My first full day at Itza Resort on the Lighthouse Reef Atoll in Belize was incredible and I still had two more days of diving to go. I had a hard time sleeping and was a bit nervous the night before diving The Great Blue Hole, mostly because of how deep we would descend. Being Advanced Open Water certified meant that I was technically only qualified to dive down to 100 feet, but for this dive, we would go down to 150 feet. I worried about decompression sickness, or if I would be able to equalize the pressure on my ears, or what if I dropped my camera into the great abyss. I tried to calm my irrational brain and Elvis assured us we would be perfectly fine as long as we stayed at his depths the entire time and never strayed.
The Great Blue Hole is a bucket list item for any SCUBA diver and one of the most popular dive sites in all of Belize. Dive boats take one to two hours to come from all over the mainland and more populated islands and wait in line to tie up for a mooring ball. But not us! We left the dock at 7:00 am and arrived at the mooring ball within 10 minutes, We were the only people on site, other than some locals who were there illegally poaching lobster, since this is a marine protected area. We quickly donned our dive gear and descended about 30 feet to the edge of this prehistoric submerged cenote
It was a strange feeling to sit on the sandy edge, next to the great abyss of this famous geologic landmark. Without much marine life in this area, and only sparse coral, it felt a bit like an underwater Martian landscape. Once everyone was in the water and situated, we dumped air out of our BCDs and began the descent down the wall. The reason we were diving down to 150 feet was because that’s where the cave formations are. The Great Blue Hole is really just another, super old cenote that was once above sea level, giving it massive stalactites and columns visible at the 140 to 150-foot range.
I was surprised at how quickly we descended to that depth. The wall down was quite barren and an almost vertical drop-off with no end in sight. Soon, we started to see the thick columns and stalactites and I glanced at my computer, seeing a depth of 149 feet. We would only stay this deep for a few minutes before Elvis began swimming horizontally, guiding us through the different openings and around the formations. Then we started our slow ascent back up, giving us a little more time to check out the lobsters that call this place their home. Eventually, we made our way back to the lip and sat in a row as Elvis assessed everyone’s dive computers. We swam around for a while once we were back at the 30-foot depth, then began to ascend and made our final safety stop at 15 feet.
Everyone high fived at the surface, but the joy of the accomplishment was quickly deterred by all the other boats that had arrived while we were underwater, waiting their turn to take our mooring ball. We were really lucky to have the ability to dive such a popular site all to ourselves and quickly loaded up the tanks to check out the next spot. The plan was to dive another iconic site called Half-Moon Wall but Elvis could see a liveaboard boat already occupying the area. We changed plans and went to Tarpon Caye instead and were immediately greeted by another one of Elvis’ friends, a large grouper who followed us for the entire dive. I tried to take a picture with him but he spooked and I cut my finger on one of his spines, letting out a little trickle of blood. Elvis’ other buddies, the reef sharks, were also following us around and I made sure to keep my finger pinched, just in case.
The second dive that day was just as incredible as all the others and we surfaced to stormy conditions. We had planned to have lunch on Half-moon Caye, but since we were staying so close we just decided to go back to the resort and dive later in the day when the weather cleared up. This was another reason why I loved staying at Itza Resort, because it gave us the flexibility to adjust plans with the weather and to avoid other dive boats. Had I chosen to stay somewhere else, we would be stuck out in the storm!
After lunch and a hammock nap, the rain clouds dispersed and we headed back out to do two more dives. Since I only had 8 dives included in my package, I was a bit hesitant to do them all in just my first two days, leaving my third day open. Elvis assured me it was best to dive while the diving was good and predicted conditions to be a little windy the following day. Our last two dives were named Lighthouse Wall and Chain Wall. Just as before, we meandered our way through the reef and along the different wall segments. There were so many reef sharks and eagle rays on each of the dives that I eventually stopped even trying to take pictures of them and just appreciated their magnificence with my own eyes. Elvis got my attention and pointed out a turtle, lazily cruising along, so I followed and enjoyed my guided reef tour by one of the locals. Watching the turtle and all the other marine life makes time go by in slow motion. What feels like several minutes is only several seconds, as verified by my GoPro recordings.
Our required surface interval between the afternoon dives was spent exploring Half-moon Caye, which has been developed for camping and hosts several adventure groups. The island was beautiful and lined with palm trees and tropical forests. It is also a nesting ground for frigates and red-footed boobies which were currently in their nesting season. I was thankful to see the boobies were nesting in the treetops and not on the ground like the blue-footed dummies on Isla Isabela that we had seen. The island was also home to the largest hermit crabs that I had ever seen, some the size of a fist! Aside from coconut crabs that I had seen on some nature shows, I had no idea they could grow that large without any natural predators. It was a bit sad to see that some of them had made a home of the trash and plastic that washed ashore.
As predicted, my third and last full day on the island was a bit windy and I decided to opt-out of any additional dives. The father and son from Colorado decided to still go out and confirmed that the conditions had deteriorated and visibility was poor compared to the days before. Instead, I explored the island and enjoyed lounging in a hammock and sorting through the many underwater videos I had taken. My time at Itza Resort was incredibly special and I felt lucky to have been able to add this adventure to my SCUBA diving experiences. My only regrets were that I didn’t book the longer, 7-day trip and wished I was able to share the experience with someone.
The next day I was sad to leave, but it was time to discover the rest of Belize!
