San Pedro,
Ambergris Caye, Belize Dive Trip
January 11, 2004
to January 18, 2004
The room at the Mayan Princess was nice. The hotel is right on the beach, but swimming is best done off of a dock because of sea grass. My room (6) was on the first floor with a private porch. It was far enough away from the local bars and nightclubs such as Fido’s (pronounced Feedoze) to be pretty quiet. Music ends around 11:30 pm in San Pedro.
Sunday. After unpacking, wandered the streets of San Pedro. Yes this is an LDC. The streets are dirt or sand. Several restaurants have dirt floors, but the major ones like Elvi’s or Celi’s do this more for effect (and maybe economy, but not necessity.) There are lots of small souvenir shops and restaurants. It is a pleasant small town of maybe 4,000 depending on which source you use. Bought some purified water at the San Pedrano Grocery behind the hotel. Next to the playground between Front Street and the Caribbean are several stalls where vendors sell Belizean crafts. They are also sold along Front Street and the beach
My dive package included Amigos del Mar for diving, which is on a dock right outside the Mayan Princess. I went over to Amigos to fill out forms and was assigned what turned out to be the advanced boat. (They were running only two in the morning, but had several more boats.) Gilmar was a real help in their office.
Had my first Beliken beer at Cholo’s Sports Bar just up the beach from the hotel. It’s a nice open-air bar that attracts both locals and tourists.
Had dinner at Caliente on the beach in an open room with a local family at the only other occupied table. Later a pair of Americans came in.
This area seems very quiet at night. Or at least Sunday night.
Monday. This was my first dive. Tony the dive master offered to hook up my gear and take care of it. He cleaned masks and switched tanks during the surface interval. At the end of the morning’s dives, he washed my gear and hung it up to dry. They stored my dive bag also. All the gear was back in the boat in the morning. I dove with Tony and Renee (the captain) all week.
The weather was probably around 75 and cloudy.
We used back rolls into the water and floated until everyone was ready to go to the bottom. All dives were “drift dives.” There was no current to speak of most of the time, but Tony the dive master led us, and Rene the captain followed in the boat. All dives included a five-minute safety stop at 20 feet. This was group diving on Amigo’s dive plan. You could have a computer, but not use it for determining bottom time.
Dive 1. Today we did Victoria Canyon. I tried out my first underwater camera. There were at least a dozen nurse sharks on the sandy bottom of the canyon at 95 feet. Several included remora on them. We did a couple of swim throughs that were fun. Bottom time was 44 minutes.
Water temperature felt cool at 77 degrees wearing my dive skin and a 3 mm shorty.
The surface interval (45 minutes) was back at Amigos where there was fresh coconut, pineapple, watermelon and oranges. With the time to and from dive sites, the total surface interval was around 60 minutes.
Dive 2. Tiberon (Shark in Spanish, but there were none). There were lots of canyons, most below our max depth of 60 feet. I wish I had nitrox. More on this below. Instead of sharks we saw two turtles, a lobster and a crab. We also saw some small purple and orange fish, grunts, parrotfish, sergeant major, and blue tang. There were lots of good coral and sponges.
We got back at the dock around 12:30.
I found a hole-in-the-wall restaurant (Ruby’s) serving Johnnycakes for breakfast filled with chicken, ham or ham and cheese. This day I tried the banana bread and a small coffee. Local workers, school kids and tourists crowded in here. Two small tables that had very little room gave me a chance to sit down.
I had lunch at Caramba Cocina (lobster sandwich) and dinner at Elvi’s, which is a diver tradition.
Hung around a couple of bars. Spent most of my time at Cannibal’s talking with a family from Wisconsin. There was a game of trying to hook a 3-inch ring on a light rope on a hook in a post. Make up your own gambling rules.
Tuesday. There was a light rain, but we went out. The ocean was up a little making the ride through the breakers on the reef a little more difficult for Renee.
Dive 3. Tuffy. Again lots of nurse sharks. Tony held one upside down and passed it around. Saw two nurse sharks fighting over a fish that one had taken to be his breakfast. Water temperature was 75 degrees.
