DECEMBER '97 - JANUARY '98 Volume 13.0
SCUBA TRIP NEWS

BELIZE

IN THE TROPICS FOR NEW YEAR'S EVE

LIFE IS GOOD

   Has it really been four years? My first major dive trip four years ago was to Belize. With only 30 dive logged and armed with an almost unused passport I hopped a plane to travel to a place I had never even heard of. The country, it's people and the diving were all more than I expected. Now four years later and with almost almost 400 dives logged I'm headed back.

    This time I'm traveling with people I know very little about, cyber-dive buddy P. J.  set this trip up from her base in Houston Texas using the WEB as a contact. She did this trip last year and it was very successful so I was looking forward to meeting some new people and diving the world's second longest barrier reef. As it turned out it would only be P. J., her friend Lisa and myself on this year's trip. This was cool.

    My journey as always started at Hartsfield Airport in Atlanta and then on to Houston to link up with the P. J. and Lisa before heading on to Belize. Of course I can't go on any trip without something going wrong and this trip proved to be no exception. Winter storm warnings in Atlanta in December? No, No, this can't be real. Oh sure it can, Monday morning arrived with two inches of snow and announcements that there were airline cancellations at Hartsfield. I called Continental and they informed me that they would leave on time, so a little unsure of the day's outcome I headed for the airport. My fears were unfounded and the plane took off as scheduled, arriving in Houston a little early. I met P. J. and Lisa at the gate for our connecting flight to Belize and everything looked good. We cleared customs in Belize City and caught a cab to the water taxi port for the 45 minute ride to Caye Caulker. The wait for the water taxi was over two hours which we filled by meeting others that would be on Caye Caulker for the week and sampling our first of many Belikin beers, life is good.

    Our plans weren't exactly set in stone and we had no reservations for a hotel on Caye Caulker. The Rainbow, Caye Caulker's premier hotel, was booked solid as were our next two choices. I was getting a little concerned about the possibility of sleeping on the beach, but P. J. came through with a hotel, primitive, but a hotel. The rooms were adjoining with doors that didn't exactly close, but it's highlight was the bathroom, "ceramic" tile floor and walls of a very strange color, a very scary shower with no hot water, and an elevated toilet with a unique approach to a seat. But hey, we're here to dive and party so party we did. Somehow this always ends up in the water doesn't it? No details are available but let's just say I flunked the search and recovery test. The cold front that had hit Atlanta also hit Belize and the night time temperature was about 60, I damn near froze, no hot shower, no blanket, I actually slept in my Polar-Tec wet suit, life is not good!

    The next problem concerned the live-aboard. They were supposed to pick us up in the morning but we were unable to contact them and they left without us.  No problem, we're nothing if we're not resourceful. We moved to Lena's hotel, a definite step up, hot water , blankets, clean and right next to a dive shop. P. J. hooked us up with a friend of hers that has a new dive operation on Caye Caulker, Big Fish, Little Fish Blue Water Diver's. Franzua, Valentino and Sandy picked us up at the dock in their 27 foot Jack boat with a 150 HP Yamaha, this boat would fly.

Our first dive in Belize was at the marine sanctuary Hol Chan. The water temperature was 79 and the viz was a disappointing 50 feet but the reef was beautiful and full of fish on Amigo Wreck. This dive started on the reef and we drifted to end on the wreck of the Amigo, a small freighter sunk at 50 feet as an artificial reef, not that this place needs any artificial reefs. After a few minutes drifting along this awesome reef I heard someone banging on their tank, when I looked up I saw two nurse sharks headed right for me. Nurse sharks, or as I call them, catfish with an attitude, don't alarm me at all but these guys were on a definite mission. They swam right under me and straight toward Franzua.They swam right up his body like they were old friends, TOO COOL!! These guys stayed with us for the entire dive allowing us the pet and scratch them.

We also found a rather friendly green moray I met upclose and personnel as I was exiting the wreck.The two of us were trying to share a compartment that wasn't large enough for two. He finally figured a way around me and we both went out the hatch together. A great opening dive with promises of more to come, life is good.

After a SIT of over and hour Farnzua took us to Pillars Channels, a series of deep canyons lush with corals, sponges and fans and seemed  to go on forever. We were soon thrilled with the first of two spotted eagle rays. He drifted lazily down one of the canyons and allowed us to get fairly close before he picked up the pace and soon disappeared over the reef. The second one didn't get as close but it was still a thrill.

