Hol Chan Marine Reserve, Belize
Ambergis Caye / San Pedro II
Around
town
After
showering off the salt water and having a nice relaxing coffeee on
our super balcony, we ventured into town, and here you always meet
nice people, today we met another guy from the US coming here for 13
years to dive. And then we booked our snorkeling trip: hopefully this
time it won’t be cancelled due to weather. Back through the little
streets in the town bakery – super market – checking out the
narrow streets and escaping golf carts, we have a quick break until
it is time for a Super Burger at the Plaza. If we stay too long here
we will be too relaxed!!
Snorkeling
at Hol Chan Marine Reserve
ok
we have time to do one snorkeling trip so what should we do: Hol Chan
or Mexico Rock – they say there are more fish at Mexico Rock but
in Hol Chan you swim with the sharks: so Gine says: Sharks!! We were
all ready this morning and out on the boat at 9 am with Serious
Adve
Only
4 miles of shore from San Pedro we are then very close to the Reef
and the huge breaking waves: It is fascinating to see the waves break
at the reef.
- Hol Chan means little Channel: it’s a cut in the Reef 23m wide and 9 m deep (by the way we swam through it)
Once
there after all the safety instructions we are finally in the water –
and where it looked first that clouds are all coming in, we ended up
with a beautiful blue sky. You put the head underneath and you see
fish!! the Snapers as well as the yellow tailed silver fish came
super close and Gine actually could touch several of them: maybe they
liked the yellow camera (as per internet it would be the horeseye
jack or a yellowhead snapper – more internet
investigation needed). Then we saw underneath us a stingray sleeping
in the sand and suddenly he moved and swam away – that was also
super cool. We saw the Zebra fishes, (or Sergeant Major fish) then a
lot and lot of fishes near corals (I think they are the blue striped
grunts and french grunts), there was one with red (as per internet it
likely was the Stoplight parrot fish) as well the black with blue
fish (good thing we have internet to identify them: The Blue Tang –
by the way the blue sparkles super nicely) – and yes we did saw
Baracudas (that is at least one fish I recognize without
internet search).
He did pointed out a trumpet fish to us, the picked up a black urchin
(Gine couldn’t go fast enough away from that one).
And
after we were “fished” out – we were swimming through the Coral
channel – that was kind of super cool, good thing he knew where to
swim, we saw a lot of different corals and you could see also the
drop going down – once outside of the reef when looking down you
could only see water underneath you – it was super cool. And then
all the way back and that it was not too boring we spooted an Eagle
ray and then later an octopus. We both loved it
Then
we moved on and they did a quick stop with us, so that we could see
the famous Loggerhead turtle: and it even swam close to the boat and
stuck
out it’s nose – they are endangered species and an adult can be
up to 300 lbs (and yes it was a big one).
- Loggerhead turtles are endangered species, they can way up to 400 lbs and can reach 4 ft in length
- they also can live up to 150 years
And
the next Stop Shark Alley: here you put on your stuff
– jump on the left
side off the boat and swim around the boat, because the sharks will
be always on the right
side – and don’t go to close, especially don’t panic and wave
around your arms, because then they may eat a finger!! Sounds easy –
but unbelievable Gine suddenly thinks she is too close and tries to
backup – they are not that tiny. Paul drifted in even further and
the Nurse Sharks actually touched him!!! Ok good thing is (that
hopefully the sharks now that too): they don’t attack humans:
- nurse sharks are slow-moving bottom dwellers and for the most part harmless to humans
- they can be huge up to 14 ft
- they have very strong jaws with thousands of tiny teeth and will bite defensively if bothered
A
relaxing afternoon?
First
we had coffee and recovered on our balcony – but we can’t sit for
too long: on we went along the Beach onto the dock of the Palapa Bar
– then towards the town so we can stroll up and down some of the
streets... guess we stopped again in the bakery. We came by the
Artisan Market: a fancy name for gift shops, admired more of the golf
carts, sitting in the central plaza and watch people, enjoy some time
in the loungers at our place to soak up some sun – you can never
get in enough Vitamin D. And we did enjoy the wind!!! Today it is
another very windy day in Paradise. We got told it is mostly windy at
this time of the year, good thing is you won’t feel that hot, but
then everything gets always blown around.
Good
bye busy Caye
up
with coffee and beautiful sunshine – relaxed breakfast. Our
original plan was to use the closer ocean ferry – but then we would
have to wait until 1 pm!!! to long, so we walked to the Belize
Express ferry and were on the 11.30 one. This one was a super small
boat and we were stuck underneath.
2025-05-22