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2 weeks vacationing and diving in Belize

Shim — Thu, 27 May 2010 20:28:48 +0000

On our way up to Mexico for our friends’ wedding, we stopped off in Belize for 2 weeks to relax and do a little more diving. Having only dove Roatan in the Caribbean, we were looking forward to diving another location for comparison.

When we arrived in Placencia, we didn’t realize it was coming into low season and rainy season. For most of our 2 weeks, it’s rained a little on some days and a lot on others. We’re also often the only people in the beachfront resort hotel we’re staying in. So we’ve had a staff of 10+ taking care of us each day as we lounge by the pool when the weather cooperates.

We’re staying a 2 minute drive out from the village in Placencia. It’s quiet, and a bit removed from even the slow pace of town. There’s little to do but sit on beach chairs watching the pelicans flying by, or going for a swim in the pool. Our tans have vastly improved.

Last Friday we went for a day of diving with Seahorse Divers around Laughing Bird Caye. 30 minutes away by speedboat; we dropped off some snorklers at the Caye, then proceeded out to Pompion Caye Wall. It’s was a steep and deep wall dive down to 30m and the wall continues down into the blue. We saw 3 large moray eels, a couple big lobsters and crabs, and a few barracudas. We also saw a huge eagle ray cruising below us while doing our safety stop.

During the quick trip back to Laughing Bird Caye for lunch some dolphins showed up to play in our wake. The boat was stopped and we grabbed fins and masks and jumped into the water. They weren’t shy in the least, swimming right below us and circling us as we free dove down a few meters to get closer. For about 10 minutes we chased them around the boat while they made their clicking chatter noises and played amongst us. Swimming with wild dolphins has been on our wish list for a long time and it really made the day memorable.

After lunch the boat took us around the other side of Laughing Bird Caye and we dove the sloping reef and sandy patches. Visibility had worsened considerably to the point where it looked like it was snowing underwater. We found a few arrow crabs, cleaner shrimp, and a toad fish which I’ve never seen before.

A week of laying in the sun and running from the clouds later, we came back to Seahorse to do the whale shark dive. A few days before the full moon and until the quarter moon each May the snappers spawn which draws the whale sharks to Placencia to feed. We rode over some choppy waves for an hour to Gladden Spit, checked in with the rangers and then jumped into the blue searching for schools of snapper and hopefully a whale shark! We dropped down to about 20m and swam our asses off… against current, trying to keep up with the schools of fish. We saw snappers spawning below us, but no whale sharks drifting up from the blue.

We surfaced and headed into the shallows for lunch. We had a bite to eat, a little snorkel around the sandy patches, and then a call came over the radio that they had spotted a whale shark on the surface. We sped out to the site and jumped into the water with our masks and fins. 10m away was a 3-4m whale shark with four or five remoras tagging along. It was only there for a minute and we swam frantically to keep up with it in on the choppy surface before it dove back down into the blue.

We did our last dive hoping to meet up with the whale shark, but it wasn’t meant to be. We saw schools of horse eyed jacks, and some big barracudas and trigger fish were swimming along with us, but apparently we’d only snorkel with one of the giants that day.

We headed home elated, but still shy of our goal of seeing a fully grown whale shark at depth. Halfway there, one of our engines ran out of gas and we had to hang out in the shelter of a nearby group of mangroves while we waited for some additional fuel to be driven out to us, rather than risk the possibility of losing the other engine in the rougher waters. An hour later we were home, happy, and exhausted.

We’re hanging out in Belize for a couple more days before heading up to Belize City to fly over to Mexico. You know, it’s whale shark season in Mexico from June till September. ;)

Read the original article here: 2 weeks vacationing and diving in Belize

From Tamarindo, Costa Rica to Roatan, Honduras

Shim — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 02:40:44 +0000

After 6 months, our time in Costa Rica has come to a close. Last week we woke up early to take the 5am shuttle to Liberia from Tamarindo. Around 9am, we boarded a Ticabus headed to Managua, Nicaragua. A few hours later, we arrived at the Nicaraguan border to find a HUGE line. Spending the next 3 hours frying our brains in the sun while we waited to get our exit visas, then another hour waiting as the Costa Rican DEA randomly selected our bus for a screening, and then another hour getting our entry visas in Nicaragua. During all this, the Canadian men’s final hockey game was going on… something we had realized only a few days earlier. Oops, bad scheduling on our part and we had hoped to make it to our destination on time to catch it. But we did meet a few people on the bus and chatted the hours away.

