Live from Cancun Cave Scuba Diving

[Rusty Heap]

Cancun

Riv Maya

an hour south of cancun is a small sleepy town of Akumal.

Awesome Cave Scuba Diving..........jaw dropping.........totally different than any reef or salt water dive


A sample of the 240 photos I shot today with a new 165 degree fish eye lens in 200 foot viz fresh water cave dives. Lighting is damn hard in the caves, strobes are key.

Stunning stone structure from 14-70 million years ago when they were dry forming the structure. Now you dive them for an hour and the cave systems go on for miles and miles.

way frigging WAY cool.

you only live once, this is special. Not many people see this. more to follow

[look 171]

When I was in there 6 years ago, I kept wondering how did those little fishes get there?

[Laneco]

Our last trip down there, I stumbled across a reference to cave diving and snorkeling in the cenotes (open to the sky spot of the under ground river cave system). Had to try it! So Steve, the kids and I hired a local guide Eddie (Ed-Ventures!) to take us around. Eddie and his wife, who if I recall correctly was actually from Wyoming, took us to three cenotes to snorkel.

We went to Dos Ojos, Carwash and a third one that was on a jacinto - don't recall the name of that one. The water is so clear that you lose perspective. When you are snorkeling, and you see an object below you, maybe it appears to be 6 or 8 feet down. Big breath and dive, dive, dive, ears pop, lungs tighten and you are no where near it! Its probably 30 or 40 feet down!

After snorkeling in them, I'm pretty sure that I wouldn't scuba dive them. I've only done one scuba dive, but I would definately be weirded out getting into the cave itself where there was no airspace above the water.

This is an absolutely unreal experience. It is like being transported to another planet.

angela

[charleskieffner]

what kind of camera? we want more pics of that. wayyyyyy cool

[Moses]

I dove cenotes in the Yucatan. Bizarre! The dive master had an enormous spool of twine to help us find our way out if we had a problem. Other than the remarkable water clarity I remember the haloclines. The salt water is at the bottom and it's crystal clear. There is fresh water at the top and it's clear as well. If you swim where the two waters meet, there is a strange visual swirl. Really strange.

Extremely dangerous diving, by the way. You can't just ascend if there's a problem. It's a technical half hour swim to the surface.

[Moses]

You can sort of see the halocline below;

[charleskieffner]

great pics. 99.99999% of peoples never have a clue of the unta-wata vizuals us divers get to see and experience.

any SURGE inside of these fresh/salt water caves? ie where fresh and salt water meets is there any extensive water movement to be wary of? ie. high tides/lowtides?

kona caves were stunning beautiful but dangerous as hell as well, because of the dreaded and has been fatal, KONA SURGE. and i have been nailed by it and i thought i was in a washing machine and i was gonna buy the farm.


my younger son just completed his basic dive certs and has his open water dive this coming weekend. we are now a complete family of divers.

[Moses]

Never heard of a tidal surge in a cenote, but it has to happen. A cenote may travel more than 100 miles to it's opening in the ocean. I started my cenote dive in an inland forest in the Yucatan. A small freshwater pond in the middle of the jungle miles from the coast. Bizarre!

One danger is the silt at the bottom. You have to be very disciplined. If you stir up the silt you can have a complete blackout. You cannot see and cannot tell up from down. Good luck finding that bit of twine that leads to out under those conditions!

[Don Plumley]

We did some snorkling in the Yucatan cenotes as well. Amazing.

At one point I drifted to the left, instead of directly following my kid. I ended getting caught under the top of the cave. Let me tell you, that was a tense few seconds. After the initial panic (let's say 3 seconds, felt like a minute) subsided and I got back in control, I started to touch the top and pull myself back to the center. Fortunately, the guide company has an extra guy whose sole purpose is to save the lives of the dumb touristas. So he hauled me back into the center so I could breathe again.

I've done a little scuba in the Caribbean, I don't have the cojones to contemplate cave diving.


BTW - plug for an amazing tour company: Alltournative Adventures. Very sustainable, employ locals and encourage them to build businesses, such that their family members that once were in El Norte, are returning home. In the Rivera Maya, they use Unimogs on some of the tours - very cool! I *hate* organized tours. With this group, I'd consider choosing a destination based on where they were locatedl.

[Rusty Heap]

More pictures to share, as THIS IS A WAY COOL experience..........like visiting mars, only closer.


Scuba diving beats snorkling any day, even in the salt water. You're so much more relaxed and don't get beaten up by wind/waves/choking/sun/surf/choking, with Scuba you just breathe so easily.......it's WONDERFUL, even 30 minutes of swim time back into a cave! Who needs an airpocket over head.....


Camera gear? (I hate that saying "what kind of camera do you have") like it's the sole single device that captures the moment..... There is a person behind the lens that is 80% of what makes a photographer different than a picture taker, but I degress.

I shoot with a "pro-sumer" rig, not basic, but not a DSLR big dollar setup either.

Point and Shoot 8 meg pixel Olympus SP-350, Ikelite housing, NICE Ikelite DS-125 strobe, TTL exposure via corded hotshoe set on manual shutterspeed and f-stop, sweet ULCS arms, INON wet mount 165 degree fish eye lens you can see on the arm (big black round thingy). Around $2,000 USD invested in the rig. The strobe/lighting/shutterspeed/ASA settings are everything to a photographer.......now do it underwater while diving (not easy!).....I'm always learning but I do push my rig hard compared to most "picture takers".




More shots from the Cenotes Dos Ojos and Taj Mahal...........


Enjoy the underworld cenote photos. Yeah it gets freaky, but so does Autocross or 911 track days coming into turn one too hot/fast and threshold braking past the limit of no return and here comes the tire wall........

heh heh heh, yeah, both take big balls more than mere mortals.












Diver Dave