Hi there! My friend and I will be in Cabo Pulmo from Sunday, 2/26-Friday 3/2. While we're there, I'm hoping to dive as much as is possible? I'd love to hear any experiences diving in Cabo Pulmo - conditions, sealife, etc., - especially this time of year!
Thanks so much!
Sarah
My husband and I were in Cabo Pulmo with the intentions of diving for 1 week in mid July, 2011. In retrospect, it was not the best time to go...as the visibility was not very good at that time of year and the diving shut down for 2 days because of a hurricane further southwest of Cabo San Lucas.
Anyway- here is what I can tell you about Cabo Pulmo and the diving there. Getting to Cabo Pulmo is very difficult to do without a car - so renting a car in Cabo San Lucas is best and most affordable.
Cabo Pulmo is a tiny village, and the diving is limited to 2 dive shops (at least when we were there last summer, that is all that we could find). We went with Cabo Pulmo beach resort dive shop. They were excellent - the divemasters were very experienced, safe, knowledgable, and thorough. The equipment was also very good. The BCDs were in good shape and they had many sizes. The regulators were excellent quality and well maintained. They also had a variety of sizes of wetsuits and they were also good quality, not ripped or falling apart. My husband and I brought out own masks.
There were 8 divers in total in our group. We dove 2 dive sites before we had to head in because the sea was so rough and the visibility was terrible. We did not see very much in the way of underwater life - but I think much of that had to do with the poor sea conditions, and the time of year (the migrations of whales etc had been a few months earlier).
My husband is a very experienced diver (500 dives) and I am not as experienced (100 dives). My expectations were high as we had been diving in the Red Sea, Borneo, and Mozambique and were looking forward to huge biodiversity in Cabo Pulmo. After speaking with the dive instructors, they said that the diving is good, but not as good as in Asia or in the Red Sea. If you get good visibility, then it will certainly be great!
We were the only people in the dive group who were staying in Cabo Pulmo. The others came up for the day from Cabo San Lucas with a dive package that they had arranged with their hotels in Cabo San Lucas.
There was not much in the way of food in Cabo Pulmo - there was a very small grocery store which had some dried goods, bananas, tomatoes, onions and potatoes. The restaurant at the bungalos/beach resort was excellent - but expensive. You can bring food in from the closest town that has a good grocery store. The bungalows have refrigerators and stove tops in the rooms. It cost us approx. $90.00 USD/night without air conditioning. The place runs on solar power, so air conditioned rooms only have the air conditioning available during the day (there is not enough power to run them at night, but there is enough to run a fan).
I hope this gives you some information about Cabo Pulmo. We did not know very much about it at all before we went, and found that it was hard to get any reliable information. I would try diving there again, but not in the summer!!
Wow! Thank you so much for your reponse! I have been having similar difficulty finding information and have also heard that the conditions can be variable there - I've got my fingers crossed for good weather, and will incorporate the information you've offered into our plans! Thanks so much!
Sarah
Hi Sarah,
No problem! I hope that it helped to give you a bit more information than is available in travel guides etc. I will look for the email address of the couple who were divemasters at cabo pulmo beach resort while we were there - they were an Irish couple and were excellent divers and a great source of information. If I can find their email address, I will send it your way.
We found that there was not enough to see diving to keep us occupied for a week - so afte a few days we ended up booking a condo on the VRBO website for half the price of staying in Cabo Pulmo and based ourselves out of Cabo San Lucas and traveled around from there.
This is kind of an aside - but the road in to Cabo Pulmo is really rough - it was paved for the first bit and then was maybe 50 km of rough gravel road where we could only go about 20 - 30 km/hour in some spots. It is really beautiful there - it is well worth the trip in - but be prepared for rough road.
We also did some kayaking and snorkeling in La Paz (we wanted to try out the snorkeling before booking in to an expensive diving trip to check out their equipment b/c the places where you can book the diving are just store fronts - you have to go out to their dive storage place to see the equipment). We were not impressed with their equipment up in La Paz - or the service - we went through a company that came well recommended in the LP guidebook - but it was good to have checked it out. They promissed us a variety of things that never materialized - but it was the low season so maybe that had something to do with it.
Good luck on your trip, I am sure that you will have a great time!
Trina
If you rent a car and drive to Cabo Pulmo the insurance you purchased is worthless because it is a dirt road. Not a bad road and a nice drive, but this is a risk.
A cab will cost more.
The local dive shops all have boats running out there for less than a taxi.
On second thought, I recommend that you book with a La Paz dive shop and stay there. On your second trip then become more adventurous, Mexico isn't like you expect, it is better and worse.
Cabo San Lucas has limited diving and La Paz is on the edge of all of the better spots and is almost as close to Cabo Pulmo.
In Cabo I use Eagle Divers.
On your third trip try Rancho Leonaro.