Diving and Dancing in Cozumel

Friday January 29, 2010

Today we’re in Cozumel an island 33 miles long and 11 miles wide, 12 miles off the coast of Mexico. Cozumel dates back to 300AD when it was inhabited by the Mayans and drew people from all parts of the Mayan culture to it’s shrine of Ixchel – goddess of fertility and love. In the 1500s the Mayan world was destroyed when the Spanish imposed their culture on the area. The Spanish brought disease which wiped out the inhabitance of Cozumel. The island served as a pirate base of operation and a sleepy village of no more then 700 inhabitants until the early 1960’s when it was discovered by Jacques Cousteau. He put the island on the map through his TV show as one of the best diving destinations of the world. Cozumel has since grown to become the cursing jewel of the Caribbean recently surpassing Saint Thomas of the British Virgin Islands.

With this history and reputation Nita and I were left with little choice as to how we would spend our day in Cozumel. “We would explore the underwater world of Cozumel” Not being susceptible to the high prices of the ship tours we chose to bargain with the sidewalk tour peddlers off the ship. The ship excursion carried a cost of $65 per person the street vendor started at $45 and we made our purchase at $35; “boy are we professional cruisers or what?”

We boarded our boat with 11 other divers (snorkels) and headed for the deep waters (8 to 15 feet) to see for ourselves one of the best dive locations in the world ( we never got out of sight of out ship). We had a blast, the brightly colored fish were plentiful and showed no fear of swimming with us, we even had several spotting of barracuda and man-a-ray. Our journey back to the pier included beer and tequila shots with the traditional Mexican whistle and head shakes.

Ron and Avie, not being water people, chose to explore the retail offerings of Cozumel but failed to find anything that they had to have. Back on the ship the pool side party started building as we repaired to depart Cozumel. The pool side filled with joyful passengers dancing to the rhythms of “Hot-Hot-Hot” and “The Macarena”. Then out of nowhere came the familiar sound of “Sweet Home Alabama”. Nita and I watched for deck 13 overlooking the pulsating activities. Much to our surprise we witnessed a woman join the pool side activities arms raised to the sky, hips gyrating while singing our “Sweet Home Alabama”. Her back was to us but as she spun to the music Nita nudged me and asked, “Isn’t that Avie?” “Ya, but that’s a side of Avie that I’ve never seen before.”

Saturday January 30, 2010

Our journey is coming to an end the weather has turned from mid 80s, sunny, and low humidity to high 60s, cloudy and heavy rain. We did get our early morning deck walk and run in this morning but we’ll be spending the balance or our day inside on the computer, in the library, and in the gym.

It’s been a good get-a-way but not comparable to our past adventures of late to Spain, the Baltic’s, Southeast Asia and China. We’re making plans for future trips to the eastern US and Québec, South Africa, and the UK, hope to see some of you in our travels and invite you to join us.