CREEVES515
Registered
:07: I just got back from a week at Ramon's village on Ambergris Caye, in Belize. All I can say is wow. Well actually I'll say more, but let me start with a disclaimer. This was my first dive vacation out of the states, so I don't really have an accurate point of comparison. That said, I'd like to report what I did and saw while I was there.
Day one: After a few tense moments on a tiny airplane (one of my fellow passngers actually had to sit at the controlls right next to the pilot), I arrived at the san pedro airport. The nice people there made a call for me and within a couple minutes someone from Ramon's showed up in one of their pink golf carts. He took us (my new wife and myself) right to the front door of our honeymoon suite, took our bags inside, and even gave us some resturant tips. A little while later we headed to the dive shop, located on the pier, there we signed a form and we were ready to dive. They gave us a key to a locker at the dive shop where we stored our dive gear for the remainder of the trip. I found this to be very nice because it kept our gear safe and also kept us from having to haul it back and forth from our room to the pier. Next stop the Purple Parrot Bar at Ramon's a fun place to sit around and have a drink try the la cucaracha if you're brave. When you go, tell julio(one of the bartenders) chris and amelia said hey.
before bed i took a starlight snorkel around the pier which had an impressive collection of underwater life housed in an artificial reef.
-- okay this is getting long with the details and i've got seven more days to go.. i'll skip to the diving. feel free to request any specifics.
Day two: showed up at the pier at 8am and got on the boat with rolando and his first mate andy. I recomend diving with them if you go. we went to a site he called cyprus tunnels, a fifteen minute boat ride. we decended on a sandy spot within the reef at about 50'. here we were greeted by 2 nurse sharks and seveal large gouper, as well as numerous jackfish, horse eye jacks, parrot fish, spade fish, snapper.... i could keep going. the reef here, while not stunning, is very pretty. there were lots of vases and fans. we came to a 15' swim through that let us out around 70' in a narrow canyon in the reef. we finned around over and in several more of these canyons, sighting a hawksbill turtle, spotted eagle rays, and some large barracuda. most of the fish i mentioned earlier were present for the entire dive. when we surfaced andy was there with the boat and helped us aboard. a quick boat ride later and we were at site 2, cyprus canyons. same story as the canyons at cyprus tunnels. multilevel diving as shallow or as deep as you want just folowing the canyons in the fingers of reef. Then, back to the boat, and back to ramon's by lunch.
Day 3:The famous blue hole. Yeah i forked over the dough for me and my wife to do this dive. I go on record as saying it is definitely worth it no matter how new or seasoned you are.my wife got certified the week before we went and she did great. admittedly the blue hole alone didn't even make up for the three hour boat ride out ther not to mention the $195us per person. However they fed us breakfast on the boat, i got to log 140' at the blue hole, we ran into a school of huge bull sharks on ascent, we saw some beautiful scenery on the way to half moon caye, did agreat dive on half moon caye wall: 60' for 47min lots of fish an egle ray and beautiful coral, we ate a great lunch on the gorgeous half moon caye, then had another great dive on long caye wall: 60' for 48 min and the best coral vistas i saw for the whole trip. then we had some great snacks on the two hour trip to ramon's and got back by 4:30. add it up. i had a great time and would do it again
Day 4: Went to hol chan and shark ray alley This is the trip i would skip next time. hol chan is fairly bland 45 minute dive starting in 8' descending to 29' make a u-turn and return to the boat as for shark ray alley there are better ways at much less crowded places to swim with more sharks and rays that night i snorkeled around the pier at ramons again and found a moray eel residing in some of the rubble underneath
Day 5: One of my favorite days. we signed up for a beach picnic earlier in the week ended up going with just one other couple on board. our DM took us on a dive where we got to follow him along as he spearfished for our lunch we collected conch as we followed. after surfacing we headed for a shallow area near the reef where he let us use his spearguns to catch some fish of our own while he began cleaning the other fish in preparation for lunch. as if this fun enough, while we were snorkeling around the reef looking for fish, the scraps of fish and conch thrown in by our DM were atrracting lots of southern stingrays and several spotted eagle rays which i finally got to see really close up. then he cooked all of our haul over a fire of palm fronds, we had belikin beer and sodas with our grouper, snapper, conch. it was excellent and among the best food i had while i was on the island. back to ramon's by 3:30. Later that nigh my wife and i did a night dive at hol chan which was pretty cool but a sunburn from earlier in the day was starting to sting and kept me from enjoying it as much as i could have.
Day 6: ouch that caribbean sun is hot. turns out that little sunburn from the beach picnic is a bad sunburn that kept me from diving this day but it was my honeymoon so i had some back up activities that were just as fun.
Day7: two tank dive at cyprus, Same as day 2 but this time our DM brought along some sardines which attracted droves of huge grouper & snapper and a crowd of nurse sharks. i was able to pet the sharks like puppys hold them like babies and even kissed one on the forhead it was amazing. my wife and i still cant help but smile huge when we tell about it.
It was a greta end to our diving in belize.
Day 8: bye bye belize. a sad departure early in the morning.