We arrived in Managua around 7pm. Asking at the front desk of the Ticabus Hotel (a bit of a dump, but you can’t get any closer to the bus station) where to go for a quick bite and we were told to head for the Mall for safety and selection, so we hopped in a taxi. 5 minutes later we arrived at an extremely busy food court complete with karaoke. After a quick McBurger; only the 2nd time we’ve had fast food in the last 6 months, we headed back to the hotel, massively over-tipping the taxi driver by mistake when I did the conversion from Nicaraguan cordobas to Costa Rican colones to dollars wrong. Another oops and definitely not the last. We crashed out early, watching the closing Olympic ceremonies on tv.

With a 3am wake up call and a 5am boarding, we were headed next for Tegucigalpa, Honduras. We arrived at the border and into Honduras with minimal effort. Arriving in Tegucigalpa 7 hours later; we split a taxi with Peter – another Canadian who we’d met on the bus and was going the same way, and headed to another bus station. When we arrived at the station, the taxi driver wanted $15 a piece for the 10 minute ride. Oops. Always negotiate the price beforehand! We bartered and complained him down to $5 each. Still not exactly a deal.

We grabbed a quick lunch of chicken and rice from a little cafeteria and then got onto another bus headed for La Ceiba. This time with no air conditioning and another 7 hours still ahead of us. After a very sweaty ride and a few liters of water we arrived in La Ceiba. Staying downtown near the ferries there weren’t too many options beyond a Pizza Hut and a Wendy’s, so we went for a pizza and a beer. Unfortunately, the restaurant had run out of beer! Ugh, the hardships of being on the road. ;) Downtown La Ceiba didn’t really seem to have much in the way of options, so we headed back to the hotel.

The next day we woke up early again and caught the 9am ferry to Roatan. We caught a collectivo taxi and headed south to Casa Calico where we’ll be staying for the next couple months. We unloaded the car and checked in, only to realize that in all the bustle I hadn’t grabbed my laptop bag! Shit. Panic ensued. My laptop, my dive computer, my backup drives, everything was in that bag. We ran up the street to where Peter was staying, but the driver had already been there and gone, headed to the hotel of the 3rd couple in the van. While I went to the main road to possibly catch him if he headed north to the ferries again, Kelly went to the house and talked with the front desk about how to get in touch with the driver’s company and made a few calls. 15 heart pounding minutes later, they’d tracked it all down and he was headed back our way. Needless to say, the driver got a bigger tip than the one I had previously miscalculated. But lesson learned, don’t carry your backups in the same bag. Kelly and I will swap drives from now on instead.

And so ended 3 very long, uncomfortable days on the road with over 20 hours spent in a bus. Kelly and I are very happy to have arrived. We’re not really emphatic travelers, preferring the destination over the process of getting there.

So far, we’re loving Roatan. It was cold when we first arrived. Around 27 degrees Celsius, which was an adjustment after the months of 36 degree weather we’ve been having in Costa Rica… but it’s warmed up considerably already.

As is the case with most dive destinations, the people are very friendly. Will from the dive shop even took us out scouting for apartment options when we first arrived and the dive crew are a hilariously good time. We’ve already made some new friends and gotten a ton of advice about living on Roatan. We’re stocked up with a kitchen, have done a few dives already, and had a few good nights out on the town with our new friends. So we’re settling in nicely, back to work, and enjoying our days off in the water.

Read the original article here: From Tamarindo, Costa Rica to Roatan, Honduras

Week 61: Where’s the skip button?

Kelly — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 15:11:54 +0000

This week has been skipped due to the lack of interesting events in which to post about. Instead here’s a picture of Tamarindo.

Read the original article here: Week 61: Where’s the skip button?