I spent 7 nights at the Iberostar Cozumel with my brother in the beginning of September, sandwiching luckily between Gustav and Ike. This is a perfectly nice hotel on a mediocre beach but nearest the best scuba diving reef I’ve seen. Skip to the end if you’re easily bored; stay with me if you want all the details. I have stayed at the Barcelo Beach and Dreams Tulum resorts in the Mayan Riviera and at the Barcelo Palace in Punta Cana for all-inclusive reference.

We booked through our local travel agent Anna at OK Travel, GoGoTours was the group. Flew American Airlines right into Coz, laying over in Miami. The second leg into Coz is on a little turboprop, but it was very smooth. Nice to land right in Coz and not have to deal with the Cancun madness and ferryboat ride. No problems with the flights or airport, van from Olympus Tours was there to bring us to the hotel. It’s about 20 m south of the airport, quite a ways from town. Check in was a breeze and our room was ready. We were in 8114, nearest the beach and the pool on the South side. It was quiet and clean, small as others have noted but perfectly acceptable. The closet does not give you a lot of room to spread out clothing, but how much stuff do you need? It’s not a fancy place. The minibar was full and the safe worked fine. Each room has a nice balcony and hammock out in front. We did find some tiny ants in the bathroom, but they didn’t seem to bite and were nothing more than a minor annoyance (and my Deet skin spray did not deter them at all).

The hotel is lovely, very jungly with trails weaving in and out of the lush foliage. There is no direct way to get anywhere and you must be prepared to walk a lot. The pool is clean and nice, the swim up bar was handy. There are plenty of chairs but never enough in the shade, and folks stake those out early. There are more chairs in the shade on the beach, though, so you aren’t out of luck if you miss one early. The beach is very nice, good clean sand and you can walk North quite a ways. The water entry is unusable due to coral rocks, so if you want to swim in the sea you must enter off the slippery dock stairs, under which there are a lot of fish all the time. If you like to wade around in the ocean, this is not the place for you… go north to the Occidental or Allegro… .their water entries looked great.

Food service was quite good. There are buffets for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and with 7 nights you get 2 a la carte meals in the specialty restaurants. The breakfast buffet was great every day… .eggs and omelets, meats and potatoes, lots of things I didn’t recognize, lunchmeat for the europeans, lovely cajeta to spread on toast, plenty of fresh fruit and smoothies. You can’t go wrong with breakfast. Morning entertainment was provided by the many birds (mynahs?) who fly in to steal things from the tables… anything you leave is fair game and if you go to the restroom, expect your waffles to have been walked on by the time you get back. If they find no food, they’ll steal the sweetener packets off the tables undeterred by the upturned ashtrays in their way. If you were wondering, the yellow packets of Splenda are the unrivaled winners in the mynah bird taste test; we never saw any other color flying away despite the presence of sweetnlow and sugar packets. The birds did not bother me in the least (nor did the cats at dinner who shared my fish under the table), but some folks might be unnerved by all the nonhuman company in the buffet.

Lunches were held down by the pool bar… various salad things, hot items, plenty of guac and salsa and ice cream. Dinner buffet was quite varied every night as well. We chose the Mexican restaurant and steakhouse for our special dinners… both were excellent, but wear bug spray to the steakhouse as the fans aren’t adequate to blow the skeeters away. Overall I felt that the food was better than the price I paid would suggest, but not as good as Dreams across the channel (but not as expensive, either). I ate absolutely everything I wanted all the time and never had a moment’s bowel question (though it occurred to me this vacation that I eat a lot of cheese at every meal there off the buffet, so frankly it’s a wonder I could poo at all). I only drink bottled water, only rinse toothbrush in bottled water. I have been to Mexico 5 years in a row now and have NEVER had a single shaky poo… ..either I am Ironstomach or you folks who get sick are doing something wrong.

The grounds are lovely, there are flamingos and peacocks and iguanas and cats wandering about. The staff is wonderful and accommodating and kind. On the last day we rented a scooter and drove all around the island… .this was a GREAT choice. Got to spend a few hours in town with the cruise ship people (note to self; never take a cruise with those people) and drive around the windward side where we happened upon a little beach bar where SEA TURTLE babies were hatching at that very moment! There was a cop there making sure they all made it to the sea…he put one in my hand right out of the nest and I got to carry him down and release him into the ocean! What an amazing experience! The scooter ended up being about $60 for the whole day with insurance and all… ..totally worth it, but expensive in the long run because now I have to buy a scooter for myself because they’re so much fun.

