Snorkeling or City Tour in Belize

[IRISHSPRING]

This is my very first post; however, doing a lot of reading of reviews. When taking the snorkeling excursion (looks like coralbreeze tours) might be the best, do you see any of the town of Belize? Sounds like Caye Caulker is really pretty. OR I was thinking of doing the ship excursion and taking the city tour and the air boat ride. I would like to see a little bit of Belize and not just water.....tubing sounds awesome, but I am soooo claustrophoic. I have cruised before and hate ship excursions, but I'm stumped what to do in Belize. I'd appreciate any input. And thanks everyone for all your help - this CC site is awesome.

[obsq]

We were in Belize last week (March 25) with the Carnival Valor. We did the Airboat/City tour in the morning and a snorkeling excursion in the afternoon. Half of the city tour was before the airboat tour, and half was after. It was interesting to see the city, houses, people and shops. The narration along the tour was interesting also. The airboat is fun, but there's not much wildlife. They advertise that you stop to look for manatee, but in reality, we only stopped for about a minute while the guide said they come up every 3 to 5 minutes for air, for about 3 seconds, and if you're lucky, you see their nostrils sticking out of the water. Odds of seeing them are nearly zilch. We went to an area where there were 2 crocodiles and 3 turtles. That was the extent of the wildlife, other than birds. Birders might like it as there were several kinds of birds that we stopped to look at. It was a fun and relaxing tour, the same as the airboats in the everglades. The city tour and airboat tour was done by Bak-a-Bush. We went on a snorkeling tour in the afternoon and really enjoyed it. We snorkeled for about 45 minutes, then went to Bannister Island and relaxed on the beach. We snorkeled at all four ports, and this was probably our favorite. It's a tough decision on what to do in Belize. We also wanted to do the River Wallace and ruins, but that will have to wait until next time. In answer to one of your questions, if you do the snorkel tour, you won't see any of the city since the tender will probably pick you up at your ship, which is a couple miles off shore, and will take you straight to your snorkel site. (At least that's what ours did). The tender takes about 15 minutes to reach the city. We saw lots of tourists just outside of the shopping village, but I personally would not have been comfortable doing that.....I was glad I was on a guided tour on the bus. Good luck on your decision.

[Fourseventeen]

You wont get claustraphobic doing the cave tubing tour. My wife is very (and I do mean VERY!) claustraphobic and loved it!. Plus you get to see a lot of sites along the drive to the cave tubing site.

[crewsweeper]

If you want to snorkel, the barrier reef around Belize is awesome. If you're snorkeling in any other port(s), you may want to take a break and do the city tour. The City/Zoo tour will show you not only the city sights but a bit of th ecountryside. Zoo is outside Belize City and akin to a game preserve (they do some animal rescue there). A good intro to that section of Belize.

 

obsq must have had a long port day to jam in what most folks do in two port visits. Doing the snorkeling in th eafternoon and getting picked up and dropped off at the ship were definitely time savers; nice planning.

[IRISHSPRING]

Thanks for your help all. I have not snorkeled in some time, maybe this is the place to do it. Thanks Crewsweeper - I have read several of your posts and seems like you know your stuff...I would love to see some of Belize, but there's always another time. The snorkeling trip I was looking at included swimming with string rays - that scares me - anyone know about that? Wouldn't want a stinger in my heart - like that guy on TV (forget his name). Australian guy.... Such decisions.....(it's a tough life wondering how to spend you're cruise).

[obsq]

I'm not familiar with the stingray tours in Belize, but we did a combined snorkeling/stingray excursion in Grand Cayman. I was nervous too, but when you consider that thousands of people hold them each week and no one gets hurt, it will make you feel better. :) Supposedly, the one that killed Steve Erwin was a different type than the ones in the Carribean...at least that's what I read, and these are used to people handling them constantly. It was awesome to feel them brush against you as they swam by and I finally held one. You won't regret doing a stingray tour!! Some ports have them in a one acre enclosure, while the ones in Grand Cayman are swimming free in the sea. Not sure about Belize. What ports are you visiting?

 

You're right, crewsweeper, it wasn't easy to get it all done in one day. We were in port for 9 hours, (8 to 5). The city tour was scheduled 8:30 to 11 and when we booked the snorkel tour, it was from 1 to 4:30, so not a problem. Then they changed it to begin at noon! The city tour left late, so we got back to the ship at 12:35 and missed our scheduled tour. I ran to guest services and they put us on the Bannister Island/snorkel tour at 1 and we barely made it! I was bummed that we missed the one I originally booked, but it worked out and ended up being our favorite place to snorkel on the cruise. The interesting thing about Belize is that if you don't book a tour, there is NOTHING to do, but there are SO many good tours that it's hard to decide what to do!

[IRISHSPRING]

The ports I'm visiting are Key West, Fl., Costa Maya, Belize (of course), Cozumel and Nassau. I have everything booked for Costa Maya and Cozumel. Just was undecided about Belize. I was just in Nassau this past September, so know what to do there. Key West, sounds like there's nothing to do there but drink - I'll have a problem with that..... LOL I'm 100 percent Irish.....

[obsq]

I was wondering if you were going to Roatan or Grand Cayman.....not this time. We didn't find much to do in Key West when we were there a few years ago, either. We went on a tour of the town and took photo's of the "Southern most point in the U.S." and mile marker 0. Let us know what you decide to do in Belize. You'll have a great time with whichever you choose.

[DisneyCrazy123]

We were in Key West last May when our cruise was re-routed from Cozumel. We ended up booking a snorkeling tour on "The Fury". It was a large catamaran, but was the best snorkeling we have done in the 15 cruises we have been on. My husband even saw a shark, which was a bit scary.