Luis, my dive guide with Playa Scuba in Mexico, recommended San Pedro and Caye Caulker as the two best places to dive when I came to Belize. Today, I did dives at Tackle Box, Esmerelda and Hol Chan marine reserve (all a short boat ride off the coast of San Pedro) and also a snorkel trip to Shark Ray Alley, and I definitely wasn't disappointed, seeing the most spectacular marine life I have ever seen whilst diving.
The highlight was swimming with wild nurse sharks, and when I say swimming, I mean touching, feeling and really getting up close with them, as another dive group had brough bait which attracted 8-10 of them to us within minutes of us starting our dive. Asides from the sharks, we saw moray eels, tarpon, spanish mackerel, lobster, sea horses, baracuda, eagle ray and southern sting rays, and even a turtle in the distance.
A maximum descent of 83 feet at Tackle Box is the deepest I have ever dived, and it was certainly the first time I have looked up and not been able to see the surface of the water. The exhiliration from that and swimming amongst wild sharks and rays has made me start to consider an advanced divers course when I get to Honduras, which is supposed to be extremely cheap for diving.
Although I am sorely tempted to stay another day in San Pedro and do another dive in Esmerelda, I will push onto Caye Caulker tomorrow to dive the Blue Hole, and then start heading west through mainland Belize to Gautemala.
