El Bajo Marisla Seamount
La Paz is a great diving destination for the more adventurous divers. The city of La Paz is the capital of Baja California Sur – it has not the resort feeling to it as other locations in southern Baja, but is rich in old Mexico culture and is filled with friendly people. The scuba diving is fantastic and varies from off shore pinnacles, exciting wreck dives and beautiful garden reefs. All sites are loaded with amazing sea life from huge schools of jack, marine mammals of all sorts, giant Manta rays and hammerhead sharks. There are a lot of beautiful small creatures for those macro enthusiasts as well, a wide variety of nudibranch’s, frog fish, sea horses, octopus, shrimp and much more. Many of the best dive sites are between 1 to 2 hours boat ride away from the city; some see this as a negative aspect of La Paz diving, but the sea of Cortez is so beautiful that the boat rides can prove to be very entertaining with whale sightings, schools of dolphin, flying fish, jumping mobulas, sail fish and who knows what else you may see along the way.
The dive season in the Sea of Cortez is May through November. May and June are a little cooler with water temperatures between 65 to 75 degrees but this is the best time to see the whale sharks. In July and August the water is warming up to 75 to 85 degrees and this brings in the schooling fish and the sport fish that come in to feed on them. This is a good time to see schools of tuna and possibly marlin and sail fish. September and October finds the best visibility and abundant sea life. At this time the sea lion pups are more curious and adventurous to come around and interact with the divers, this is also the best time to see hammerhead sharks at sites like El Bajo.
Many of the dive sites are intermediate to advanced diving so it is a good idea to do some refresher dives before you go to La Paz so that you are on your game with your scuba skills.
Most favorite La Paz dive sites are:
1. Los Islotes: The sea lion colony where you can swim with many sea lions and even get some close encounters with these curious animals. This is one of the easier dive sites and is a great snorkeling site too. If you want to do an advanced dive here you can by going around to the back side of the island where you can dive deeper and approach the currents to possibly see some pelagic fish.
2. La Reina: Here you can see huge schools of fish and maybe even a giant manta ray. This is another off shore islet or rock outcropping that is subject to heavy ocean currents. This brings massive amounts of sea life to the area to feed. You can find shelter from the current by going on the down current side of the rock. Depending on the conditions you can also get to some wrecks that are at this location.
3. Suwanee reef: A 3/4 of a mile long reef loaded with hard and soft corals, brilliant colors and amazing sea life. This is a shallow dive, mostly around 20 to 40 feet deep and is a great last dive of the day if you have been doing deep repetitive dives. At Suwanee reef I saw frog fish, garden eels, many different nudibranch’s, turtles and very colorful corals and reef fish.
4. The Salvatierra wreck: A 300 foot long cargo transport ferry that sank in 1975. The wreck is loaded with black coral and is home to several very large groupers and big schools of jack. You can find some cargo scattered about the dive site including some trucks. This is really a great wreck dive to go along with several other great natural and artificial wrecks that La Paz has to offer.
5. The Marisla Seamount, colloquially known as El Bajo, is an underwater volcano chain surrounded by the most fabulous pelagic a diver could ever hope to encounter and in such quantities that they completely overwhelm the senses. It is located some eight miles North by North East of La Paz, Mexico in 65-120 ft. of water. The three sea mounts composing El Bajo on any given day are filled with manta rays, nudibrachs, and colonies of eels. Schools of fish swim around like recess was just released and when the conditions are right, scalloped hammerhead sharks circle in the hundreds above divers!
The Sea of Cortez has been called the “world’s aquarium” by Jacques Cousteau and rightfully so. It is a must see for anybody who loves diving.
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b.i.n. = Baja Infortheque Network.