If you are looking for high-octane diving to take you out of your comfort zone, look no further than diving into the freshwater Cenotes of Mexico. As a family, we have made a couple of trips to Playa Del Carmen on the Yucatan Peninsula to ogle at these magnificent marvels and to experience an environment underwater that few people ever get to experience. It’s possible to snorkel these eerie landforms, but diving these is much better if you have the time. The play of light coming through the openings down into the darkness is beyond beautiful.
How did the Cenotes Form?
The Cenotes of the Yucatan were the result of the meteor impact that killed the dinosaurs 65 million years ago. The impact compounded with millions of years of erosion left and a smattering of limestone sinkholes and underwater tunnels that are still being explored today. Imagery shows the circular location of the Cenotes and although the meteor was thought to have hit the Northwest side of the peninsula, the cenotes are prevalent throughout.
Do You Need Special Certification?
On our first trip there in 2013, we decided to get the IANTD cavern dive certification which took 4 days. We had read countless tales of dive masters and instructors drowning because they had overestimated their abilities as recreational divers and had not taken the time to learn the technical skills which are necessary in this unfamiliar environment. Even though that many of the ‘routes’. (string lines divers follow to do a loop through and not get disorientated) are already laid out and followed, it helps to learn how to manage zero visibility conditions after overactive finning or a collapse of a cavern ceiling. Also, how to outfit your BCD, and regulator lines is slightly different as divers in underwater caves are usually horizontal and need longer hoses for buddy breathing and a primary and backup dive light for safety.
However, some cenotes (like Angelita) are essentially sinkholes and are straight down and back up again. Some other cenotes like ‘Casa’ are very shallow and have some swim-throughs that can be done on scuba or for snorkellers who like to hold their breath. We took our 13-year-old Ava to dive ‘Casa’ two years ago and she dove it like a champ.
Our Favorite Cenotes
The Pit This was one of my favorite sites as one as it’s a bit of a haul to get down into but opens into a wide base with a large bommie rising up from the bottom. The deep descent and then spiral rise up through beautiful stalagmites make ‘The Pit’ one of the more challenging dive sites but worth the effort. It’s also one of the few dive sites that contains Mayan artifacts of pottery shards that you can see on your safety stop.
Angelita Or ‘Little Angel’ is a walk through a mosquito-infested forest to a modestly sized pool. After hopping in, you descend straight down 30 meters to a haunting layer of hydrogen sulfide that obscures everything below save branches that have sunk to the bottom from the tree canopy high above. After meeting at the bottom, you can descend through the layer (with zero visibility) to the bottom which is crystal clear but dark from the layer above so be sure to take a flashlight.
Dos Ojos This is a good training dive as it’s very open and has two large openings like eyes which is the Spanish translation. Dos Ojos is so big, that multiple dive groups can make their way past each other going in and out without feeling that they are low on space.
Casa ‘Casa’ is one of the few Cenotes on the cost and feels less like a Cenote and more like the typical swim-through. It’s actually a river, and the mixing of salt and fresh water can create a visibility blur, but the allure is swimming through a Mangrove swamp. If you’re lucky, you might just see the resident alligator!
Grand Cenote This was our first Cenote dive and it holds a special place as it’s where the magic started. We did some training skills in Grand Cenote and its entry and exit was quite easy making it great for beginners and advanced divers alike.
The Bottom Line
I highly recommend taking the Cavern diver course as it leveled up our skills and prepared us for a litany of dangers that we never faced but gave us the confidence to meet them head-on if we had. Know your limitations. Most sites have signage indicating if a route is better for cavern diving or is deeper and requires cave diving certification. Be an explorer, not a statistic.
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