if anyone reading this, happened to be taking pictures of divers while in the sub on the 14th, please send me one I was the diver with the o ring leak.
That evening while doing a night dive, it started out as ho-hum with the usual big crabs, lobsters and octopus all out and about. Towards the end of the dive a mangrove-snapper about 4 feet long came around, and I noticed a blue tang wiggling in its mouth, sideways like you would be eating an ear of corn on the cob. The snapper headed towards the sand and finished off the fish. We saw the snapper swimming around some more still hungry and only to attack another blue tang after about 2 or 3 tries the tang was in its mouth like another ear of corn. The triggerfish in the area were too big; maybe the snapper was on a diet. I shined my light on a rasse and it disappeared in one bite like a little appetizer. Another snapper came into view and devoured another blue tang, which must be a favorite. Saw the two biggest sea horses Ive ever seen on the Villa Blanca wall. The divemasters said there are three, but we only saw two on that dive.
Found an integrated weigh pouch with 12 pounds of weight while diving on the Paso Del Cedral if anyone is missing one, and can describe it, Ill be happy to send it to them, sorry I left the lead on the boat. Bringing up the extra weight was a mistake, and played havoc with my safety stop since I dive with 10 pounds. I should have known that you shouldnt try and lift more than ten pounds my buddy found 2 masks, but gave them to the dive boat.
The wreck dive was great; we saw the engine room, and the heads, while doing our multilevel dive. It was nice to see the ship with more coral growth than the previous three penetrations. Devils throat was a great dive with little current and the divemaster said it was ok to go a little deeper when we came out at 125 feet, I wanted to test the alarm I had set for a max depth of 130 on my Suunto Viper. Geiser said it was ok if I descended to 140 feet. The computer really beeps a lot while descending below the max limit but still had 2 minutes left of no decompression time so headed back up to the second swim through with the sponge cross. We saw a big eagle ray below us when we came out. Along with a couple of turtles, two decent size barracuda on top of a coral head. The last dive was Las Palmas were we saw two sleeping sharks and one 6 or 7 foot nurse shark swimming around we cut the 24 hour no fly time very close, since our plane left at 12:30 the next day, glad it took a few extra minutes to get all the passengers loaded.
Ran into Greg, DiverG and his girlfriend Gradia at the El Moro restaurant on our last evening. For those of you that want to hear about the hotel I cant compare it to the Pres Allegro or the occidental. The rooms are clean, no TV, or telephone or even pictures on the walls. They do have a mini fridge in the room that keeps the beer cold and the air conditioning works. Enjoyed the hammocks in the evening while watching the thunder and lighting across on the mainland.
The food is great at SCC, they do charge for all drinks in the bar except for water. About 2 dollars for sodas and icetea and about 5 dollars for margaritas, and an 8 dollar corkage fee. This was my 4th time to Cozumel and I still havent seen the other side of the island or seen the ruins. The weather we had was outstanding, I expected it to be much hotter and humid in the middle of July, however afternoon and evening rain showers kept everything cool.
Next time I would like to go down and dive with Christi after hearing all the great things, but would not hesitate to dive stay and dive with Scuba Club Cozumel again.
DateTime Dive Site Max Depth DiveTime
7/10 3:59 PM Scuba Club shoredive 20 127:00
7/11 9:43 AM Palancar Gardens 81 54:40
7/1111:50 AM Paradise Reef 37 71:00
7/12 9:47 AM Columbia Deep 102 52:00
7/12 11:51 AM Tormentos 65 53:00
7/12 3:46 PM Scuba Club shoredive 21 61:00
7/13 9:39 AM Palancar Caves 91 53:20
7/13 11:29 AM Yucab 55 61:00
7/14 9:32 AM Columbia Bricks 85 54:00
7/14 11:37 AM Chancanab 54 55:20
7/14 7:49 PM Paradise [Night Dive] 48 65:20
7/15 9:28 AM Paso Del Cedral 72 57:40
7/1511:35 AM VillaBlanca Wall 56 64:40
7/15 3:28 PM C-53 [Wreck Dive] 78 48:20
7/16 9:52 AM Devils Throat 141 37:20
7/1611:35 AM Las Palmas 67 54:40
In short, had a great time.
Ok here are some of the highlights and details for those of you who want to read a long trip report.
Arrived in Cozumel at the SCUBA Club Cozumel at lunch time with a group of 22 other divers, had a quick bite to eat before donning my scuba gear in preparation of helping two instructors certify 8 new divers Open water divers. My certification level is PADI rescue diver, getting ready to go for the Divemaster training. The instructor let me watch as the students demonstrate their skills. My job was to herd the students together and help stop anyone if they decided to bolt towards the surface. There was a little current so the herding wasnt too bad. I would have liked to have seen the students in during the pool sessions so I could have seen their tendencies, either way it seemed a little overwhelming and was an eye opening to what I can expect as a Divemaster.
The food at SCC was much better than expected. It is a sit down style, and you dont have the all you can eat buffet style I was expecting. Met with Choppersrule, his wife Melissa and Diverg his girlfriend had some flight delays and had to hear about the missing camera housing. I expected a larger group, and was hesitant to introduce myself to the group. Amazing how beer works as a social lubricant. DiverG sorry didnt find your camera housing while diving, it didnt make a lap around the island, so obviously there is some lucky kid or diver in Cuba.
