SEAduced picked us up in a high speed boat from our pier this morning at about 8:45. There were 8 other people on the boat. We made one more stop, picked up another couple and one more crew member and we were off. Giovanni and Enrique were our captain and guide. They were a comedic duo and kept us laughing all day. They spoke English, Spanish, and the local Creole, which I find very hard to understand. The creole is equivalent to our ghetto slang, but it sounds like it's intended to be light hearted.
After about a 1 hour ride south at high speed, we arrived at the Manatee grounds.
Part of this tour included a look at the manatees - we couldn't swim with them because some Texans had been trying to rope and ride them last summer - since they are protected, the authorities put an end to that! We looked for at least 30 minutes before we found them. Everyone was getting hot and we all were beginning to think we weren't going to see them when we spotted a family of 3, momma, daddy, and baby. They were feeding, and though there wasn't alot of action, it was fun to see these gentle giants. Hopefully you can spot them in the photo.We could see rain all around us on the boat ride, and as we left the manatees, it found us. Luckily it was scattered and we ran out from under it into extremely smooth water on the leeward side of some mangrove islands.
Next thing you know, there are three Atlantic Bottlenose Dolphins right in front of us, so we stop to watch them. The water was extremely clear and we could see the whole animal from the boat.
From there, we headed to Goff's Caye - an islet of ~ .25 acres with a pier, covered palapa, picnic tables, palm trees, nice swimming, great snorkeling, and locked bathrooms. The water around the islet was every shade from clear to dark blue.
We swam for a while as our guide & captain prepared lunch. Then we geared up and Enrique took us snorkeling out over a ledge that dropped off to over 45 feet. The coral were large, Staghorn, Elkhorn, black coral, all sorts of soft corals, and loads of fish. We paddled against the current on the way out and enjoyed an easy swim back to the beach. I would have liked more time on the reef, but lunch was ready and we were starving.Lunch consisted of rice, savory fish stew (very good), pasta salad (also quite tasty), spicey sliced potatoes, sweet pineapple slices, and tortillas, plus a variety of sodas, water, and Belikin beer. Captain Giovanni had cooked it all up on the bbq pit while we were snorkeling. Rayne even went back for seconds!
After lunch, we packed it all back up, jumped back into the boat and headed for Shark/Ray Alley. This was a different area than we visted on Wednesday. We ran into some rain, waited for it to pass, picked up a mooring ball, and everyone jumped in. There at least 10 large rays - some were 3 feet across. There was only one or two nurse sharks. They all swarmed around the boat and we weren't even chumming. The rays would come in a squadron formation of about 6 to 8 rays. We were in about 4 or 5 feet of water - so we were really close to them.
We got back in the boat and took off for Caye Caulker. On the way we ran into a heavy rain which made us slow down to avoid the needle like projectiles! Once on the Caye, Rayne got some ice cream, of course, and we headed to the split to meet up with our boat. When we got to the boat, the crew had picked up a couple of sea horses and put them in a bucket for us to see. They live in the mangrove and were about 3 to 4 inches long - a real treat to see!
We made the 30 minute run back to San Pedro at high (read: bone jarring) speed and were dropped at our pier at about 5:15 pm. It was a great last day and we're all tuckered, eating pizza (from the Pirate place) and watching WNBA Basketball, again...
Breakfast tomorrow at Estelle's and we'll catch the water taxi at 11:30 to Belize City to catch our plane at 3:25 pm
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