Cozumel Trip and What I Learned on My Vacation

[DanL]

Back from a great trip to Cozumel - "rough" notes:

Sat Feb 1 -
Arrive Coz in PM, check in at Safari Inn at Aqua Safari. Everyone has their Coz favorites, but I like Aqua Safari more each time I go. You'll see why in the notes below.
Safari Inn is $45/night incl tax. No TV, phone, but hot water, very clean, free bottled water in room. Dive shop downstairs and boat across street. Leave equip in dive shop overnight - they have rinse tanks, hangers, etc. VERY convenient!!!

SUN FEB 2
(Note - water T was 77F on every dive all week. Had a 3mil jumpsuit. Warm on dive 1, slightly cool by dive 2. Sounds funny, but next time will take light hood to conserve body heat. One DM wore hood on every dive.)
Dive on Aqua Safari fast boat Belinda. ($60/2 tank dive) Very fast, 600HP, canopy and smooth in water. 5 exp. divers, one DM and capt that stays on boat. Snacks, soda and plenty water on all Aqua Safari boats.
Dive 1 - Columbia Deep. 86ft/37 min
Nurse shark,south. rays, 3ft turtle, great coral arches/swimthru's. Grade:A
Dive 2 - El Cedral. 57ft/48 min
Many juv spotted drum, very large spotted moray, small turtle, 5 large barracuda, HUGE french angel in coral cavern, very large nurse shark and grouper at end of dive. Grade:A

MON FEB 3
Out on Aqua Safari large boat Ocean 4. Taking Deep Dive Specialty with Patricio Aguilar, PADI Master Instructor. 2 full days, 4 dives. Taking course with AS in Coz is a good deal. Boat/dives included, thorough instruction by guys in the water every day, and one on one guide/instructor for all dives. Any way, learned to use the "wheel" for planning multileevl repetitive dives, learned that we should be planning our dives, not hopping in the water based on the computer info.
Dive 1 - 100ft/41 min
Palancar Caves - lg lobsters, purple "neon" color sponges - beautiful. Test of memory at 100 ft. Had to properly ID colors on a toy that I studied at the surface. Colors are different at 100ft. Real challenge! Hmmm... am I narced???
Tough feedback from Patricio - don't underestimate 100ft!
Dive 2 - 65ft/45 min
Tormentos - BIG FAT 6ft green moray free swimming over edge of wall - WOW! Fast north current.
Dove a plan from the PADI wheel. Went into yellow on nitrogen on my computer for first time ever. Compared 4 computers side by side. All agreed to within 3 ft on depth, all same time, but differences in N loading indication. Another interesting learning. Back yourself up with a solid plan on the wheel.

TUES FEB 4
Deep specialty day 2. Big boat Ocean 4.
Dive 1 - Santa Rosa Wall - 121ft/42min
Tables and the Wheel again. Practice.....
Math prob at 121 ft. Hold depth, in current, moving along wall and mult 3 digits by 3 digits - you did bring your slate didn't you?. Slate, oh yeah, let me get it out. Hmmm, not too conveniently located. Oh sh*t, am I too close to the coral on the wall??? D*mn, these columns don't add up....
YES, NARCOSIS DOES reduce capability. Felt fine, thought I was diving fine, breathing fine, but definitely task overloaded.
Thanks, Patricio - humble me.
Surface: Multiplied correctly,but added columns wrong.Duh....
Learning - At 120, felt fine, but as task load increased, really couldn't perform that well. MUST not assume full capability at depth! Must pay attention, do buddy narc checks, etc. Know equipment and be well practiced in all tasks - even simple ones.
Dive 2- Chankanaab - 71ft/36min
Did computer comparisons. Checked computers to see differences in Plan mode output. Very different. Another reason to have a standard: use a multilevel rep dive planner even with computer.
Found a scorpionfish myself - pretty cool - they're hard to find/see.

WED FEB 5
AS fast boat Belinda. 5 divers.
Dive 1 - Dalila - 60ft/48min
Huge king crab, coral caverns, flat sandy with coral heads.
C- dive. Don't buddy with photographers. This guy never looked at me, didn't even check his own guages. Basically a solo diver! I stayed close, but on surface asked "want to dive on your own next dive?" He said yes, dives solo in CA. Great - Thanks for telling me on first dive, dipsh*t.
Dive 2 - Chankanaab Balonnes 60ft/41 min
Average dive - B-. Lots of life, but nothing special seen.
Nice dive, but think I'll try someting else tomorrow.

