Scuba Diving in the Mexican Riviera

[ayag]

It's my first time on a cruise and so I was planning on using the RCCI offered diving excursion. Just to make things more convenient all around.

 

I'd just like to ask the ff questions and would appreciate it greatly if anyone can help me out.

 

1. What gear should I bring?

2. How are the diving conditions in early October?

 

I only have a little over 30 dives under my belt (yes, I barely qualified) and have been relatively spoiled and pampered by my previous dive masters and the generally calm waters of my usual dive sites. First time diving out of my country as well so I'm not quite sure what to expect.

[Mekamax]

Personally we were disappointed in the water compared to the caribbean. We ended up snorkeling instead and horseback riding on the beach - things I wanted to do but we always dive. We went in early May and then the visability was maybe 30 feet. The caribbean has us spoilt with 100 foot vis. Anyway, the ship tours a lot of times are cattle boats and hold 30 divers and so you are not taken care of or accounted for. We always book with a local dive operator but this is hard as the ship times and the local times are different - as in you arrive at 10am and the first dive left at 9:30am. Anyway, once you are on board ask the pursers desk about the tours - find someone that knows. Ask them how many on the boat and what dive operator they use. Sometimes you can hook up with crew on board that dive. We have gotten sticky regulators and funky BCs before. Mainly I like my own regulator but we rent a lot of times as dragging the equipment is tough and is likely stolen if flying. One big thing is fins. It you don't bring your own they rent you snorkel fins which can be tough in current - we do it anyway just because we hate to lug gear around but on a deep dive you will want good fins and boots to go with them. Of course your own mask and snorkel is a given. If you like a weight belt that is not the traditional bring that. I also bring my own skin all the time as I do not trust not getting anything in the water and they have old shortys not skins. Hope this helps. We snorkeled at Puerto Vallarta at the beach filmed in "Night of the Iguana" with Elizabeth Taylor. You can search and find the beach on the net by the movie - popular. They have water taxies you can rent when you get there to take you out. We took a van there with another couple and rented a water taxi. It was $15 a person for the van for 3 hours. We then were let out in town as it was only $2 per person to get a cab back from there. Cabo was very little vis - maybe 10 feet when we were there - tried to snorkel and saw some divers on the surface where we were snorkeling (out in front of Lovers Beach). We asked them and they said the current was so bad and the vis nonexistant that it wasn't worth diving. That was then and in May though. Hope this helps.... Debbie

[ayag]

Thank you. That was extremely helpful, just a couple of more questions, though. I get the feeling I should decide about it now than on the ship because as you said, I may be lugging my gear around unnecessarily.

 

What do the sites generally have to recommend for themselves? I understand that reef coverage isn't that good. Are there any fauna endemic to the area?

[captainron]

Hi,

Dove in Cozumel while on the EOS last November. Deb, gotta disagree with you on RCCL. We dove with a ship excursion to Playancar & Santa Rosa reefs and only had 8 of us in the dive boat (4 with one divemaster and 4 with another). It worked well as the 4 of us with more experience had the opportunity to go down over the wall and enjoy the drift dive along the wall of the reef (150 ft plus vis). Maybe it was the location.

Agree with you on Cabo. Depending on storms at sea, you can get a wild backwash around Los Arcos and Lovers' Beach. Over at the Solmar and Playa Grande Resorts, there is no water access due to the severity of the riptides. These rips tend to swirl around the rocks at Land's End. Some Cabo operators take you to more secluded spots on the Sea of Cortez side north of SJD at Cabo Pulmo where there are 15 different dive sites from a shallow 20 feet to out on the ref at 110 feet. Some beautiful opportunities to get close up with Mantas and whale sharks (depends on the season).

Two good operators in Cabo are:

 

www.cabopulmodivers.com

and

www.amigosdelmar.com (Ask for Eric)

 

Prices vary between operators and generally don't include gear (USD$65-70 for a 2 tank dive)

 

Manzanillo has several operators that take you off the edge of the bay (90-100 ft) and a shallow wreck dive on an old beached freighter in 35-50 feet of water.

End October on the west coast wraps up the stormy season, so vis may be a little less than usual, but I'd say you'd have at least 40ft in Manzanillo and same in Cabo (away from the Pacific influence).

 

Hope this helps, and...

 

Ciao for now!!!

[stingraynz]

I really enjoyed my dives in the mexican riviera. We did a Xmas cruise in 2002 on Princess. So we were there in Dec - I'm not sure about Oct.

 

We dove both dives with the ship and I would bring my gear for same reasons posted above. I wasn't expecting the caribbean so maybe that was why I wasn't disappointed.

 

We did Cabo and our dive sites were right in front of the incredible 'land's end' formations. We were visited by sea lions at the dive site and saw some sharks. the vis was not great but our ship was only there for the afternoon, so our dive was in the rougher afternoon waters and it was a bit cold on the SI as well as afterwards. But the animals made it worth it.

 

Puerto Vallarta was a pleasant surprise. We went out to the Los Mariettas Islands a national park about an hour boat ride at the edge/mouth of the bay PV is located on. We saw whales on the way there and back and heard their song during our dives - fantastic! Our DM took us into caves and we saw sea horses and lots of puffer fish puffed up. We also had the most model beautiful dive instructors from Argentina that were our guides and they even washed all our gear while we had drinks on the way back (but that is just an aside!).

 

All in all two great diving ports. Enjoy

[becca23]

Any more info for a beginnig diver/snorkeler leaving San Diego on "Mercury''

10/31/05 for an11 day to the Mexican Riveria...

Puerto Vallarta

Acaulco

Mazatlan-Randi's horse ride

Cabo

Ixtapa/Zihuatanejo

Manzanillo

[LVMarc]

what operator in PV??? sounds great..

 

email to LVMarc@att.net please

 

Marc

[LVMarc]

becca do the book work and pool work before you dive in mexico,, then just book dive thriught the boat or locally... sam eocean thoruh tghe baot cost a wee bit more..

Marc