Tormentos Reef
- Date of dive: 11/7/2017
- Maximum depth: 59 ft
- Average depth: approximately 39 ft
- Total dive time: 64 mins
In the middle of the West coast of Cozumel, Mexico is a wonderful reef surrounded by sand chutes and gardens of seagrass. The Tormentos reef sits in about 60 ft (18.3 m) of water with the high peaks of the reef heads around 40 ft (12 m). The day we went diving at this site there was a slight North current like all drift dives in Cozumel and we would consider this dive to be an easy to moderate skill level dive. The visibility was between 80 to 100 ft (24 m to 30 m) and the water temperature was around 79°F (26°C).
Tomentos is north of Yucab and just south of the wreck site near Chankanaab. the San Clemente Wall dive sites. Like most of the other drift diving sites, make sure to keep good buoyancy and allow yourself to move with the current. This helps with air consumption and you can easily get an hour long dive at this site.
During our dive at this site, we sworn all the life we saw looked about 20% larger than everything else we have seen in Cozumel. We weren’t sure if this is due to this site being one of the lesser noted sites or if we were experiencing a little bit of narcosis. Regardless, this site was beautiful and we look forward to diving here again. Along this reef, you will have the chance to see a huge variety of the various species found in Cozumel. Invertebrates commonly seen here are: Smooth Floral Coral (E. fastiginia), Clubtip Finger Coral (P. porites), Staghorn coral (A. cervicornis), a variety of sea fans, Giant Barrel Sponges (X. muta), Purple Vase Sponges (C. plicifera), Strawberry Vase Sponges (C. plicifera), Yellow Tube Sponges (A. fistularis), Dark Volcano Sponges (P. zeai), Green Finger Sponges (I. birotulata), and Horned Feathered Worms (S. giganteus). Common vertebrates here are Spotted Drum Fish (E. punctatus), Balloonfish (D. holocanthus), Yellowtail blue damselfish (C. parasema), Four eyed butterflyfish (C. capistratus), Blue Striped Grunts (H. sciurus), Great Barracudas (S. barracuda), Trumpetfish (A. maculatus), Scrawled Filefish (A. scriptus), Queen Triggerfish (B. vertula), a variety of Parrot Fish, Black Triggerfish (M. niger), Green and Spotted Moray Eels (G. funbris and G. moringa), Spiny Lobsters (P. argus), Hawksbill Turtles (E. imbricata), and many other species