Costa Rica: Bull Shark Diving and Playa del Coco

The bull sharks were approaching, and my heart was racing. Shark silhouettes were everywhere. And I was glad to pull together a happy hour with people from all around the world.

Day 1

The dive shop Deep Blue Diving is just one block away from my hotel, La Puerta del Sol. The breakfast at the hotel is made-to-order. Not bad. I would eat it every morning.

This is my first ever dive in Costa Rica. The meet-up time is 8 am, and I get there by 7:30 am. The shopkeeper asks me to come back later. I go and buy a cup of mocha and come back. Still too early.

The beach is several minutes' walk away from the dive shop. The beach does not have any pier or dock for boarding. A small boat comes close to the beach, and the divers will walk into the water to get onboard.

The boat is smaller and less amenitized than what I had in Scuba Life Cozumel ('SLC") but comparable to SeaVoice in Malaysia. The configuration is not as customized for scuba diving trips, and putting up gears and jumping off the water is not as smooth. But, it is decent enough.

I am diving with Carolina, and another guy, who does not speak much, presumably does not speak English. Carolina seems to be in her late 20s, and she is a physicist at the University of Costa Rica. She is setting up a space telescope in Santa Cruz nearby, so she is taking the opportunity by doing a couple of dives here. She is pretty familiar with this crew as she was certified here a couple of years ago, and she comes back often.

The crews are Emanuel, Edgar, and a no-name captain. Emanuel seems to be a mini-celebrity in the diving world. He has been with Deep Blue for ten years, and he also organizes trips to other exotic destinations such as Coco Island and Cozumel. He told me that people from all around the world had fully booked his 2022 and 2023 trips. And these are not cheap trips - $6,000 to $8,000 week-long all-inclusive trips. He is also a professional underwater photographer. That definitely makes him pretty popular.

Like every first dive of a diving trip, I am a little nervous before jumping into the water. I have one more thing to worry about for this trip - my Hero 8 GoPro. That thing does not turn on after the first 10 minutes. Damn it.

The first dive site is the Tortuga or Turtle. The seafloor is not very lively. There is not much coral reef compared to Cozumel. But we see big schools of fish and a small boat wreck. There are rays hiding in the sand, a frogfish pretending to be a rock, and many sea urchins. I wonder if we can make sea urchins a popular dish here to get rid of them.

The second dive site is Argentinian Point. The guide says that we will see some white-tipped sharks, and yes, we see a lot of them underwater. The last time I saw black-tipped sharks, they were pretty shy, and I could hardly get a good look at them. But this time is different. There are groups of three or four of them resting in certain spots. And we can slowly approach and circle around them to film them. This is probably the highlight of my first day of diving.

Day 2

I very much look forward to Day 2, Bat Islands dive. It is supposedly one of the top dive sites in the Americas. I make friends with a girl from Germany, Mandy. She is on a one-year travel trip now and will be bouncing all over the Americas for scuba diving and travel. She also stays in the same hotel too. Carolina is also on this trip, so are another local guy Ce and his friend, a girl, who I never figure out how to pronounce her name. Captain Brian is a younger guy, probably in his early 20s.

After approximately one hour of bouncing up and down on the ocean, we finally got to the dive site. The first dive is a disaster. Because of the ocean current, we will make a negative descent, which means that we will descend as soon as we get into the water, compared to popping back to the water surface to wait for everyone to get ready. Easy enough. I need to make sure that there is no air in my BDC and hold my manual inflator high to let the air out as I descent. 3, 2, 1 off! Less than 15 feet under the water, my upper left forehead starts to hurt. I immediately stop and begin to ascend again. I signal to my guide to let him know something is wrong. When the guide and I are back on the surface, I tell him what is wrong and that I will try again. He says it may have to do with not being able to equalize my sinus. The second attempt, it is still a problem. Safety first, I am going to sit this dive out.

Back on the boat, lying on my back, I keep thinking about what has gone wrong. Did not sleep well last night? The beers I had last night? Sinus? Too excited? Descending too quickly? The boat bobbing up and down the strong waves makes me want to puke too. This is not going to be good.

Forty minutes or so later, my fellow divers come back up to the surface. All of them asked what had happened. I also hesitated to ask about the dive because I would be pretty jealous of what they have seen. I did anyway. Before the next dive, I ask to do a trial dive to see whether the same problem happens again. Ten feet, 20 feet, 30 feet... I could still feel it,, but it seems OK if I blow my nose frequently. I am ready for the second dive.

