Dive Review of
Living Underwater/Hotel Presidente InterContinental in
Cozumel and the Mexican Yucatan

Grand Cayman, Turks and Caicos, Roatan, Bonaire

Dive Conditions

[None]  

Overall Rating

My partner and I recently escaped to Cozumel for five days of diving.
Between the two of us, we've logged over 600 dives, including shore dives,
boat dives, and live-aboards. We both agreed that the Living Underwater
dive operation provided service that is second to none.

We contacted Living Underwater in advance, and arranged to have them pick
us up at our hotel's dock. Jeremy (owner) and his team, Gustavo (dive
master) and Francisco (captain), arrived five minutes early and greeted us
with big smiles. We passed our gear aboard, and never touched most of it
again until it was time to get in the water. The crew stowed our dry gear
in overhead cargo nets, placed fins, booties and wet suits under our seats,
connected our BC's and regulators to fresh tanks, and added appropriate
weights to our BC pockets.

As we were nearing the dive site, we put on our wet suits and fins. After a
concise dive briefing from the DM (Jeremy on the first day, Gustavo for
days 2-4), Francisco helped each of us into our BC, lifting the heavy steel
tank up onto the seat and holding open the straps of the BC. When everyone
was geared up, we just moved from the seat up onto the gunwale, and on the
count of three did a backwards roll into the warm water.

The actual dives were a lot of fun. Both Jeremy and Gustavo like to take
their time, patiently coaxing toadfish out of their holes, pointing out
tiny pike blennies and pipe horses, and still keeping a keen eye out for
turtles, rays, lobsters, eels and sharks -- all of which we saw on a
regular basis. The French and Queen Angelfish were amazing - some of the
biggest I've ever seen. There are also a number of intriguing coral
formations which include tall pinnacles and easy swim-throughs. And all of
this is made more interesting by the ever-present current, which whisks you
along your dive route with very little swimming effort unless you want to
stop to look at something.

After a dive which typically lasted 55-75 minutes, we surfaced with the
dive master. In most cases, the boat was waiting less than 50 yards away,
and never did we have an issue with not being picked up very quickly.
Following Jeremy's instructions, we slipped out of our BC's while still in
the water next to the boat. While Francisco pulled our heavy gear aboard,
we were free to remove our fins and climb the aluminum ladder relatively
unencumbered. As soon as we were aboard and had our wet suits unzipped,
someone was always waiting to put a warm dry towel around our shoulders.
Fleece-lined dive parkas were offered regularly as well. And once all the
guests were situated, the crew brought out fresh fruit, cookies, cold
water, and soda. While we munched away the surface interval, they switched
our gear to fresh tanks in preparation for the second dive.

At the end of each day, we left almost all of our gear on board the boat.
The Living Underwater team rinsed everything out and hung it up to dry
overnight, so that when we got on board the next morning everything was
ready to go again. Truly amazing service... I can't think of a single thing
they could have done better! 

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