Profile: 92 feet (max) for 49 minutes.
Dive 4: Boca Chica. This dive was at a maximum of 62 feet (max) for 48 minutes. Like all the other second dives, I came back on with around 1,000 pounds. My dive computer was just shy of the caution. Tony pointed out a Southern Sting Ray about four feet across that was in the sand. He also found a flounder and a trumpet fish. Other sightings included small mouth grunt, four eye butterfly fish, blue tank, blue chromis, red-banded parrotfish, squirrelfish, gargantuan grouper, fairy basset, French angel and a spotted moray eel.
Lunch: Ambergris Delight. I got talking with a hotel manager from Nantucket Island, Massachusetts who was spending a month or two in Belize. He reported that he was moving up the beach to Patojo’s dive operation. He also said that Patojo’s seemed to offer more personalized service than Amigos del Mar.
Dinner: Cannibal’s Bar and Restaurant (lime chicken kabob)
Wednesday. The rain and winds were heavier making the passage through the waves at the edge of the reef more exciting and damp.
Dive 5. Tackle Box. There were interesting canyons and a few swim throughs. There were more schools of nurse sharks, including one of five. Tony held one in his arms and turned it upside down. They are very docile creatures. He also passed around a sea cucumber and the head of a dead king lobster. There were great sponges and corals.
Profile: 86 feet (max) for 50 minutes.
Dive 6. Sand bar. Mix of fish similar to Boca Chica.
Profile: 71 feet (max) for 41 minutes.
I signed up for the Blue Hole trip for Thursday. It includes a wall dive at Half Moon Caye and one at the Aquarium.
For lunch, I had shrimp fajitas at Celi’s overlooking the ocean. Restaurants end lunch at 2 pm here. I ate dinner at Mango’s looking at the ocean reflect the stars and a few lights.
Thursday. The weather started to clear as we left the dock at 6 am for the open water crossing to the Blue Hole on a larger, more enclosed boat. Once we hit the open water, it got rough, and we had to stay in our seats for the two hours it took
Dive 7. The Blue Hole is an awesome geology dive. It is a cave or cavern dive with the opening at the top of the cave at the surface of the Caribbean. Along the edge there is a sandy bottom down to about 40 feet. Then it drops off and stalactites and stalagmites are visible. We went down to around 130 feet and swam among them. Very few fish at this depth, but those that I saw were swimming funny. One was swimming on its side and bending its body to move instead of depending exclusively on its fins. Visibility was 20-30 feet instead of the 70 feet we had at other sites. No sharks visible at depth.
Amigos del Mar made it clear we were to use their profile and ignore our computers.
While back up around 30 feet over the sand doing our safety stops, a couple of Caribbean Reef Sharks come out of the haze and pass abut 30 feet away.
Water temperature: 73 degrees
Profile: 143 feet (max) for 32 minutes.
Dive 8. We moved to the Half Moon Caye wall for a second dive. This is part of the Lighthouse Reef Atoll. It was awesome. I saw five or six tarpon just hanging around in a canyon. Spotted a moray eel calmly moving along a way. There was a wide variety of other fish. A mother and her two sons were diving nitrox on this dive (but not the Blue Hole). She got it at Protech, as I suspected. They do the standard practice of having the diver verify the mix and sign the logbook.
Profile: 65 feet (max) for 51 minutes.
We had a picnic of BBQ chicken and potatoes au gratin on Half Moon Caye, which is a Belize national park. Walked through the jungle (bare foot) to a 20-foot tower to see the red-footed boobies and frigate birds. There were dozens of each all around.
Dive 9. Eagle Ray Alley and the Aquarium. A slight change in plans had us covering two sites instead of one. We did the top and upper edge of the reef. There were great corals and sponges. We were surrounded by schools of French grunts. We saw coral blooming and some sort of sea worm on some coral. The further out atolls and reefs are in better shape.
Profile: 57 feet (max) for 55 minutes.
Dinner: With some divers at the Blue Water Grill. I had red snapper in a spicy soy sauce. It was very good. Probably not authentic Belizean cooking
Friday. The weather continued to improve. Temperatures were in the high 70s.
