Belize: Top 5 Insider Travel Tips
TRUE BLUE: Diving the Blue Hole, Belize (Nathan Borchelt)
This guest post comes courtesy of Joshua Berman, author of the recently updated Moon Belize travel guidebook.
- 1. If you find yourself on a tight budget after the plane fare to Belize blew most of your wad, choose a budget accommodation from the Toucan Trail, an association of small, often family-run hotels in Belize that charge less than $60 per night. Despite Belize's reputation for being an expensive Central America destination, there are over 100 of these budget options, located throughout the country. Saving money on your hotel every night means you can devote more cash to tours, activities, and restaurants.
- 2. Go on a cave trip in Cayo. The jungle-draped pyramids of Xunantunich and Caracol archeological sites are the most obvious above-ground attractions in Belize's western highlands, also known as the Cayo District. But to get a peek at Xibalba—the Maya underworld—grab a headlamp and sign up for a trip to one of the area's numerous caves. Each is different—some caves, like Barton Creek, you float through in canoes; others, like Actun Tunichil Muknal, force you to hike, swim, crawl, and climb to reach its treasures. Most caving companies are based next door to each other on Burns Avenue in San Ignacio, the area's main town.
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May 22, 2009
Video: Freediving World Record Set at 288 Feet!
In April of 2009 an astounding mark was set at the Vertical Blue freediving competition in the Bahamas. Will Trubridge established a new world record for constant-weight, no-fin freediving at 288 feet. Check out this video of the dive in its eerie, utterly inhuman entirety here:
As Trubridge explains in the YouTube comments, the reason he starts to sink at the 1:20 mark is because, at a depth of around 60 meters, the body becomes negatively buoyant, letting him free fall the rest of the way. But, Trubridge explains, "This obviously works against you in the ascent, as you feel heavy after the turn at the bottom and have to swim all the way back to the surface." He also wears nose plugs and liquid-filled goggles to reduce the degree of equalization needed as he descends.
The deepest I've ever been is 110 feet—and that was with a full scuba tank. This guy, he's just amazing.
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May 07, 2009
Greater Fort Lauderdale Really Is Greater
Pompano Beach Pier (courtesy, Greater Fort Lauderdale Convention & Visitors Bureau)
Have you ever been to Pompano Beach? It's one of those waterfront towns, perhaps the quirkiest and most colorful of a string of beach communities that make up Greater Fort Lauderdale. And it is pretty great. It's the kind of Atlantic seaside community that put Florida on the tourism map. It's the kind of place that hard-working Americans with families travel to on vacation and then vow to one day retire in. It's like Miami’s South Beach—in 1960.
It’s also one of the great, warm-water dive destinations (80-plus degrees) in the continental United States. No, the coral reefs are not as rich as they used to be, not by any means, but there’s still some biological diversity below the surface. And it’s a great, non-threatening place to learn to dive. The folks that run the dive shops are cool and fun to hang with.
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August 12, 2008
Cenote Excursions: Perfect Rain or Shine
LIGHT IN THE TUNNEL: Cave diving, Riviera Maya, Mexico (courtesy, RivieraMaya.com)
The Riviera Maya is world renowned for its spectacular white sand beaches, where you can spend weeks on end laying in the sun, margarita in one hand, trashy novel in the other. But there will be days when it rains. Or simply days when you want a break from the beach. Cenote diving or snorkeling is a perfect alternative if you're looking to do something different.
Cenotes are sinkholes that are carved out of the Riviera Maya's extensive underground river system. They line the coast from Playa del Carmen all the way to Tulum. All are filled with crystalline water and often are connected to one another by tunnels. Some are open air, but the best, at least in my opinion, are those in caves and caverns.
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March 19, 2008
Snorkeling With Whale Sharks off Isla Holbox (Mexico)
"When the captain cuts the engine, jump out of the boat and start swimming as fast as you can," said our guide. We'd been on the water since daybreak and had just arrived at the site. I looked out over what appeared to be a sea of floating mattresses. Huge ones... all moving. We were bobbing above a shoal of 30-foot-long whale sharks. I adjusted my mask and snorkel and asked, again, "You're sure they won't hurt us, right?"
I was in the middle of a two-month tour of the Yucatán with my husband, and we'd seen an island on the map—Isla Holbox—that we'd never heard of. On a whim, we went. A three-hour bus ride from Cancun and a quick ferry ride landed us in the sort of place people dream of: a one town island with sand streets, no cars, Caribbean-style clapboard houses, a handful of eco-friendly hotels, and miles and miles of windswept beaches. That, and from June to September, one of the best places in the world to see whale sharks. They're the largest fish in the world, growing up to 40 feet and weighing between ten and twenty tons. Fortunately for those wanting to swim alongside them, whale sharks aren't man-eaters, sticking instead to plankton, macro-algae, and krill that they skim off of the surface. Tour operators also follow strict conservation guidelines to prevent stressing out the sharks; only two snorkelers and a guide are allowed in the water with any individual whale shark and the duration and number of swim-alongs are limited.
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