Trip Report - October Diving with Aldora

Please register or login

Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.

Benefits of registering include

  • Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
  • A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
  • You can make this box go away

Joining is quick and easy. Log in or Register now!

KC Diver

Registered
Messages
10
Reaction score
12
Location
Kansas City
# of dives
100 - 199
Three dive buddies and I take an annual trip to Cozumel, typically in October. This year, we arrived in Coz on October 5th, and flew back home on the 12th. This gave us a solid 6 days of diving, five of which were spent with Aldora. The sixth day was some cenote dives on the mainland. The full week was the longest trip we have taken as a group, usually we only dive Sunday through Wednesday, and fly home Thursday. I am extremely pleased that we opted for the longer trip this year.
We have been using Aldora as our dive op for the last 5 annual trips, and they were great, as usual. I haven't reviewed Aldora before, and probably wouldn't have this year, even though it was great. However, there was one particular difference that made me want to post here.
Many folks deride this dive op for "forcing" all of the divers to surface together, and I will admit that at times my buddies and I have been victims of being grouped with some air hogs that reduced our bottom time. This year was different, and the primary reason was our DM, Rich. Rich is one of the most enthusiastic DMs I have ever had the pleasure of diving with, and his enthusiasm for long dives, along with some great additions to our dive group, gave us the longest bottom times I have experienced in Coz.
We began our diving on Sunday, the last day to dive the southern reefs before closure. The four of us were teamed up with another couple on Sunday. We began in Columbia, and after the typical relaxed SI, followed it up with Palancar Bricks. Columbia was a max depth of 92 ft, and total time of 79 minutes. Palancar Bricks had a max depth of 84 ft, with a total time of 85 minutes. Not super long dives, but that was only the beginning!
Monday, one of our group was feeling a little under the weather, and that left only three of us diving with Rich. Since the southern reefs were closed, we hit Santa Rosa wall. That dive was 85 minutes with a max depth of only 84 ft, and I believe we did 4 different swim throughs there. Our second dive was the best of the week. We started that dive at Dalila, and stayed under all the way through La Francesa. Our total time, including safety stop, was exactly 2 hours. We spent the entire time on the reefs, and Rich was great about finding interesting things, both small and large. It was the BEST dive I have ever had in Cozumel, including Maracaibo and Punta Sur.
Tuesday we were with Sharif, and diving with him was great as well. We started on the wall, as close to Palancar as the patrol boats would let us get, and spent 105 minutes drifting to the north, with a max depth right at 100 ft. Our second dive that day was Cedral, and we had a bottom time of 111 minutes, mostly shallow, with a max depth of 63 ft.
After some unremarkable cenote dives (I had never done it before, but I guess I prefer the scenery on the reefs), we were with Jorge on Thursday. Jorge seemed to be having an off day, as we have been with him before and he was great. However, on Thursday, he seemed to just drift along in the current, and left us to find our own things to look at along the reef. That was fine with us, we are pretty independent, but it was different than we have experienced before. Still, we enjoyed Paso Del Cedral and our second trip through La Francesa. Cedral was 90 minutes and La Francesa was 106 minutes at 96 ft and 63 ft respectively.
Friday we were back with Rich for our final day of diving. We again started as close to Palancar and they would let us get (we were buzzed by the patrol boat), and dropped in. After heading down to 95 ft, we had a relaxing and beautiful dive along the wall. 112 minutes later, we climbed back on the boat. After a surface interval on the beach, we hit the shallow side of Santa Rosa for our final dive, a 70 ft max depth with bottom time of 111 minutes.
I know I have focused mainly on the bottom time here, but that was the key for us. We are all pretty good with air consumption, and occasionally feel stifled by the other divers with us. This trip, however, was different, and the biggest part of that was Rich. If you haven't used him at Aldora, try him out. I don't think you will regret it. In all, according to my computer, we did 10 dives in Coz with a total time of 16 hours and 43 minutes. That averages out to 110 minutes per dive!
On the reef itself, it is sad to see the damage the disease is causing. I think we only saw one brain coral that wasn't infected on the ten dives we did. Also, there seems to be fewer sharks than we have seen in the past, and the reef sharks that were plentiful 7 years ago were pretty much non-existent. I also was able to get the best Toadfish picture I have been able to capture
G0278486 (2).JPG
on this trip. I have attached it here. I have seen others who have better pictures, but this was the best I have had the good fortune to take.
Thank you to Aldora, Rich, Sharif, and Jorge for such a great trip. We will be back again soon!
 
We did a rental house south of town in Costa Del Sol. It is a 4BR house right on the water for $300 a night. Divided over 4 people, it isn't that expensive. It is a great house, and this is the 5th year in a row we have stayed there for our annual dive trip. I found it on VRBO back in 2015, and we will likely always stay there for our trips. Since it is far south (just a little North of Secrets), it is a haul to head back in for meals, but a stop at Mega to stock up on food makes that only a once or twice a week trip to hit some of the great food in Cozumel.
The best part of the house is that the boat ride to the dive sites is relatively short. There is a pier a few steps away from the house, and we would walk down to it each morning around 8am when we saw the Aldora boat pulling in. I highly recommend Casa Calypso for dive groups of 4 or more. Here is a link to it on VRBO. Oceanfront Beach House, Great Views, Close to Dive Sites! - Cozumel
One thing I forgot to mention was that we never went to the Aldora shop. Filled out the paperwork here ahead of time and emailed it to them. Gave them the sizes for the 2 people who needed rental gear via email as well. The other diver and I carried our gear to the boat on the first day. I paid for the dives on our last day during the surface interval on the beach. Fortunately I had enough cash left to get the discount when I paid Denise, but the other guys just called her later with credit card numbers to pay for their diving. That was also very convenient, and much appreciated.
 
Good to hear how well that worked out for your group. Might also be really nice for a family.

The relatively isolated location would be an issue, though.
 

Back
Top Bottom