-- Ramon's was great and looked nicer than a lot of the other resorts i visited while on Ambergris. San pedro was interesting seemed safe and has a lot to offer. The diving was excellent the weather was beautiful. I'll sing its praises till ican find something to top it. :07:
hope this was helpful and not too long
chris
Day one: After a few tense moments on a tiny airplane (one of my fellow passngers actually had to sit at the controlls right next to the pilot), I arrived at the san pedro airport. The nice people there made a call for me and within a couple minutes someone from Ramon's showed up in one of their pink golf carts. He took us (my new wife and myself) right to the front door of our honeymoon suite, took our bags inside, and even gave us some resturant tips. A little while later we headed to the dive shop, located on the pier, there we signed a form and we were ready to dive. They gave us a key to a locker at the dive shop where we stored our dive gear for the remainder of the trip. I found this to be very nice because it kept our gear safe and also kept us from having to haul it back and forth from our room to the pier. Next stop the Purple Parrot Bar at Ramon's a fun place to sit around and have a drink try the la cucaracha if you're brave. When you go, tell julio(one of the bartenders) chris and amelia said hey.
before bed i took a starlight snorkel around the pier which had an impressive collection of underwater life housed in an artificial reef.
-- okay this is getting long with the details and i've got seven more days to go.. i'll skip to the diving. feel free to request any specifics.
Day two: showed up at the pier at 8am and got on the boat with rolando and his first mate andy. I recomend diving with them if you go. we went to a site he called cyprus tunnels, a fifteen minute boat ride. we decended on a sandy spot within the reef at about 50'. here we were greeted by 2 nurse sharks and seveal large gouper, as well as numerous jackfish, horse eye jacks, parrot fish, spade fish, snapper.... i could keep going. the reef here, while not stunning, is very pretty. there were lots of vases and fans. we came to a 15' swim through that let us out around 70' in a narrow canyon in the reef. we finned around over and in several more of these canyons, sighting a hawksbill turtle, spotted eagle rays, and some large barracuda. most of the fish i mentioned earlier were present for the entire dive. when we surfaced andy was there with the boat and helped us aboard. a quick boat ride later and we were at site 2, cyprus canyons. same story as the canyons at cyprus tunnels. multilevel diving as shallow or as deep as you want just folowing the canyons in the fingers of reef. Then, back to the boat, and back to ramon's by lunch.
Day 3:The famous blue hole. Yeah i forked over the dough for me and my wife to do this dive. I go on record as saying it is definitely worth it no matter how new or seasoned you are.my wife got certified the week before we went and she did great. admittedly the blue hole alone didn't even make up for the three hour boat ride out ther not to mention the $195us per person. However they fed us breakfast on the boat, i got to log 140' at the blue hole, we ran into a school of huge bull sharks on ascent, we saw some beautiful scenery on the way to half moon caye, did agreat dive on half moon caye wall: 60' for 47min lots of fish an egle ray and beautiful coral, we ate a great lunch on the gorgeous half moon caye, then had another great dive on long caye wall: 60' for 48 min and the best coral vistas i saw for the whole trip. then we had some great snacks on the two hour trip to ramon's and got back by 4:30. add it up. i had a great time and would do it again
Day 4: Went to hol chan and shark ray alley This is the trip i would skip next time. hol chan is fairly bland 45 minute dive starting in 8' descending to 29' make a u-turn and return to the boat as for shark ray alley there are better ways at much less crowded places to swim with more sharks and rays that night i snorkeled around the pier at ramons again and found a moray eel residing in some of the rubble underneath
Day 5: One of my favorite days. we signed up for a beach picnic earlier in the week ended up going with just one other couple on board. our DM took us on a dive where we got to follow him along as he spearfished for our lunch we collected conch as we followed. after surfacing we headed for a shallow area near the reef where he let us use his spearguns to catch some fish of our own while he began cleaning the other fish in preparation for lunch. as if this fun enough, while we were snorkeling around the reef looking for fish, the scraps of fish and conch thrown in by our DM were atrracting lots of southern stingrays and several spotted eagle rays which i finally got to see really close up. then he cooked all of our haul over a fire of palm fronds, we had belikin beer and sodas with our grouper, snapper, conch. it was excellent and among the best food i had while i was on the island. back to ramon's by 3:30. Later that nigh my wife and i did a night dive at hol chan which was pretty cool but a sunburn from earlier in the day was starting to sting and kept me from enjoying it as much as i could have.
Day 6: ouch that caribbean sun is hot. turns out that little sunburn from the beach picnic is a bad sunburn that kept me from diving this day but it was my honeymoon so i had some back up activities that were just as fun.
Day7: two tank dive at cyprus, Same as day 2 but this time our DM brought along some sardines which attracted droves of huge grouper & snapper and a crowd of nurse sharks. i was able to pet the sharks like puppys hold them like babies and even kissed one on the forhead it was amazing. my wife and i still cant help but smile huge when we tell about it.
It was a greta end to our diving in belize.
Day 8: bye bye belize. a sad departure early in the morning.
-- Ramon's was great and looked nicer than a lot of the other resorts i visited while on Ambergris. San pedro was interesting seemed safe and has a lot to offer. The diving was excellent the weather was beautiful. I'll sing its praises till ican find something to top it. :07:
hope this was helpful and not too long
chris