Dive 10: Hol Chan Canyon/Shark Ray Alley. We were diving with Anta from Belize Underwater, which is probably why we went there. It cost BZ $5.00 because Hol Chan is a national park. We saw and followed lots of spotted eagle rays sucking down the air, but it was worth it. We saw one nurse shark and a juvenile barracuda. I saw another juvenile barracuda during the safety stop. The sun came out full blast and the temperature moved into the low 80s. Visibility improved also.
Water temperature: 77 degrees.
Profile: 87 feet (max) for 45 minutes due to chasing the rays.
Dive 11 (my last dive); Dardenellos. Anta came along with us again. Tony pulled some fish pieces out of his BCD to attract fish, which swarmed around him. I was glad to see Anta because I think they gave us a better location when she was on the boat. I saw a large moray eel come out of its hole without any prompting. It tried unsuccessfully to eat a couple of blue striped grunts. It then tried to investigate Anta’s underwater video housing.
Toward the end of the dive we saw several turtles. All in all, a good last dive.
Profile: 60 feet (max), 55 minutes.
Lunch was at Lily’s, which is a hotel with a restaurant on the beach between the Mayan Princess and Cholo’s Bar. The chicken fajitas were good to OK. Met a couple from the Blue Hole trip who were staying at Ramon’s. They like it and recommended a second floor room so you could see the thatched roof. The thatching forms the walls in most of the units.
We had dinner at Celi’s. The stone crab was not very good.
Saturday. The weather continued to get better, but not very hold. I could have done another day of diving, but I decided to see Lamanai, which is the site of Mayan ruins.
Amigos del Mar. I thought that Tony the dive master was excellent at finding things, but one day a diver who had not dove in a few years joined us. She told Tony that she was rusty and would take her time going down. He ended up holding her by the shoulder strap of her BCD for the entire dive, which she probably did not need. The next day of diving she and her friends were on the beginner boat and were not happy about it. They were kept above 60 feet and never got to the top of a reef, let alone down in a canyon to get close to most of the fish. They reported there was one couple where the wife literally hung onto her husband during the entire trip and dive.
I also got some answers from Amigos that did not show a great deal of effort to accommodate my desire to do a lot of diving. I told them that I wanted to dive and to tell me about afternoon dives. They said they had none, but later I learned that there were some, but I would have had to go out half an hour after coming in.
I was told that they could get nitrox, but I would need my own analyzer. As mentioned above ProTech offers nitrox, which I could have verified the night before and initialed the tag (or tank) before it was sent to Amigos.
I think they were concerned about the surface interval between the morning and afternoon dives. Maybe they thought the nitrox would be an effort for them or would lead me to want to dive my own profile. Of course, nitrox could have made the afternoon dive more possible and left me less tired. Or maybe they thought they would be duplicating dive sites for me in the afternoon.
I also told them I was interested in off shore dives to Turneff, but they never materialized.
Diver Operations. Thursday I wandered around talking to dive operators in San Pedro. The ProTech operation was clearly the most sophisticated offering more rental equipment including cameras, scooters, nitrox, and rebreathers, and more technical dive instruction. I would like to find out more about their dive schedule.
Also, I left my sunglasses in their store. I gave up on finding them, but the woman in the store came running out after me when I walked by several hours later and return them.
Blue Hole Dive seemed competent, but there seemed to be no real reason to go with them. There was some equipment in the store.
Patojo’s was recommended by the hotel manager from Nantucket for personalized service, but when I went in the woman behind the counter did not know what nitrox was. They had lots of wet suits, regulators and BCDs in the shop. I’m not sure that I would go with them.
In summary, next time I go to Belize, I will probably go to one of the further out atolls.
PS—After reading Bruce Baker’s report on Belize, I tend to agree with him. The nightlife was very limited and there did not seem to be a lot of divers and other tourists around. I think the fish were healthier than the corals around Ambergris. There seemed to be a lot of excess capacity around. There was lots of rental equipment not being used and there were dive boats not going out. Several trips to outer atolls that were posted were cancelled because enough divers did not sign up. All the restaurants had empty tables.