Belize scuba diving

This is the next installment of the Belize trip! So after Chan Chich, we hopped on our charter from Gallon Jug to Dangriga, flying over the beautiful, and seemingly undisturbed, Maya Mountains. We were picked up in Dangriga and driven to Hamanasi, home for the next 10 days.

Hamanasi is located just south of Hopkins Village, a small, sleepy fishing village.

We arrived about 4 or 5 p.m. on Oct 12, a Tuesday. and spent the rest of the day lounging around the grounds. We were actually just laying out at the beach when 2 ladies approached us from the beach and asked us to check out their wares. We ended up looking at their stuff and I chose a pretty cool orange/yellow/brown bag for $25. The lady lied and said she handsewed it. I later found out it was machine-sewn somewhere in Guatemala. I was pissed about being lied to, but I still like the bag. The entire clan staying at Hamanasi that week was couples, most were honeymooners, a couple were celebrating anniversaries, and one was neither but at least half that couple wished they were honeymooning;)

Anyways, the next day began 3 straight days of diving adventures. We went with 3 other guests and the dive crew to the southern barrier reef. This entails about 45 min boat ride and a 1/2 day of diving.

The little boat on the left was our boat for day 1 and the big boat on the right was our boat for dives 2 and 3.

This was the view as we drove away from the coast, the Maya Mts in the background.

We dove to 80 feet our first day. Highlights were a turtle swimming right beneath me and many stingrays. And of course there was dazzling fish and coral. On our return trip, we encountered a pod of bottlenose dolphins swimming all around us (see video below)!

We didn't expect to get to dive Blue Hole, where divers dive to 130 feet, but because our group of new divers did so well and they had a large enough group to go the next day, we were cleared to dive Blue Hole the following day.

So the second day we went to the famous Blue Hole, seen below. Despite taking 2 dramamine pills, the choppy seas made for a sickening ride. Randy enjoyed the boat ride up on top and I barely held my stomach down in the back of the boat. Once inside the Blue Hole though, the waters were calm and we descended easily to 130 feet. However we descended in a crappy spot and really didn't see much. We were all disappointed so the divemasters said we could go down again instead of one of the other 2 dive spots. We opted to go down Blue Hole again in another spot, but that required a 2 hr rest to detox our body (from the excess nitrogen build-up).

Our second attempt at Blue hole was much better. Not only were the geological formations much more interesting than the sheer wall we had been at before, we also had 3 reef sharks circling below us. It was simply amazing!

After that dive we ate lunch and toured Half Moon Caye, a protected island that is an important nesting site for red-footed boobies and magnificent frigatebirds. The island was also home to cool lizards and tons of hermit crabs.

The third day we dove at Glover's Atoll. We completed 3 dives thid say as well, 80 feet for dive 1 down to 50 feet for dive 3. Highlights were more turtles, spotted ray, and a dolphin that swam right by our group! by the end of our diving, we had swam with all 3 species of turtle, the green, hawksbill and loggerhead. The hawksbills were very pretty! We also saw many lobsters, lionfish (exotic), and many colorful fish.

We loved our first official diving adventures (minus the boat ride to get there).