THURS FEB 6
Diving today with Pascual - highly reco'd by a friend. Feeling like real he-man diver, and want to go see the big eagle rays that I heard were swarming up north at Barracuda reef. Bill, owner of Aqua Safari, said his boats wouldn't go there - too dangerous/high current. Pascual said he would go there.
Show up at Pascual's shop, have to wait for some divers. 6 divers on small boat with Pascual as DM. Have to take 15 min taxi ride from shop to Caleta Marina. Don't get off shore until after 9:30. (Aqua Safari is prompt every day - 8AM for fast boat, 8:30 for big boat - and right across street from shop!)
Learn that we aren't going north to Barracuda because one diver not skilled enough. OK - disappointed, but OK.
Head to southern reefs...
Dive 1 -Palancar Caves - 99ft/37min
Wow! Skilled and aggressive divers. Many swim thrus, caverns at depth. LOTS of life. Pascual catches trigger fish by hand and allows us all to examine it. Not sure if this is a good thing, but amazing to see...
Very fun dive, and chance to do back-roll entries rather than standard giant stride.
Pascual took some divers deep, newer divers stayed shallow with another DM. Coz operators seem generally careful about matching divers to dive difficulty.
Dive 2 - Cedar Pass - 90ft/49 min
RIPPING current. Fifth trip to Coz, feel fairly experienced in current and took 2day drift dive specialty last year, but this was CURRENT. Very uniform northbound, and easy to maneuver, but you really had to know some tricks to stop or move laterally. Great fun, just for the ride!

FRI FEB 7
Planning to dive with Pascual again, today to Cantarel/Barracuda to see th eagle rays that I love.
Show up at shop - no other divers show - trip cancelled. Bummer - this never happened to me at AquaSafari. But Pascual is amazing - gets on phone and finds me a dive to Barracuda. Personally drives me to The Equalizers for the dive. I don't know anything about Equalizers - feel a bit uncomfortable. Pascual says they are OK. Have decent small boat, nice office, O2 and radio on boat, and DM Gerrardo seems very smart, knowledgable.
Dive 1 - Cantarel/Barracuda - 93ft/39min
One DM, 2 divers
Plan - backroll in, head straight down in current, targeting a sandy bowl at 80ft for shelter from current. Swim to 90ft, hang on to dead coral or rock and wait for eagle rays to circle.
What actually happened: DM and I hit 60ft and realize other diver at surface. We planned for this. Resurfaced, regrouped on boat, went back upcurrent and tried again. Perfect placement this time. Find way to 90+ft and hang on. Current is ripping. Suddenly, BIG eagle rays. Saw 7 in all and they came within 10 ft. All we did was hang on and watch. What a great show! Damsel fishes come out of coral head and bump my lenses, nibble my cheeks, lips and ears as I hang in the current and watch eagle rays. Later on in my room I see bloody bite on my ear! Ouch - I'm fishfood!
Dive 2- Las Palmas - GREAT reef. 69ft/51min
2 splendid toad - one I found myself, big octopus on hole, very large grey and french angels everywhere, 6 ft (BIG) blue spotted cornet fish (swam right next to it) large queens, large scrawled cowfish. A++ dive for beautiful, plentiful and diverse fish.

Friday afternoon - diving is over, fly out tomorrow, Sat, at 2PM. Meet up with Patricio. Tell him about the eagle rays at Barracuda. He is not happy. He was my drift diver instructor and just this week my deep diver instructor. Bad judgement, he says. Yes, current was fast and stable northward, but at the island tip you can't count on that. Downcurrents are common there. He is really not happy - asked me what I learned from him. In retrospect, he tried to show me many times in all the lessons he gave me that you can't trust anything in the ocean - currents, computers, your own mental and physical ability at depth. And on my last day, I screwed up. I agree with him. And this is why I am even more sure that Aqua Safari is a great dive operation. They don't go where there is undo risk - even if the eagle rays are spectacular. Their dive profiles are very reasonable, but not stretching the limits (the AS deep profiles I reported above were part of the deep diving course. The normal profiles are less aggressive.) An additional tidbit shared by Patricio - US Navy divers train off of Cozumel. Four were lost off Barracuda and never seen again - assumed taken down by a downcurrent over the wall. The current at Barracuda was about 2 knots the day we dove according to Gerrardo, the DM. Had that been a downcurrent, that would be almost 200ft/minute down - scary. Don't think I'll be diving Barracuda again.
Another learning experience from Coz: On the way back in from morning dives, we passed 4 divers totally alone in the water, probably 1/2 mile off-shore. We came around to check on them - they were separated from their boat. Had no safety sausage or signal, no whistles. We marked the location and went looking for their boat. Found it - from a small dive operation. Small boat, no radio, no elevated platform. Would have been dumb luck if he found his divers. We led him to his divers and all was OK. I will never dive without a whistle, safety sausage and yes, a "useless" snorkel too. If I had to swim to shore, I would really like to have a snorkel.
Sorry if too long, but it was a great trip and I learned a lot.
Dan