Scuba Diving with Eagle Ray Divers I read countless positive posts on the great service provided with Eagle Ray Divers so we booked our day in Cozumel with them. They are so many dive ops to choose from in Coz that this would be an example where we would not book with the ship. I contacted Chellie at Eagle Ray and we organized a day where Lisa and I could dive and Paula could snorkel. This way we could all go together and Paula can see where she needs to get certified, because diving is so much better than snorkeling. Unfortunately, Chellie did not prove this point that well since Paula was the only snorkeler and she had the most beautiful model-esque snorkel guide all to herself! After meeting Oscar on the boat I wanted to snorkel too! That day I’m not sure if the true beauty of Cozumel was under the water or above the water. Our first dive was a wall dive at the Palancar Caves. We went to a max depth for a few minutes at 102 feet to see this huge eagle ray that gliding below us. Then most of the dive was about 85-90 feet for 44 minutes. We went through some amazing ‘caves’ (more like swim-thrus). This was probably the best dive site I have been to for both animals and topography. It was like a playground (jungle gym) for divers. We went through many caverns and beside seeing the eagle ray, we saw lobster, crabs, banded coral shrimp, hawkesbill turtle and a lot of grouper. Fantastic! The second dive Las Palmas was 60 feet for 50 minutes, excellent dive over a sandy bottom spotted with patches of coral. Excellent, excellent!! So many animals. We saw five really cool toadfish that are endemic to Cozumel. We saw jewfish, huge anemones, small nudibranchs, big anglefish, trunkfish & really colorful coral. We saw one eel that was out and swimming along the reef, Benjamin couldn’t resist picking it up. We saw almost everything on the fish identification card! Our boat was the ‘estrelle del mar’ (star of the sea) is was very charming and comfortable. It looked like a converted fishing boat, it had plenty of room for all our stuff and to lounge around. We had a full boat that day and it was busy. I read some posts about Coz diving not being that good anymore. Well I don’t know what it used to be like but I will put it at the top of my list (tied with Bora Bora) and that is a tough act to be compared to. Chellie was a pleasure to deal with and they offer snorkel trips (you may luck out and get Oscar) and discover scuba. They would be a great bunch to do your first dives with. The other boat they had was doing discover scuba that day and we spoke with a guy who has been ‘discovering’ scuba with them about 6 times. www.EagleRayDivers.com Chellie and Antonio Castellanos chellie@eagleraydivers.com or antonio@eagleraydivers.com 011-52-987-872-5735 phone/fax The other ships is port were as follows: Carnival Miracle, Navigator Of The Seas, Grand Princess Splendour Of The Seas were docked four beside each other at the International Pier (newer one) Voyageur Of The Seas was there but I can’t remember if it was at anchor or not. The Veendam, Sea Dream II and us (NCL Sun) were at the Punta Langosta Pier the Carnival Sensation was at anchor next to us. The Punta langosta Pier was very close to downtown. This pier had a big pavilion offering tons of shops, Senor Frogs, Carlos ‘n Charlies, it seemed after our day on the turquoise sea we only had time to go to the shops near the pier. As it turned out, that is all we needed. We usually go get everything at Cinco Soles they have everything we need and it is very conveniently displayed. It may be more expensive but I never find anything really over priced. My favorite purchase was a silver chain with a scuba diver pendant.