    Our first night on Belize was spent sampling a local restaurant for dinner and Belikin beer and ended at the dive shop to look at the day's video and exchange stories with Franzua, Valentino and several other locals.Franzua told us they would be going to the Blue Hole in the morning and that meant we would have to change dive boats since we would be doing that dive on the live-aboard later in the week. This would prove to be a mistake.

     Lisa was suffering from a cold so she choose to skip this day's diving. Once again P. J. arranged a dive boat from a friend on the island. This shop was under new ownership and still had a lot to learn. As usual I was first in at the dive site and reluctantly P. J. followed, the problem was that nobody else entered for several minutes and by then the boat had drifted quite a distance. We had been told to dive the three fingers that make up Annie's Delight. We did as we were instructed and had a very enjoyable dive but upon surfacing after our safety stop we didn't see the boat. Apparently Oscar, the dive master took the rest of the divers in the opposite direction and did not return to the embarkation point. This put them a half mile from us. The seas had become quite high and we were not sure if the boat had spotted us or not. Fortunately there was one of Blue Water Diver's boats closer so using P. J.'s whistle we signaled them and they came to our rescue. No real harm and I'm sure our boat would have found us but it does make you think about how vulnerable you are at the mercy and skill of your dive boat crew.

    The second dive was almost as strange. This time P. J. said she did not want to be first in so we waited for everyone to get ready before we entered the water. This was to be a drift dive on Sponge Ally, but upon our ascent Oscar proceeded to swim against the current at an extremely fast pace. I decided this was not going to work, took a compass heading and slowed down to enjoy the reef. Again nothing great, one small spotted moray, couple of lobsters, the usual assortment of reef fish, mostly juveniles, but still an enjoyable dive.

    OK, this is New Year's Eve so we needed to party and party we did. The evening started with a restaurant hop for dinner, followed by a return to Franzua's dive shop to watch the day's video and thank Lawrenceo, our rescuer, for helping us. We popped the cork on some of the Champagne P. J. brought and then started bar hopping. We started at Ocean Side and ended up on the dock of our hotel with a couple of stops at The Other Side of The Moon in between. Life is good.

    WOW, it's 1998 and we're still alive!! Everyone was moving very carefully as we roamed the streets looking for breakfast. Diving was out for the day as the wind had picked up, coming out of the North at 30 knots. The good news was the temperature was also up. Feeling more than a little of the effect of the previous night's party, I wasn't too upset about not diving. We just hung around the beach, watched P. J. play some Backgammon, did some shopping and prepared for the next day's trip on the live-aboard.

    The wind was still blowing but the live-aboard trip was still on. Lisa bailed since her cold was still with her so at 7:30 AM P. J. and I boarded the boat for our trip across open water and the Blue Hole. This is the same boat we took to the Blue Hole in '94 and I had some fun with Captain Horace and Dive Master Don about the adventures we had on that trip. The ride over wasn't all that bad, Horace took the long way in order to stay inside the reef as long as possible and stay away from the high seas. Norma, the cook, made us an awesome breakfast, the best food we've had since we arrived in Belize and that's saying a lot.

    Our first dive was Tarpon Creek, strangely named since there were no tarpons and no creek, but a great dive. As if breakfast wasn't enough, Norma out did herself at lunch, I was almost too full to dive, RIGHT! The dive after lunch was the famous Cathedral. This is still one one the best dive sites I have dived. Everything is so colorful and lush, so many fish and the variety of coal, soft and hard, it's almost overwhelming. After this dive we headed for Half Moon Caye to dock for the night. There were way too many people on this boat for everyone to sleep onboard, eight people decided to pitch tents and sleep on the island, bad decision. Around midnight a major storm with winds around 30MPH blew in and took down all the tents, drenching everyone on the island. Most came aboard and found sleeping accommodations as best they could, many people doubled up in single bunks, but everyone seemed to take all this in stride.  

The next morning the storm was still hanging around but not as intense, so after a snack for breakfast we headed for the Blue Hole. It was just as I remembered, the drop into the abyss, the stalactites, and even the 'Cuda was there. We had several "new" divers on this trip and a couple experienced being narced for the first time. This reminded me of my first trip to the Blue Hole which was also my first experience with nitrogen narcosis. One one the new divers said she felt for a moment like she didn't need the regulator and almost took it out but realized what was happening to her before she actually did anything radical. Of course I was feeling a bit of a buzz myself as usual for me on a deep dive. What a great way to start the day!! Life is good.

