Santa Catalina Beach, in front of Scuba Coiba
Santa Catalina Beach, in front of Scuba Coiba
We chose to dive with Scuba Coiba, after reading all we could find on the topic it seemed like (literally) the only choice. It is a small shop that operates out of 20 foot open boats. We briefly met the owner, Herbie Sunk, on his few check-ins at the shop.
Scuba Coiba headquarters
Scuba Coiba washing and fill area
Scuba Coiba washing and fill area
Scuba Coiba Office
Scuba Coiba gear and bannana staging area
The dive masters we had were Jeremy, who seemed competent but un-excited, Ben who had been there one day more than us but was very nice and Luis who didn't speak English but was fabulous - showing an inspired attitude about diving, outstanding customer service and a superior knowledge of the sites.
On our second boat trip, the crew set up our gear. Oddly it was set up just about completely incorrectly. Regs on wrong BC's, LP hoses not connected, regs installed upside down and backwards. This was surprising and potentially harardous because except for our own checking, we would have exited the boat without the ability to inflate our BC's. We were also a bit surprised to see that we were expected to carry our tanks from the boat to the shop after the dives.
The dive sites fall into two categories, local and Coiba Island. The local dives were about an hour by boat and the Coiba dives were about 2 hours. On our first day we dove a local spot called snapper point. This is a deep sea mount with many schools of fish. Our first dive turned out to be a tour of the boats anchor, hanging free 100 feet deep in the sea because our crew had missed the sea mount - particularly impressive given that they had a GPS.
Our second dive was to the same site, but less the air we wasted on the first dive. The site turned out to be the best site we would see.
So you can rate the value of this opinion, I've been diving for 21 years, 1,400+ dives in 20 countries, PADI Master Instructor.
We had planned 13-15 dives while we were there. Due to problems (not weather) we were able to complete 8 plus our tour of the free-hanging anchor on dive 1.
Giving the dive a grade of A-F, here is how they break down:
Grade A = none
Grade B = 3 (two of them repeats of snapper point)
Grade C = 2
Grade D = 3
Grade F = 1
Overall average of the dive was a C to C-.
The better of the dives were NOT on Coiba Island
We chose this destination based on other trip reports that we have read and had the impression that this was a remote and difficult trip, but a very special one for the quality of the dive sites. We had even heard it compared to Cocos Island. Having been to Cocos is July of 07, the only similarity I can find isn that they are both islands.
Coiba Island Dives:
Welcome sign on Coiba Island
We had the impression that the dives on Coiba Island would be even more special than the 'local' dives around Santa Catalina.
The boat ride to Coiba for us was 2 1/2 hours. Well to be fair, 2 hours was spent moving and 30 minutes was spent fixing the boat a hundred yards offshore. Given the long boat ride to the island, it makes send to spend a couple of nites on the island so the boat rides would be only a few minutes instead of 2 hours plus whatever repairs needed.
Coiba Island Ranger Station guest quarters
On arriving at the island we thought it was much nicer than we expected. Nice beach, more room than we had thought. Note that you need to bring everything that you need including soap, sheets, toilet paper, lots of bug spray.
After our dives for the day we were informed by the rangers (who's guards walk around with machine guns) that shooting video on the island and underwater was forbidden. We were informed that we would have to pay US $3,000 for every 30 minutes of filming that we did. With the civilized daily limit of $10,000.
Oh yea, cash only.
This was stunning news since we had been very clear with the owner of Scuba Coiba, Herbie Sunk, that we were a group of videographers and needed an extra large vehicle to hold all the video gear as well as needing to be able to charge many batteries on the island, which required bringing extra fuel for the generator.
We refused to pay this extortion.
We became aware that the owner of Scuba Coiba, Herbie Sunk, had been well aware of this problem. He had conflicts like this before. He did not warn us because we simply would not have chosen this destination.
The next morning we were escorted for an hour by their patrol boat to the edge of the park to make sure we left the area. It was like being ridden out of town on a rail. Welcome to Panama.
Our group consisted of 4 people and there was one other person who tagged along in our boat. When we left the island they sent us back in the backup boat with the brand new dive master (3 days experience) and left the primary boat and dive master with the single diver who was not in our group.
When we returned to Santa Catalina, we urgently tried to speak with or meet with Herbie Sunk. He was unavailable to do either. Later, we did receive a message from him saying we should send him an e-mail with our concerns and he would consider them. To date, we have not heard from him and he has yet to express any actual concern.
Luis, the owner of the other dive shop, Coiba Diving Center, who did not receive out business, took it upon himself to drive us and our gear around and make immediate arrangements so we'd have a place to stay upon our unexpected return to Santa Catalina. He even drove us to dinner. I cannot say enough to praise his and his partner's customer service, and we weren't even his customers! His partner even closed their shop for a few minutes to drive our gear to our hotel.
The hotel we stayed at, Sol Y Mar was very nice and a good choice.