Puerto Vallarta Scuba Dive: Los Arcos Dive 1
I am spending the week in Puerto Vallarta Mexico with my wife and kids, on a much needed vacation. Peruto Vallarta has a vibrant scuba industry, and although the cold water and limited visibility would probably bother many Caribbean divers, as a Pacific Northwest Diver, 60F is practically balmy, and 30ft of visibility is practically god-like vision.
I’m diving two days total, two dives each day. I am a pretty experienced diver with more than 80 dives, plus Rescue training, but since I haven’t dove in open water for two years, I decided to make my first day of diving “easier dives”. Los Arcos is considered a pretty basic dive, with a lot to see at 30-40ft, and in fact, enough to see at the surface that it’s also a snorkel site. Many divers prefer to avoid snorkelers, but I don’t mind… since as this dive reinforced, you rarely see snorkelers once you drop down under the surface…. unless something goes horribly wrong for the snorkler. 
I dove with Chico’s Dive Shop, which had been recommended by an employee at my local dive shop. Apparently he worked at Chico’s a couple years ago while he was an American living abroad… probably getting his Cervesa on every night. That being said, the shop seemed pretty well run, with a significant amount of local flare/authenticity. My sense was that these were real serious local divers, who were all local, and therefore really knew the area. They were off the beaten path enough to not feel like a complete tourist trap, but certainly they knew how to cater to tourists.
I had booked my dives the day before over the phone, and had a special request of diving with Enriched Air Nitrox. This added a level of complexity to my request, but the team handled it well, and when I arrived in the morning I found that they had prepared the nitrox cylinders and were ready to go.
My scheduled “sign in” time was 8:30am, so I awoke at 7am, grabbed a quick breakfast at the hotel, and then ran to the corner to catch the local Mexican bus system down town. Puerto Vallarta has a classic public transportation system. For 5 pesos per ride ($0.50 USD) you can ride anywhere in the greater Puerto Vallarta area. There are classic stories of the free style and almost bohemian aesthetic of the PV buses, and although they are certainly more rustic than Seattle’s bus system, I found them to be a very reasonable, reliable, and inexpensive alternative to Taxi’s.
I showed up at the bus stop just in time to catch a bus headed to city center (Centro) and arrived at my destination by 8:15 am. The shop which is scheduled to open at 8am was empty, and as divers and snorkelers began arriving we all sat around scratching our heads wondering when the staff would arrive. Once they did arrive, they had us all processed, and equipment distributed in no time. What could have been a frustrating experience was no big deal at all.
There was one family of four scuba diving at another local dive site: The Marietas Islands. There were three other divers who, like me, were planning on diving Los Arcos. My fellow scuba divers included: two men, one an experienced diver with 50+ dives and his friend who was being certified on this trip; and a woman from Ontario who was also a relatively experienced diver who had worked at a dive shop in Australia a few years back, but now only dives on vacation. The rest of the customers were a huge group of snorkelers who were part of a wedding party. The bride and groom, their brothers and sisters and friends, and the grooms Grandmother. It turns out that they were all from Seattle, and staying at the same hotel as me. Small world.
Our dive trip left from the pier in old town Puerto Vallarta. Let’s be clear, this is an old pier… it’s been around since the eighteenth century, and shows. Our dive boat, a large covered pontoon boat, was unable to come dock at the pier, and so we had the classic small tender shuttle to transfer us to our dive boat. Once we got on our main boat, I found it to be a really nice alternative to the more industrial dive boats I’m used to diving from. Although, this boat would clearly never last in the Puget sound or even the waters off of Maui.
The trip from Puerto Vallarta to Los Arcos was relative uneventful. We had a brief sighting of a hump back whale. But mostly I spent time chatting with the other divers. It was pretty clear that I was going to be buddied up with the solo woman diver, so we spent our time chatting about our dive experience and sizing each other up to know what to expect during the dive. We talked about our craziest dive experiences, and how we managed in a pinch. It’s good to know that another diver has had to deal with a close call, so you know that they’ve handled the panic before and won’t become a liability on you in the middle of your dive.
Ok, how was the diving?
Our first dive was at the main pinnacle of Los Arcos, and over the “Canyon”. Our dive plan was to drop down the anchor line, to about 20ft, then follow the reef/shelf around the pinnacle till we got to what is called the canyon at about 50-60ft. Then after we got to about 1500psi on our air we’d turn around and head directly back to the boat. In general, I’d say this is a slightly more aggressive air management plan than I’d like to dive with… I’d usually shot for 1/3 out, 1/3 back, 1/3 reserve… but I feel comfortable enough with my own skills that I decided I’d be able to deal in the event that the plan went sideways. The key to scuba diving is to know your limits and manage your own dive profile within those limits.