Mostly we were there to dive… .after watching the onsite dive shop Dressel load 60 tanks onto one huge dive boat in the afternoon, we were more glad than ever that we had prebooked with BlueXTSea divers. If you want more info on them, PM me. I cannot recommend them highly enough…I will never dive with anyone else on Coz if I can help it.

We had no problems whatsoever with any aspect of our stay until the morning we were to leave and found a text message from a friend (phones didn’t work there at all, TMobile or AT&T, but text messages went through… .strange) who mentioned that our flight to Miami had been cancelled. After much fussing at the Olympus guy Valentin (who kept saying “tomorrow, tomorrow” like some Little Orpan Annie auditionee… as if Hurricane Ike was going to completely clear the Gulf in 1 freakin’ day), we got AA to reroute us to Dallas via a Cessna hop from Coz to Cancun (fun in a scary way).

So let’s sum up. I can compare this resort to mainland resorts I’ve been to. The food was a bit better than Barcelo, not as good as Dreams. The room was smaller than either. The hotel was smaller than either. The beach was not as nice as either. Staff is great everywhere. The scuba diving was WAY WAY WAY better here than anywhere else. So on the whole, what did I think? If I were coming on a dive vacation, I would happily stay here again. It’s farthest south on the island, closest to Palancar and Maricaibo reefs which are simply unparalleled anywhere I’ve seen. If I just wanted a beach vacation and were not a diver, I would probably not come to Cozumel at all, but stay anywhere on the mainland (Riviera Maya) where the beach is nicer and the hotels are fancier for the same or lower price (they have to be… the diving isn’t as good!).

Thanks for hanging in there through this review… .feel free to email me if you have specific questions!

Our dives took us to Tortugas, where the sea turtles are and later to Paamul.

Tortugas was the first time I’ve ever seen Wendy descend easily. Normally, she has significant trouble with her ears and equalization, but on this dive, she went down at a normal rate. We had a 49 minute dive with Mikey as our instructor and Dan & Scott from St. Louis on the dive with us. Dan was quite possibly the worst diver I’ve ever seen — he constantly swam with his arms forgetting that they’re all but useless under water and was so multi-level it was unreal — and we’ve seen some doozies. We saw tons of Hawksbill Turtles, Cowfish, and, after both Dan & Scott were cut, we saw a school of GIANT Tarpin during our safety stop.

After dives, we hung out at the dive shop and talked with the gang a bit, and then went to the pier to swim. Toro, one of the dive shop assistants, came to the pier with loads of fish food and threw it on the wading Wendy, attracting loads of fish to torment her. Being the gentleman, I tossed Toro into the water and threw food on him. After that, he and I got into a language-barrier splash contest. We had lunch and happy hour with Dawn & Jon, a super-cool couple we met down there. They live in Ohio, and pretty close to us, so we’re sure to see them again!

Wendy & I then went to the Mexican restaurant for dinner, which I wrote about here. After dinner, we went straight to bed because Thursday was going to be a big day. A really big day!

Our gear was quickly loaded on the boat and we got all hooked up to check our pressures. My tank was a little bit low, so Jochen called for a replacement and we waited a few minutes for the new tank to be brought. I checked the pressure and it was fine, but in my haste, I forgot to connect my inflator hose the second time. This would come back to be embarassing in a few moments at the dive site. Because we were a very small group of customers, we were taken to a first dive site very close to the shore — probably less than 10 minutes out. We Jacques Cousteau’d off the side of the boat and were into the water in no time. Expecting a less-than-satisfactory dive based on the placement, we were pleasantly surprised at how clear and vibrant the site was as we started our descent. By the time we got to depth, I tried to inflate my hose and found that it wasn’t hooked up. Staring at it dumbly for a moment, Jochen came over and with a look of “dumbass” in his eye, calmly hooked me up and I was good to go.

Our dive was fairly uneventful after my inflator hose issue, though Wendy had a brief moment of her own. We saw a Hawksbill Turtle, 2 spotted Eagle Rays, one Green Turtle, black durgan, parrotfish, queen angels, squid, barracuda, and pufferfish on this dive, which lasted 49 minutes.

After a decent surface interval (we actually came back to the shore, got dried off, had lunch, and reported back to the boat), we went back out to Cuevitas/Angelitas for the second dive. Mikey, the manager of the dive shop, decided to be our divemaster this time. The shop was very slow, so they were ’sharing the wealth’ of two self-sufficient divers. We dove with a guy called Bill who was pretty random underwater, sort of fun to watch him flail around as Wendy & I were calm, collected divers. He got cut pretty early, which was no surprise since he was all over the place, and Mikey, Wendy, and I enjoyed a full 50-minute dive. In Bill’s defense, he was a quarry diver enjoying his first-ever ocean dive.