Boy, I am glad that I did not miss this dive. After we get into the water, we are just circulating a specific area. I am confused - why are we not swimming somewhere. Lo and behold, a couple of large silhouettes appear on the horizon, slowly revealing themselves. Bull sharks. Massive bull sharks. I am talking about 8 to 11 feet long monsters swimming less than 30 feet away from us. We stay close to the ground and watch them swim by. So many of them that the first phrase that comes to my mind is "shark-infested water." I am in awe the whole time, constantly looking around where these giant monsters are. As the dive comes to an end and we slowly ascend, a curious massive bull shark follows and comes straight towards me. We make eye contact! A thousand thoughts on how to wrestle and defend a bull shark cross my mind within milliseconds - maybe my GoPro stick could help. Less than 30 feet away, she turns away. No legend was born today.

Money well spent. The visibility could be better. The water could be less choppy. The current could be slower. But this is the money-trip. Diving among some of the largest ocean apex predators - and so many of them- makes this a highly recommended trip.

Before we do our third dive, we stop by a small sandy beach to take a break and eat some simple ham and cheese sandwiches. The third dive is not near Bats Island anymore. I am a little bummed, to be honest. The third dive is at a dive site called Black Rock. By this time, I felt pretty good and became more chatty again.

The third dive is a rather average dive. We dive around the Black Rock in circle, counter-clockwise. It is still a pretty good dive. We see quite a few Eagle rays, several white-tipped sharks, and a variety of smaller fish. Instead of calling them other fishes, I know I need to do a better job recognizing fish species.

But man, those bull sharks are enormous

If Scuba Life Cozumel is a 5-star operator, I would give these guys a 3-star rating. In my mind, Scuba Life Cozumel is the gold standard in dive shop operations. Though it is not highly recommended, I would still come back to Deep Blue.

Day 3

I am still thinking about going back to Bats Island this morning. It was too good.

Today I am doing a 3-tank dive with another hop, Summer Salt. It is a shop that is run by a French couple. They both had worked at Summer Salt on-and-off until October 2019, when they decided to buy the dive shop. Celine and Michael. They run a relatively small and lean operation. Their shop is just off the main road, on my way to my hotel, La Puerta del Sol and Deep Blue. The shop is very simple; Celine and Michael are the only ones that work there, plus a boat driver when they have a dive trip.

The diving boat for this trip is much better configured than the Deep Blue's. It has a row of seatings and gas tank holders running against both sides of the boat. Everything seems neat and clean. When the divers are ready to jump, they could do it either directly behind where they sit, go to the back where the boat wall is lower, or do a giant stride from the small platform at the back.

We also have two French girls joining us. One is Celine's sister, and another is her friend, both of which work in some hospital lab in France.

Today's dive sites are Sopresa, Varador, and Argentinian Point. Sopresa is a deeper dive (75 ft or so), and we see big schools of fish and several very large rays. I am pretty intrigued by the needlefish - they have a long and narrow body with a long protruded mouth, and some of them are more than 2 feet long. The second dive site is called Virador. We see big schools of jacks and some other random fish. We also see many white-tipped sharks - groups of two or three usually resting on some sandy bottom in some small canal. I get pretty close to them - as close as two feet away.

I learn to play with the large schools of fish during this trip. There are many schools that may have more than a thousand fish, and they are not afraid of humans. I get as close as a couple of inches away from them, swim through them, and follow them. It is pretty fun to play with.

Scuba Learning Journey

I still feel like I do not have good control of my buoyancy. I feel like I need to work a little hard to control my buoyancy. The sinus thing does not bother me anymore, though I still feel it when I first get into the water. I usually use 10 pounds of weight; maybe I should drop it to eight pounds. This is also the first time I have brought my GoPro with me. I am happy that I did because I filmed some monstrous bull sharks! But I lost my red filter. Damn it. Another thing I need to work on is my breathing. I am still averaging between 40 minutes to 50 minutes per tank. I just need to be more relaxed and breathe slower. But I am feeling more confident and more at ease.

Playa del Coco - Costa Rica Review

Playa del Coco is a tiny town that centers around scuba diving. The only main street here has less than ten restaurants and bars, and most of them are pretty rudimentary. You can walk from one end to another end (beach) in less than 5 minutes. Mainly because I am here during the rainy season (it rains at least once per day, and these rains are full-blown tropical rain that usually lasts at least half an hour), the town is tranquil and full of local people. Tourists are far and few between. Nightlife during this time is pretty much just hanging out at some beachfront bars, and it is pretty tame. There is a curfew at 10 pm every day. There is nothing much else to do other than diving.

In terms of diving, the local dive sites are average. Again, I am here during the rainy season. In general, this area has very limited corral reef, and the visibility is low to medium. But you get to see some larger marine life such as white-tipped sharks, eagle rays, sea turtles, and devil rays. On the ocean surface, you can also see humpback whales and dolphins.

The money is really at Bats Island. You are almost guaranteed to see bull sharks. A lot of them. I have also been told that you can see big pods of orcas, hammerheads, and other megafauna.

I will come back only to dive Bats Island and Catalina (to see manta rays). A trip with at least two dive days and not more than three days. After having dove Bats, you probably would not be too keen to dive locally.