My dive buddy had a little bit of trouble getting neutrally buoyant on the surface, mainly because she didn’t have enough weight with her. The problem was that the water was so cold they had forced her to wear two layers of wet suit. The extra layers made her more buoyant, and she didn’t really have enough weight because she was used to diving with a lot less wet suit and a lot less weight. Once she got under water and down a little, the natural water pressure did it’s part and she was able to manage her bouncy. I had no problems getting neutral, getting down to the bottom of the anchor line and waiting to begin our adventure. It was encouraging that I was able to be comfortable so quickly in the water after such a long time off from the sport.
Once we actually started our dive, we saw amazing local sea life immediately. Clearly the marine wildlife laws are significantly different in Mexico than in the US, as our dive master was grabbing, poking, prodding, holding and displaying every possible species we encountered. Within about 200 yards of the boat we’d been shown sea snakes, eels, puffer fish, and a red pacific octopus.
When the dive master spotted the octopus lair, he swam over and immediately pulled to octopus out. Then he signaled for us to come close and he transfered the octopus to each our our hands. I’ve seen octopus on several occasions: in Maui, I’ve seen this same species of the smaller (about the size of a feather duster) red pacific octopus; and in the Seattle area I’ve seen the Giant pacific octopus, about the size of a medium sized dog (although clearly a lot softer and more flexible). But this is the first time I’ve ever touched an octopus. I have to admit, I have a little guilt about it, as I’ve been told that the neoprene material of a wet suit is harmful to the skin of the octopus, but it was an amazing experience to have this octopus grab my hand and wrap its entire body around my arm. Cool!
After hanging out around the front of the pinnacle, we made our way around to the canyon. We went deeper, and the water got colder… much colder… It was the coldest I’ve ever been in a wet suit… and it was a bit uncomfortable. I had a little trouble clearing my right ear at around 50ft. But after going up a little I was able to clear it.
The canyon was pretty cool. We were told that it drops to well over 300ft. So this was essentially a wall dive at this point. On top of that, there was a significant amount of surge, so buoyancy control was important. It this point I could tell my dive buddy was getting a little nervous about her air, and since we’d reached 1500psi it was time to turn back.
We headed back toward the boat, seeing more octos hiding in rocks, more eels, more rays, and lots of cool fish. We eventually got back to the anchor line, and I had about 700psi, and my dive computer was reading 2mins left of air. (My computer considers 500psi to be “out of air”.) I could tell that my dive buddy was down to less than 500psi, because she was clearly eager to get back on the boat.
But after showing us the anchor line, our dive master started swimming away and signaled us to follow him. What was going on? I figured that he just wanted to get maximum bottom time, and figured that since we knew where the anchor line was, we were good to go. My dive buddy was not pleased she was clearly freaking out. At first he showed us another octo, and I was thinking, “ok, nice, but lets get back up to the surface”… and my dive buddy started signalling “go up go up”.
So, our dive master pulled out his diver down flag, and grabbed our shoulders and we started to ascend. By this time my computer was beeping and flashing about being out of air, even though it had 550psi, my dive buddy’s eyes were the sized of saucers, and I was thinking, hmmm… I’d much rather be ascending on a line… but ok, at least we’re going up. When we finally got to about 15ft, the dive master gave us the “safety stop signal” and we attempted to stay neutral at 15ft for our planned 3 minute safety stop. There was a lot of surge and so we mostly bounced around between 15 and 20ft for about 2minutes and then we ascended to the surface.
When we finally got to the surface and could talk, our dive master explained in his broken English that there was simply too much surge to safely ascend up the anchor line. I could see where he was coming from, but in retrospect he probably could have predicted this possibility and included it in our pre-dive briefing.
All in all it was a good dive. But I can imagine that if one is a mostly tropical diver that this dive would have been pretty dicey. It was cold, the water was very rough, the visibility was limited, and the exit was a little less smooth than we had planned. That being said, this dive was cake compared to dive number two… but that’s a whole other post. 
Workout:
- Type: Other
- Date: 02/18/2008
- Time: 10:00:00
- Total Time: 00:57:00.00
Filed under: Mexico, Other, Puerto Vallarta, Scuba Diving, scuba |
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