Belize City Here I Come!!!

Bcollins111900

New member
The wife and I are celebrating our 1st anniv. July 17th with going on a 7 day Cruise with Norweigan Cruise Lines. Ports of call are Belize City, Cozmuel, Roatan and Costa Maya. We have already booked shore excursions with Belize City being my favorite as it is suppose to have awesome snorkeling. I can snorkel in all 4 ports but Belize City is what I am looking forward to the most. Any suggestions on how any of the ports are snorkeling wise or anything I should look out for or not miss? I have a HD underwater camcorder to catch some of the reef. I took some video last year when we went on another cruise as well and it looks awesome.
 
I was in Belize City for a couple of days on a project many years ago. I don't recall seeing any inshore reefs - it was all mangrove and seagrass. We spent two weeks diving out on Glover's Reef, very nice, but that was pretty far from shore. There may be a second string of reefs inshore from the barrier reef that they take people to snorkel on.

Bill
 
been there...done that...

been there...done that...

The wife and I are celebrating our 1st anniv. July 17th with going on a 7 day Cruise with Norweigan Cruise Lines. Ports of call are Belize City, Cozmuel, Roatan and Costa Maya. We have already booked shore excursions with Belize City being my favorite as it is suppose to have awesome snorkeling. I can snorkel in all 4 ports but Belize City is what I am looking forward to the most. Any suggestions on how any of the ports are snorkeling wise or anything I should look out for or not miss? I have a HD underwater camcorder to catch some of the reef. I took some video last year when we went on another cruise as well and it looks awesome.

You will have a very short window in Belize for activities. The best way to see Belize is with a private tour guide who will meet you at the dock and whisk you away from the masses of people. What the cruise ship is trying to sell you is a "cattle drive". Not any fun being crowded into a bus with 75 other cruisers ans standing in huge lines to do your activities.

I would suggest Donald Ramerize, a licensed tour guide and ex Dragon Force member "DEA" of the Belize Defense Force. I have used his services many times when in Belize. If you make the first tender 'very important" off the ship you will beat the masses of people, Donald will be waiting for you with his air conditioned private vehicle, and off you go!

We hit all the major attractions in the six hour window of time you have before the last tender back to the boat. We did the zip line, cave tubing, Belize zoo, Alta un the Mayan ruins, tour of Belize city and local lunch on the river of home cooked Belize food and stopped at a friends of his that does local wood carvings and got a really neat head carved from mahogany.

We were the first people at the zip line was only us, and just as we were rappelling down the last tree stand, four of the Cruise ship buses pulled up and out poured hundreds of people a real mess. We we the ONLY ones at the Mayan ruins, made it there before the masses, as we did at every stop.

Trying to get some snorkeling in is tough, as you must travel to Turneff atol about 25 miles offshore to get to clean water with nice reefs, and you end up doing all travel time, and 30 minutes in the water, and if the seas are rough that day, is a pretty miserable trip by boat. You will be better off doing the land attractions in Belize, and snorkeling all the other ports as it is easily assessable , especially Costa Maya, walk through the tourist rip off village, turn right and walk a few hundred yards to where you can access the beach, and snorkel there.....very nice, no charge, and nice inshore patch reefs. Roatan is the same way, walk through the tourist village out to the main road, turn left walk over the hill...and you will find all the locals ready to show you the island, beach, and great restaurant for a lobster and conch lunch at less than 1/2 what the cruise ship charges for the same activities.

Richard TBS
 
Well we have been back... came back sunburnt (I did at least) and getting to New Orleans and getting to Columbus were an adventure in there own... thankyou Delta! Belize City was probally the worse spot of any where we went snorkeling. They tendered us right from the ship which was anchored about 8 miles off short. Saw a bunch of elkhorn coral which was nice but the water to me was not very clear and mistly sea fans... was sort of let down. Now for who had the best snorkeling.... Roatan hands down best I have ever seen in all the places in the carribean I have ever been to. Crystal clear water a TON of different species of coral and fish, very active reef.
 
I took some vids as well. I will post them online here in a couple days. I have the underwater 1080p HD camcorder and got some sweet video.
 
I stayed in Placencia and went diving a few time. It was amazing. We went to this cave that they called shark cave. It lived up to its name.
 
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