The first day of boat diving was great, we were on the Reef Cat with 21 other divers, the groups were broken down to about 5 or 6 people each, Geiser was the Divemaster in our group and did an outstanding job, probably the best divemaster Ive seen. Geiser would always give a very good predive report, and let my buddy and I have a little more bottom time we understood that he has to dive every day they also let people stay down if you have plenty of air and no decompression time with the aluminum 80s. SCC is the best dive operations Ive dove with are Paradise divers twice and Aqua Safari once.
I would have to rank the Scuba Club as the most organized and overall best dives. Our package included two dives a day, the C-53 shipwreck and the night dives were extra, also had to pay extra for the Punta Sur dive on the last day, since diving was not included on that day.
Some of the highlights while diving were Tormentos where Geiser found 4 Scorpion fish, with a male and a female together, also 3 reef sharks along with a splended toad fish all the way out of its little hole. Chacanab where we saw the Atlantis submarine, I was so close I could have grabbed onto it and went for a ride, and thought about it, but didnt think the captain of the sub or our DM would appreciate it, so if anyone reading this, happened to be taking pictures of divers while in the sub on the 14th, please send me one I was the diver with the o ring leak.
That evening while doing a night dive, it started out as ho-hum with the usual big crabs, lobsters and octopus all out and about. Towards the end of the dive a mangrove-snapper about 4 feet long came around, and I noticed a blue tang wiggling in its mouth, sideways like you would be eating an ear of corn on the cob. The snapper headed towards the sand and finished off the fish. We saw the snapper swimming around some more still hungry and only to attack another blue tang after about 2 or 3 tries the tang was in its mouth like another ear of corn. The triggerfish in the area were too big; maybe the snapper was on a diet. I shined my light on a rasse and it disappeared in one bite like a little appetizer. Another snapper came into view and devoured another blue tang, which must be a favorite. Saw the two biggest sea horses Ive ever seen on the Villa Blanca wall. The divemasters said there are three, but we only saw two on that dive.
Found an integrated weigh pouch with 12 pounds of weight while diving on the Paso Del Cedral if anyone is missing one, and can describe it, Ill be happy to send it to them, sorry I left the lead on the boat. Bringing up the extra weight was a mistake, and played havoc with my safety stop since I dive with 10 pounds. I should have known that you shouldnt try and lift more than ten pounds my buddy found 2 masks, but gave them to the dive boat.
The wreck dive was great; we saw the engine room, and the heads, while doing our multilevel dive. It was nice to see the ship with more coral growth than the previous three penetrations. Devils throat was a great dive with little current and the divemaster said it was ok to go a little deeper when we came out at 125 feet, I wanted to test the alarm I had set for a max depth of 130 on my Suunto Viper. Geiser said it was ok if I descended to 140 feet. The computer really beeps a lot while descending below the max limit but still had 2 minutes left of no decompression time so headed back up to the second swim through with the sponge cross. We saw a big eagle ray below us when we came out. Along with a couple of turtles, two decent size barracuda on top of a coral head. The last dive was Las Palmas were we saw two sleeping sharks and one 6 or 7 foot nurse shark swimming around we cut the 24 hour no fly time very close, since our plane left at 12:30 the next day, glad it took a few extra minutes to get all the passengers loaded.
Ran into Greg, DiverG and his girlfriend Gradia at the El Moro restaurant on our last evening. For those of you that want to hear about the hotel I cant compare it to the Pres Allegro or the occidental. The rooms are clean, no TV, or telephone or even pictures on the walls. They do have a mini fridge in the room that keeps the beer cold and the air conditioning works. Enjoyed the hammocks in the evening while watching the thunder and lighting across on the mainland.
The food is great at SCC, they do charge for all drinks in the bar except for water. About 2 dollars for sodas and icetea and about 5 dollars for margaritas, and an 8 dollar corkage fee. This was my 4th time to Cozumel and I still havent seen the other side of the island or seen the ruins. The weather we had was outstanding, I expected it to be much hotter and humid in the middle of July, however afternoon and evening rain showers kept everything cool.
Next time I would like to go down and dive with Christi after hearing all the great things, but would not hesitate to dive stay and dive with Scuba Club Cozumel again.
DateTime Dive Site Max Depth DiveTime
7/10 3:59 PM Scuba Club shoredive 20 127:00
7/11 9:43 AM Palancar Gardens 81 54:40
7/1111:50 AM Paradise Reef 37 71:00
7/12 9:47 AM Columbia Deep 102 52:00
7/12 11:51 AM Tormentos 65 53:00
7/12 3:46 PM Scuba Club shoredive 21 61:00
7/13 9:39 AM Palancar Caves 91 53:20
7/13 11:29 AM Yucab 55 61:00
7/14 9:32 AM Columbia Bricks 85 54:00
7/14 11:37 AM Chancanab 54 55:20
7/14 7:49 PM Paradise [Night Dive] 48 65:20
7/15 9:28 AM Paso Del Cedral 72 57:40
7/1511:35 AM VillaBlanca Wall 56 64:40
7/15 3:28 PM C-53 [Wreck Dive] 78 48:20
7/16 9:52 AM Devils Throat 141 37:20
7/1611:35 AM Las Palmas 67 54:40
