Xcalak, Mexico With XTC Dive Center

Dive Site: 

Date of Your Dive: 

Country/ Continent: 

Difficulty 

Is There A Required Certification Level? 

There's no require certification level. Xcalak offers both shallow and deep dive sites.

Depth 

: Some dives started at 15 ft and we went as deep as 100 ft.

Temperature 

: The water temperature was 84 F at the surface and at depth. The air temperature was high 80's F. Everybody wore a different thickness of wetsuit. Some wore 3 mm shorties and I wore a 5 mm full wetsuit because I'm cold blooded.

Conditions 

: The visibility was about 40-60 ft

Who Should You Contact to Dive This Site? 

XTC Dive Center-www.XTCDIVECENTER.com.

When Should You Dive This Site? 

Anytime

My Review 

Xcalak is a sleepy little town a 4 hour drive from Playa del Carmen and a 5 hour drive from Cancun. It is very quaint and the diving is phenomenal. We dove with XTC Dive Center. Javier and all of his staff were very knowledgeable and professional. The diving was amazing.

Our first dive was to a site called La Posa. It started out as a shallow dive, about 15 ft and then we went down. At about 30 ft, we saw a whole school of beautiful tarpon. We used about 1/3 of our air and time just watching them. We sat on the ocean bottom as they circled around us. They are truly amazing and curious creatures. They would follow us as we started to swim away, swim up to us to have a look.

_{Learn more about Xcalak diving:}

• 5 Reasons to Make Xcalak Your Next Dive Destination
• Photos of Xcalak Diving
• Review of Hob Na Dive Site in Xcalak

We stayed at Casa Carolina which was right on the ocean about 7 mins. from the dive shop. It was very clean and comfortable. We ate at Casa de Cocos as they had very good pizza. We wanted to eat at the Leeky Palapa which we had heard from a couple of people that the food was fantastic but it was only open on Fridays and Saturdays.

The next day, we dove sites called La Chiminea and Scott's Playground. They had some beautiful swim throughs. We saw a huge spotted eagle ray, barracudas, large groupers and many other fish. The brain and fan coral were amazing. We went into some swim throughs that had many silver side fish that you couldn't even see where you were entering into.

Between these 2 dives, we went to a marine park and saw a manatee. Overall, I would highly recommend a trip to Xcalak to see some beautiful ocean and it's creatures. I will be returning next year.

Would you recommend this to a friend? 

Natalie Gibb, Scuba Diving Guide, says: