Beware of Jorje at Blue Angel Cozumel

[NYLonghorn]

My boyfriend and I were Open Water Certified last summer. We live in NY so I'm sure you can imagine that we haven't done any dives since then. We chose to go with Blue Angel because we could do an easy shore dive to ease back into things. Last year, we did Discover Diving with Matt Moran and had a great time. This is why we returned to Blue Angel. I emailed Blue Angel to set up a time to dive with Matt again. It took several emails before I got a response. It was agreed that we would dive with Matt at a certain time. When we arrived at Blue Angel, no one had heard of us and there was no sign of Matt. We opted to go out with Jorje, the divemaster who was available. Big mistake. He completely rushed us getting into the water. He was all but pushing me into the water while I was trying to get into my gear. As a result, I didn't use any defogger. I spent the entire time unable to see. When we emerged from our dive, it was apparent why Jorje was rushing us. He had another group lined up immediately after us. I was very disappointed. After our great time last year, this was just a bad experience. Not sure if we'll ever go with them again.

[parrotcruiser]

If your name is any indication, HOOK 'EM!

[bruce-r]

Bummer. Sorry you didn't have a good time, but I am a bit surprised with your experience as Blue Angel generally gets decent reviews. Did you ever find out what happened to Matt?

 

My boyfriend and I were Open Water Certified last summer. We live in NY so I'm sure you can imagine that we haven't done any dives since then.

Yes, I can imagine that, but I couldn't wait that long between dives. I'd go diving locally. There are some find wreck dives along the East Coast. My actual favorite diving has been in British Columbia where the water temperature is a bit cooler than the Caribbean. Water temp. was 45f on my last dive trip BC, but the diving was fabulous.

 

You can't see stuff like this in the Caribbean:

[Woodsmaster]

I wasn't with you, so I can't jump to conclusions on how your dive went, but I can tell you that we regularly request Jorge for just the opposite reasons that you gave.

 

He always handles himself professionally with newbies, middies, and the advanced divers in our group. He makes us comfortable with his presence, especially with new divers. He has taken his time, makes sure all divers are geared up, personnally inspects each diver before they go in to make sure they have their Air on, BC "hitched" up, regs and guages in hand, mask ready and in place, etc. Very few of the other operators divemasters have done that for us.

 

He has always been courteous, friendly, answers questions, goes where we wanted to dive, gives a thorough dive briefing before you go in, and generally has been the best divemaster we have ever seen, and we have seen a lot of them in St. Thomas, Barbados, Antigua, Greneda, Aruba, Cozumel, Grand Caymans, Utila, Roatan, Galveston, Corpus Christi, Bermuda, Bahamas, and Hawaii.

 

Maybe you caught him on an off day, but we have never seen him act as you describe.

 

I am setting up with them right now for July.

 

Maybe your newness to diving had your anxiety and expectations out of whack? But, like I said, I wasn't there so I don't know.

 

In the future, if your mask fogs at depth, let a little water leak in and use it to swish around to clear your mask some. I have had water in a poorly fitting "rental" that was covering my nostrils, but it doesn't bother me.

 

I wouldn't recommend it for a newbie, and it may have been a dumb thing to do, but I carry my 500 PSI with me in a BC pocket and I have taken my mask off in 20-30 foot depths and used it there..... But we were just starting a dive and I left my defog off my mask making sure my kids had theirs and I did not want to slow the dive up as it was our first of the day and we were going to 100 feet. My brain farct. Then again, I am comfortable with my gear and situation in the water. I came up the old fashioned way of dumping and donning "ALL" gear in learning and we do it every year when we start predive season, but it is usually in a pool. If I wore contacts, I would never pull my mask in the water if I had a choice.

 

And no, I don't think it is a recommended technique of any certification agency either, but the more comfortable you are in the water, the more enjoyable your dives will be. As BruceJr indicates, get some more time in, anywhere you can, even if it is an indoor pool in the winter. The more you dive, the better at it you will be.

[Latitude 20]

Don't forget that in Cozumel you're generally drift diving and if everyone doesn't get into the water pretty quickly the group can drift apart. That could have accounted for Jorge's urgency.

 

Up here in the PNW, almost all of our dives are current dives and we've experienced the disappointment that a delay of even a minute or two can bring--sometimes it's the difference between a reef or wreck dive and a "sand" dive (boring).

 

That said, if getting everyone into the water quickly was his goal, he should have let you know so you could have started gearing up earlier.

 

Kathi & Leo

[Woodsmaster]

As mentioned above, most of Cozumel's diving is drift diving. If you linger on top, at times, you will miss an entry point for a particular dive and that throws everything off.

 

Making an otherwise memorable dive a drift past everything you want to see.

[cali-croozer]

As mentioned above, most of Cozumel's diving is drift diving. If you linger on top, at times, you will miss an entry point for a particular dive and that throws everything off.

 

Making an otherwise memorable dive a drift past everything you want to see.

 

This is interesting. When I first read the post, I was tempted to reply because this was our experience in Cozumel (this was a LONG time ago, when we used to scuba, BC - Before Children! :) ). Anyway, we had a great dive, but still remember how rushed the staff seemed to be in getting people in the water; I'm one of those people who can't see without glasses so by the time I took my glasses off, put them away, and put on my mask, the guys are yelling at us in Spanish. Our experience in Grand Cayman was the exact opposite......very laid back. Now, reading about the current and drift diving it makes sense. It's just if you don't know this, the staff comes across as rude and rushing, instead of doing their job correctly.