76. Blowing Bubbles in Belize

After two weeks of exploring the Yucatan Peninsula with Eitan and his family, I was headed next door to Belize. Eitan dropped me off at the bus station in Playa del Carmen and I took the bus to the Cancun airport. I would be flying the Belizean airline Tropic Air which flies out of the special FBO terminal. The plane was a small prop plane capable of holding a maximum of a dozen passengers, but there were only about 6 people on my flight. We flew over the beautiful blue coastline and arrived in Belize City an hour later. I spent my first night at a mediocre hotel in Belize City. Being the largest city in the country, I was surprised that there wasn’t much to see or do there, so I spent my first day just relaxing. The next day, I headed down to the dock where my boat transfer would pick me up and take me to the dive resort.

Belize is right between the Yucatan Peninsula and Honduras, where I got my SCUBA certification four years ago, and known as a world-class diving venue. My mind was filled with images of epic reef diving, including The Great Blue Hole, a bucket list experience for any diver. After reading a few blogs about the best place to stay for diving there, most recommended popular destinations like San Pedro or Placencia, but this would depend on scheduling, minimum group size, weather, and would also require a two-hour boat ride to the dive sites each day and another two hours back. Then I stumbled upon a blog that recommended just staying on the same atoll as The Great Blue Hole and I began to research accommodations for this alternative. Doing so would require staying on the island for 4 to 7 nights, but the boat ride would only be a matter of minutes to all the best diving in Belize. There are two all-inclusive dive resorts on the Lighthouse Reef Atoll and only one of them was open, Itza. So, I checked availability and made my reservation!

As mentioned above, I got to the dock around the designated time that afternoon and met with Elvis, the manager, and divemaster at Itza Resort. Unfortunately, the other two guests he was picking up along with me were delayed at the airport and it was starting to rain. Elvis and I sat and chatted for a while at a nearby restaurant until the others arrived and we left about an hour behind schedule. It was a relatively smooth boat ride to the resort, taking about an hour and a half, and we arrived at the sunset. One of the staff showed us to our rooms and I was immediately taken back by this little slice of paradise. The entire resort is made of mahogany, teak, and pine and beautifully constructed. My room was on the second story with a hammock on the balcony, overlooking the tops of the palm trees that line the beach.

We met Elvis in the common area around 6:00 pm to get the introduction to the resort and be served our complimentary Belizean cocktail called the “Panty Rippa”. Although the resort has 24 rooms, it had suffered from travel restrictions and only three rooms were occupied during my time there. One room was taken by a couple of young ladies from Denmark and the other was occupied by my new dive buddies, a father and son from Colorado. Since the Danish girls were only there for snorkeling, our primary dive group would just be Elvis, the two from Colorado and me. For some of the dives, we would be joined by three young guys from Guatemala who were staying on their parent’s boat nearby. Elvis explained that, although our room packages included 8 dives over three days, we were welcome to dive as much as we wanted at $50 per additional dive. Contrary to the other dive resorts, there was no minimum group number and if only one person wanted to go diving, he would take them. For now, our dive times for the following days would be at 8 am, 10 am, and 2 pm with an optional night dive starting just before sunset.

The following morning, we ate breakfast then tried on all our dive gear. I decided to rent a dive computer because Elvis’s philosophy was that we are all certified and qualified to be diving and it wasn’t his responsibility to manage our dive profiles and that he was just there to serve as a guide. He didn’t want our dives to be limited by the person who uses all their air first, so if we got back to the mooring ball with enough air to stay down for another 10 minutes without going into decompression mode, we were welcome to extend our dive times and continue at our own risk. After Eitan’s and my disappointing diving experience at the cenote, I was happy to have a computer and a well-fitting wetsuit. Elvis said we could even wear two wetsuits if we needed to if we were feeling cold. I was relieved to feel like I was in good hands.

After getting our dive gear squared away, we loaded up into the boat and in less than 2 minutes we arrived at the mooring ball for the first dive, which was a site called The Aquarium. Upon descending to the coral reef, we were quickly surrounded by relatively large fish that followed us for some time, occasionally nipping at Elvis’ dive equipment. What I would come to find out in the following days is that Elvis spends a lot of time spearfishing and hunting for lionfish in the area and all of the fish, sharks and even giant groupers follow him like puppies, hoping for a lionfish snack. The Aquarium was an incredible introduction to diving in Belize: great visibility and a great abundance of marine life. The visibility was so good that I thought my dive computer was broken because it was indicating a depth of 100 feet. I thought I was surely closer to the surface, maybe 30 feet or so down, but confirmed with my depth gauge that I was, in fact, a lot deeper than I thought. It was easy to become distracted and disoriented with all the colorful fish and other creatures, which included Caribbean reef sharks, spotted eagle rays, sea turtles, and large groupers. The next two dives we did were called Tres Cocos and The Cathedral, and each was just as stunning and full of marine life as The Aquarium.

In between dives, we were treated to either snacks or a full meal depending on the time of day. Each meal was a delicious three courses and usually included some kind of protein, rice, and beans as is typical in this part of the world. For snacks, we would be served some fresh fruit with a fresh-baked pastry or cake. It’s safe to say I did not go hungry during my time there! Mealtime was also a good way to socialize with some of the other people staying on the island that would come by for a bite to eat or a drink. I met a guy named Ricky from Seattle who had recently bought a plot of land and was building a freediving and yoga retreat next door. There was another couple from Colorado who had also bought some property and recently finished their house and were having their first guests over. I estimated there were probably less than 25 people on the entire island, which was incredibly refreshing after coming from busy Playa del Carmen.

The final dive of the day was a night dive, so we hopped back into the dive boat and set out around sunset. We descended with our dive lights and began exploring the reef which appeared to be completely different from what we had experienced just a few hours ago. We saw incredible creatures like squid and octopus and I was amazed at their color-changing ability as they escaped our close encounters. We also saw a large moray eel and a jackfish which hunt together along the reef, an interesting symbiotic relationship. There were also nurse sharks, but my favorites were the longspine squirrelfish with their gigantic eyes.

My first day at the dive resort was incredible, and with The Great Blue Hole dive planned for the next day, it was only going to get better!