Cozumel: Hacienda San Miguel and Deep Blue
NOTE: Originally posted on Scubadiving.com’s website 11/01
I needed to get away and the recent specials being offered by the airlines screamed, do it! Do it! So I did a little research on Scubadiving.com and after reading trip report after trip report on how great the diving is in Cozumel I decided to bust my cherry and give it a try.
Despite the beefed up security, I got to Coz without incident and here is my story:
The Lodging: Hacienda San Miguel
HSM is at the far north end of the main strip. It’s far enough away from the main plaza that you aren’t kept awake at night by rowdy drunk tourists trying to find Carlos and Charlies but it is close enough so that you’re a 10 minute walk from most everything. Note: Give the cab driver the street address if you’re staying at HSM (10 Calle Norte #500) otherwise you may end up being dropped off at Hotel San Miguel overlooking the plaza. Not a bad hotel (from what I could tell from the lobby), but it’s not the same place.
As I was on this trip alone and planned on diving most of the time, I booked the studio room (The Girasol Suite). When I arrived, Nicole greeted me with a “You must be Bill” which somewhat shocked me as I’m used to having to spell my last name out 3 or 4 times before my reservations can be found. The room was very nice. A kitchenette, tv, and just about everything else you might expect in a hotel room . . . except for a telephone, which seemed strange but there was a pay phone in the courtyard so I guess that makes it ok. Besides, I’m not going to Coz to receive phone calls.
I have to say that while the rooms are inexpensive (compared to other rooms in Coz), they are not cheap. Cheap would imply that you are making some sort of sacrafice in quality and I did not find that to be the case at HSM. It’s not a resort. There are no olympic sized swimming pools (actually there are no swimming pools). There is no 24/7 room service. What there is, is very personal and friendly service. In fact, HSM feels more like a B&B or a small condo community than it does a hotel. I mean, how much personal service can you get than when they bring by your breakfast (juice, coffee, and Mexican pastries) based on what time in the morning they see the lights going on in your room?
If you can’t tell by now, I loved the place. I’ve stayed in hotels in London and Paris at 10x the cost and received rooms 1/2 the size and nowhere near the personality of HSM. I highly recommend HSM for anyone who is looking for something different. Nicole and Angela make HSM like staying in at a friend’s house.
Diving: Deep Blue
I based my decision to dive with Deep Blue on two things:
1) A review on Scubadiving.com and misc positive comments.
2) The friendly and prompt replies by Debbie the co-owner.
After checking into HSM, I walked down to Deep Blue to check in with them. Again, instead of the typical “Who are you?” reception, Debbie’s husband (and co-owner) Matt almost jumped around the desk and said, “Ah, you must be Bill”. I filled out the disclaimers and such and Matt explained how Deep Blue works. Tell them where you want to go and they try to get you there. The dive sites are picked each evening based on the input of the divers who will be on the boat and there’s almost no site they won’t go to if the divers want to go there. I told Matt I was a drift diving virgin and wanted to do an easy checkout dive before anything heavy and so he booked me on a trip going out to Palancar the next morning.
We dived with DM Raul, who was simply an excellent DM. You could tell he had spent a lot of time doing OW courses just by his briefings and his emphasis on safety. That was fine. In fact it was great and spoke a great deal about Deep Blue.
Matt asked me where I wanted to go the next day and I told him I would leave it in his hands since I didn’t know jack about the Coz sites. When I arrived the next morning, Debbie told me that we were going to Maricaibo. The DM was Pepe and he was perfect for the advanced divers on this trip. Very professional and treated everyone like divers with a few dives under their belt. Excellent dive and had a great time.
The next day, we were told we were going to Baraccuda Reef. The DM was Pepe again and the other divers were mostly the same bunch as the day before. A wind had come out of the north and the sea wasn’t just rough, it got downright hostile. Pepe had us take a vote, try to go on to Baraccuda or give Punta Sur a try. It was a fairly quick vote, we decided to go to Punta Sur. Again, I didn’t know a whole lot about the dive sites and when Pepe gave the briefing, I decided to opt out of the dive. With a 120 fsw profile (in an overhead environment), and reservations on a flight to the Mayan ruins at Chichen Itza early the next morning it didn’t seem like the right way to go. Pepe respected my decision but said that he really, really, really recommended this dive. He said the Devil’s Throat was a dive worth doing. Pepe hadn’t steered me wrong so far and I’m fairly confident that Chichen Itza will be there the next time I go to Mexico so I took Pepe’s advice and did it. Man! Was that the right decision! One of the most spectacular dives of my life!
When I went back to Deep Blue that evening to settle my bill, Matt and I ended up chatting for quite a bit. When I finally got ready to leave, Debbie came out, wished me goodbye and gave me a hug.
All I can say is that both the dive op and the hotel were exceptional and I cannot give them enough praise. Both earned my respect and my future business.
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