Chankanaab Snuba Diving: Cozumel Mexico
Today, we are going back to CHANKANAAB to go Snuba Diving!
I did try to google video's or pictures of the Snuba there and I wasn't really sure that there was much to see. I did see picture's around the statues and I figured that was a great opportunity to see them up close. Good enough for me.
I booked using ShoreExcursioneer online. The total price for the Snuba would be $164.97. They required a $49.47 deposit at the time of booking. This did NOT include the price of admission to the park. Our excursion was for 10am. I figured we'd do this early enough to have the rest of the day to spend in the park. Perfecto!
Once we arrived we headed up to a worker to tell him we were there for a booked swim and I showed him my paperwork. They said they would go get someone. We sat at the entrance for a little bit waiting on someone to return.
Someone came to get us and they had wrist bands for us to put on. Then in we went.
He led us to the area they do the swims. It was located by the "family" area beach, which is an easy entrance beach to a cove like swimming area.
We paid our balance and they told us we could just hang out for awhile or look around. So, we decided to go on a little self-guided tour toward the replica ruins and the swim areas and then we returned to the Snuba booth.
It was time to gear up and get this party started!!!
We headed right over to the family beach and it was time to head in after our instructor went over the instructions of Snuba diving. Now this family beach is easy entrance, so good for little ones. However, it is a bit rocky and ouchie on the feet so beware. There's an area that you go up and over the rock and then it gets deeper and out into the ocean area.
Off we went. I had the GoPro and Sakari had the camera.
I immediately was having problems. I could go down and kept floating back up. The instructor came over and gave me some more weights. All better now.
One of the first things we saw was a pile of rocks that had a bunch of anemone's in it. There were a lot of them.
We spotted a few Four-eyed Butterfly Fish
We came up to the dolphin area and we could see the pens. We were able to stop for awhile and watch them. They were very curious about us as well.
First there was one curious dolphin. Then there were two curious dolphins.
Before long we had three curious dolphins starring at us.
There were tons of fish everywhere hanging out below the deck and some very large Horse Eye Jacks
Our instructor made a motion to take our camera and take a few pictures of us. He took two pictures of us and then started cutting us out of the picture and only taking them of Sakari. LOL
We found a rather large crab.
And then we were handed an arrow crab
I started having issues again and started sinking. I was kicking and kicking the entire time we were diving and my leg was giving out. So, I gave up and just sank so he'd fix the issue. So the instructor came over and removed some weights and everything was better again. This time correct.
We went out and around the rocks dividing the "family beach" from the snorkeling area but there wasn't much to see. We didn't go along the sides and rocks. We didn't go to the statues. We didn't do anything but turn around and come back the way we came. Um....ok. That was weird. There has to be more to it right? Nope, there wasn't. What a disappointment. What happened to the pictures I had seen online that showed Snuba beside the statue's? Chankanaab even shows pictures with the Snuba divers by the statue.
Yep, none of that was done. Did I say how disappointed I was? The best thing was getting to see the dolphins. Sakari didn't take any more pictures...because there wasn't anything to take pictures of. She took all her pictures in the first 9 minutes. All the "pictures" you see from me was taken from the short video I took along the way.
On the way back, we seen a bunch of Ballyhoo Fish hanging out around the pier by the dolphins
They did have us pay an additional amount (for entrance to the park) in the amount of $14 per person I believe. They said it's a lot cheaper than having to pay the full price of the entrance without the swim and they offer it for a reduced price. Well, that's cheaper than using the coupon for $2 off per person that I had brought along with me.
For those not doing a swim and want the discount coupon, you can find it here
Here's a short video of us diving:
Final Thoughts:
As you can probably tell from my rant above, this excursion is NOT worth the money. It didn't go to the statues as advertised on their website (and other pictures around the web showed) and there's really nothing to see down there other than passing by the dolphins. That was the highlight of the trip! If you've never done Snuba before and want to give it a try, it might be worth it to you just to try it. But don't expect to see much...at least if you go where we did and the instructor doesn't take you around to the statues. I wouldn't waste my money on it again myself.