After the dives, we came back to get cleaned up and hung out at the pool and the bar with Jon & Dawn. Dinner was Asian-themed at the buffet, and the sushi was actually pretty good — especially one that was wrapped around the outside with cream cheese.

After breakfast, we made our way back to the room to get changed, then went swimming by the dock for a while, enjoying the fish that live nearby. Soon, one of the small boats — either the dive boat or the snorkel boat — pulled up nearby and told everyone assembled that there was a nurse shark just over there, within snorkeling distance. Wendy and a few others went off in search of it while Drew stayed by the dock.

The nurse shark was never found, but we also learned that there was a barricuda near the pink bouy just over the other way, and most of the water crew snorkeled over to see it, which they did. Wendy reports that it’s a big sucker — about 5 feet long, and “fat as a sausage”. He guards the pink bouy, it seems.

We ate lunch at the beach cantina with Jon & Dawn, and sat and talked with them for a few hours, enjoying the breeze, the beautiful scenery, and the occasional beer or two. The four of us then went to the pool for a while before heading to the resort’s hot tub where we sat for a bit longer.

Cleaned up and hungry again (though we have no right to be), we went to the Seafood buffet for dinner, which is written up here.

We made it to the airport with no problem — it is always amazing to see the amount of traffic on the streets at that hour — after stopping by McDonald’s for a breakfast of McGriddles (God smiled the day McGriddles were invented).

Our plane was on time and full. The young man in the seat next to Drew smelled like he hadn’t been home all night, and his actions (getting up to puke three times before we even took off) confirmed the suspicion.

The carrier, USA3000, is quite impressive. They provide a juice service, a full breakfast (a sausage-egg-and-cheese muffin with a fruit cup), beverage service, delicious snack cakes near the end of the flight, and free headsets for the in-flight movie (HOUSE OF D on the way there and HOOT on the way home). The fact that our headset jacks didn’t work did little to dampen our impression of the airline. We rested as much as the puking row-mate would permit until the plane landed.

At the baggage claim, we met Buddy & Jenny when Buddy asked if Drew worked at Keebler (Drew was wearing a thrift-store Keebler shirt) and we struck up a conversation. Customs was a breeze and we were on the bus in no time. After a long wait, during which we met Dawn & Jon and ran into Jenny & Buddy, our bus took off for our resort. An uneventful 90 minutes later, the bus arrived at the Barcelo and we stepped off into the tropical beauty of the place. There are loads of photos in our gallery of the resort and grounds from our previous trip to Mexico.

Our room wasn’t going to be ready until 3:00, so we accepted our wristbands (which identify us as guests of the resort) and wandered around the resort. We had lunch in the buffet and took a walk around, finally ending up at the dive shop where we were happily surprised to see Edgar, who had been our dive guide when we were there two years ago. He was preparing to go on vacation (to answer the question I’m sure you’re asking — “Where do people who work in paradise go for vacation?” — the answer is Scotland), so we didn’t get to dive with him this time.

We finally got our room, room 5388, around 3:00 — the third floor of Sayil, which is the best building to be in if you’re a diver because it’s the closest to the dive shop in the ‘low rent’ district (the old section of the resort), so it’s inexpensive and convenient. I think even more ideal might be something in the 5120-30 range, but 5388 is still good — it’s at the far end away from the beach and walking the length of the building time & again each day gets tiring. We learned that the resort was only 4% occupied this week (a nice surprise for us since we really like low season without the crowds), and in fact one of the new buildings was completely closed down and without any occupants — the lights were off and everything — so we wondered why it took so long to get our room ready. Ah well. Once we got in, we found the room to be cold and comfortable, just like usual. We called down for a mattress topper (the resort will throw a 2-inch foam pad on their rock hard mattress if you ask) and set to getting settled in.

After unpacking and getting organized, we headed back to the dive shop to plan our dives. We planned to do a total of four dives in two days — not a lot of diving, but we had something else in mind, too… We watched a Whale Shark video and, in a staggering display of spontaneity, Wendy & I decided to sign up to snorkel on Tuesday with Whale Sharks. We then headed to the newly-reconstructed pier (it was a rickety wooden thing before and is now a concrete beauty) for a bit of swimming, then to the lobby bar where I had my first-and-last michelada, an awful combination of beer, lime juice, worchestershire sauce, and salt & pepper. If you think it sounds bad, it tasted even worse than it sounds. Truly nasty.

We had dinner at the Italian-themed buffet with Buddy & Jenny, then hit the sack by 9:30.