Because of the bad weather we were only going to do two dives instead of the expected three so our last dive would be Dos Cocos. This was a great dive starting and ending with a large black grouper who put on a little show for us by opening his mouth almost  as wide as he was thick, TOO COOL! I don't know the reason for this but it was very impressive. The ride back seemed to take forever and made me wonder if it was worth it. But looking back, the people we met, the fabulous food, the party in the wheel house, not to mention the awesome diving, yes it was worth it even with the storm and being wet for two days. Life is good!

        When we returned to Caye Caulker we discovered we had been moved again. Lena's had to throw us out and Lisa had moved us to the other end of the island. This hotel wasn't as nice as Lena's but I far as I was concerned I was done moving and stuck it out for the  week. P. J. and Lisa moved again to the Rainbow.

    We had planned to dive the next morning with Franzua but mother nature wasn't quite none with us yet. Shortly after breakfast in comes the wind and the seas got ugly again. I walked down to the dive shop where Franzua reluctantly informed me they would not be diving but to check back later if the wind subsided. There was much discussion about what we should do, stay on the island and try to dive later or go to the mainland and take one of the many nature tours available. Anyone who knows me knows how I voted and I guess I finally won because at 11:00 AM I returned to the shop where Fransua said we could do some "local" dives. Once we were underway they decided we could go to Hol Chan. The first site was one that was unnamed, a series of deep canyons we decided to all Franzua's Canyons. After the dive they took us to San Pedro on Ambergris Caye, the island I was on in '94, for lunch and some shopping, a great way to out-gas.  Our next dive was outside of Hol Chan, stingrays, brittle stars, swim throughs, and friendly groupers made this a great dive. Life is good.

Monday came much too quickly and our plans were to leave Caye Caulker and go to the mainland for some of the nature tours and maybe to Guatemala. Being the "gorilla", as P. J.called me, I choose to skip the nature tours and dive one more day. I would meet P. J. and Lisa at the airport on Tuesday. This dive returned me to Amigo Wreck and those friendly nurse sharks. I got a little braver this time and and following Valentino's example I held one and scratched her belly, TOO COOL! I even held on to one's tail and she towed me across the deck of the Amigo and down onto the sandy bottom, as soon as I let go she came back as if she wanted more, of course I know all she really wanted was fish.

I did tease a grouper as if I had fish in my hand. This proved not to be a good idea, one of the smaller groupers came over to investigate and then a big one came in and hit my hand to get whatever he thought I might be offering. "Oh great, now I bleeding in the middle of all these sharks".

    One of the very large black groupers was being cleaned by several fish, including a small hog fish in the middle of all this. The cleaners would go inside his mouth and gills, amazing. Our SIT was done on shark ally, a snorkel site inside Hol Chan with friendly stingrays and I think those same nurse sharks. The final dive was back outside the reef at Hol Chan. The deep canyons and lush corals were just as beautiful as the first day's dive and at the end we saw a turtle, the first and only of this trip but the eagle rays we had seen on the first day were no to be found.

    It was time to leave paradise again, it gets harder each trip. Belize was everything I had remembered. great diving, the very cool Belizian people, Belikin beer and the awesome food. This is truly a diver's paradise and I will return. We had some bad weather but only missed three dives, so the only disappointment was the lack of a suntan to go home with.

    There was a slight delay in Belize, due to a storm in Chicago our plane was one hour late reaching Belize. This made making the connection to Atlanta impossible. No problem, I hooked up with a woman I'd met on the dive boat Monday and we talked and drank Belikin until the plane left, I was thinking work tomorrow is going to be rough. This was not a problem since I ended up spending the night in Houston because I had missed my connecting flight. Why did I think things would go any smoother at this point.

    I met some really nice people on this trip form almost every part of the world, Australia, Sweden, Norway, France, Switzerland, Germany, Netherlands, England, Canada, and many from the good old USA. I enjoyed meeting P. J. after over a year of Email. Both P. J. and Lisa are very cool women who know how to have a good time. We were at times a little disorganized but everything worked out in the end. Each of us had some "strange" moments but that's to be expected on this type of trip. LIFE IS DEFIANTLY GOOD!!! Where to next P. J.?