What happened to Cozumel?

[NickinColorado]

We first dove Cozumel in 2008 and it was one of our first destination dive trips. I remember the reefs teeming with life. It was either that trip or a subsequent one that we found BlueXTsea and Pedro and looked forward to visiting them as frequently as we could. Fast forward to having kids and moving to a state that isn’t known for its diving and time got away from us. The majority of diving I’ve done in the last 10 years has been of the PSD variety with only two trips down here in the last 12 years with the next most recent being 5 years ago. We planned our current trip about 6 months ago with grandparents along for the ride as babysitters. hearing that Pedro retired we went looking for a new dive shop. I’m not here to badmouth them so they won’t be named but after reading great reviews both here and other places we went with someone that advertised small boats that had been in operation for a long time.

This was also our first time diving jacket BCD’s… in forever. We traded out the majority of our personal gear for a travel crib in order to keep the airlines happy with baggage weight. The first day of diving went fine enough- my BCD inflator was broken and the DM swapped me his setup. It was 2 sizes too big but not really a big deal. The bigger issue was the boat not having a gas analyzer. We were diving 32%. My wife’s computer failed on our second dive of the day and she requested a rental computer for the next day of diving. I might have higher standards than most but I don’t think it’s out of line. None of the other divers requested to check their tanks of course.

The boat was to pick us up at 7:40 and by 8am there was no boat and no text. I texted the dive shop and they said they would be there at 8:15. At 8:45 we left the pier and started to head back to our room to put our gear away. We were halfway across the beach when we saw our boat pulling up to the dock. We got on the boat in an attempt to salvage our morning. No analyzer, no dive computer. Thats a pretty big problem. Definitely not up to any GUE standards and the “expert halo” alarms were going off in my head.

The dive sites they chose were largely devoid of life other than seeing a dolphin (super cool!). We were on the boat with two other divers that turned out to be brand new. At one point I held a GUE tech 1 cert and have well over 500 dives. I try and maintain that same standard on all of my dives although diving with a long hose setup and a jacket BCD was pretty goofy.

We voiced our concern and cancelled the next day of diving. I was told they would not charge me for a late cancellation and then sent me 3 different invoices before seemingly getting it right.

Aside from the dive operation and dive sites being lackluster so was our resort. We stayed at Allegro- there were people having sex in the hot tub at 4pm and the food (other than the Asian) was terrible.

Someone please tell me Bonaire hasn’t suffered this same fate? That’s our plan next winter and it’ll have been 15 years since our last visit.

Also, I used to be a super active member here in the DIR forum but can’t remember my log-in. We’re hoping to get back into travel diving now that we no longer have the Great Lakes in our backyard so hopefully I will be sticking around and not just making this one post-and-ghost.

 

[LI-er]

Most reefs have suffered from catastrophic devastation over the past 2 decades, and pretty much all destinations in Mexico and the Caribbean have suffered the same fate.

I returned to Cozumel in 2017 after first diving there in 2005 and I too was shocked to see reefs that were originally teaming with life to be dark walls covered in silt and devoid of life which reminded me of post apocalyptic movies, only this was real life. A recent visit to Bonaire and Roatan resulted in the same experience. Not only was it not fun or enjoyable it was in fact rather depressing.

I see no point in returning to any of those formerly pristine dive destinations and have focused my efforts and funds in areas on the other side of the globe, concentrating more on wrecks which are always interesting even if there isn't much marine life on them.

All areas of the globe show damage but not like the areas you're describing which are simply not worth it anymore.

As far as your experience with the dive operator and the gear issues, that's a bit extreme but not at all surprising.

You spoke of your bad experience at the hotel which you named but you won't name the dive op that you had all those problems with, that's weird.

 

[NickinColorado]

Most reefs have suffered from catastrophic devastation over the past 2 decades, and pretty much all destinations in Mexico and the Caribbean have suffered the same fate.

I returned to Cozumel in 2017 after first diving there in 2005 and I too was shocked to see reefs that were originally teaming with life to be dark walls covered in silt and devoid of life which reminded me of post apocalyptic movies, only this was real life. A recent visit to Bonaire and Roatan resulted in the same experience. Not only was it not fun or enjoyable it was in fact rather depressing.

I see no point in returning to any of those formerly pristine dive destinations and have focused my efforts and funds in areas on the other side of the globe, concentrating more on wrecks which are always interesting even if there isn't much marine life on them.

All areas of the globe show damage but not like the areas you're describing which are simply not worth it anymore.

As far as your experience with the dive operator and the gear issues, that's a bit extreme but not at all surprising.

You spoke of your bad experience at the hotel which you named but you won't name the dive op that you had all those problems with, that's weird.

That’s a bummer to hear! I guess my thought was a dive op is a much smaller operation than a large resort.

 

[ggunn]

FWIW, I have been diving Cozumel for 30 years and I will be back there in April. There have been changes, sure, and some are not for the better, but I still enjoy diving there very much. YMMV

 

[Shawn C]

About the only thing I'd say about Allegro is that it's a cheap AI on the island. There's plenty of better options available, budget permitting.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

This is the kind of stuff I find very useful.
Most of the time when I read about Cozumel it's some fanboi gushing about how great it is.
I really thought it should be a bucket list place to dive.
But I'm not going to take the time and pay the money to look at bare rock and coral ash.
Thank you for being honest.
When I get a chance to travel to dive someday I think based on what I'm reading, Cozumel is off the list.

 

[Shawn C]

That would be a shame becasue Cozumel is a long ways off being bare rock and coral ash. Now, where I dove in Cuba... That description definitely fits.

 

[AdivingBel]

Lol…I find it to be a disturbing trend that folks seem to make rash decisions based on extreme postings on the internet. All IMHO, YMMV.

 

[ggunn]

This is the kind of stuff I find very useful.
Most of the time when I read about Cozumel it's some fanboi gushing about how great it is.
I really thought it should be a bucket list place to dive.
But I'm not going to take the time and pay the money to look at bare rock and coral ash.
Thank you for being honest.
When I get a chance to travel to dive someday I think based on what I'm reading, Cozumel is off the list.

One person's honesty is another's pessimism. Reefs all over the world are in decline because of rising ocean temperatures, and Cozumel is no exception, but saying that is nothing but "bare rock and coral ash" is an extreme exaggeration. There are tons of photos on this forum you can look at to make your own judgement.

 

[rick00001967]

i did not have time to read the responses yet.....but aside from agreeing the diving is not always what people make it out to be, i must say that i cannot believe anyone who has even the most basic nitrox training (let alone any type of tech training) would ever dive nitrox without personally seeing the results of an analyzer test.
did your wife dive without a computer? no depth gauge? no tables? etc etc so you shared your computer? pls let me know if i misunderstood.
whoever that dive shop is should be named and avoided at all costs based on what you have written. again, pls let me know if i have misunderstood something here.