Coral Breeze Shark/Ray and Caye Caulker Snorkeling Trip

[porschenut964]

Based on reviews in this forum I decided to book a Coral Breeze (CB) snorkeling trip. I just got back from a 6/20/04 Elation cruise and wanted to post my experience with CB.

 

I booked the CB tour with the understanding that cruise ship (leaves out of Galveston which is CDT) time is one hour ahead of Belize time which is CST. The CB tour meets on Thursdays at the tourist village pier at 8:30 am and departs at 9 am. Once on the Elation and I found out that the ship time changes the night before arrival in Belize to Belize time. Thus, there was no way I could make the departure time so I e-mailed Paul from the ship and told him I could not get there any earlier than about 10 am. He promptly replied the next day that he would wait for us.

 

Without going into great detail about the tendering process in Belize lets just say it was a mess. Carnival gives priority to guests that booked Carnival excursions first and thus some of the boats go directly to the excursion point and not to the tourist village so sneaking on an early tender was risky as you might end up somewhere besides the tourist village pier. Anyway, we got tender ticket #1 and arrived at the village pier right at 10 am. We went to the flagpole where we were to meet CB and they were waiting for us.

 

They collected our money and off we went. The boat we got on was 38 ft. and was partly covered so only about 25% of the people were in the shade for the 40 minute trip. The boat was PACKED !!! We had 45 people on this boat and were elbow to elbow with no room to move. Also, the boat was a Star Tours boat (more about that later). The CB website has a picture of a fully covered boat that seats 60 people. However, I was told that this boat had engine problems and we had to use this backup boat. The CB website does indicate that the fully covered 60 passenger boat is only one of their boats so there is no guarantee that you get that one. Thus, if you have anyone on the trip that cannot take two 40 minute trips in the sun then keep this in mind.

 

We stopped on Caye Caulker to get our snorkel equipment and the building we went to to get the equipment was a Star Tours building which leads me to believe that CB sub contracted out Star Tours for those of us that could not make the 9 am time. But hey, we did get on a snorkeling excursion even though we were late.

 

Our first snorkeling stop was Coral Gardens. As an experienced snorkeler I did not find the snorkeling that good. However, the family we were with liked it as it was their first time. There were the typical formations, fans, and colorful fish but not a great variety of types. The process they used here was a follow the leader formation through a selected path. I do not know if this is a Star Tours/CB thing or all the excursions do this. I suspect they do this to keep folks from drifting away with the rather strong current. Anyway, if the person ahead of you makes a lot of turbulence with their fins, it is difficult to see very well. One positive is that the coral is close to the surface so you can get up close to it. In fact, it may be too close to the surface as two people on the trip got cut by the coral as they were pushed into it by the current.

 

Our second stop was Shark/Ray Alley and it was more enjoyable as the area was about 5-6 feet deep and with a sandy bottom. The nurse sharks and rays come right up to the boat and you can touch them if you want to. Both stops were about 40 minutes each.

 

The CB web site states that cold water is provided but we got warm water in plastic pouches so if you want to be sure you get cold water, carry a cooler.

 

The next stop was Caye Caulker for lunch. If you want to save money do not take the lunch option with CB but just eat at one of the restaurants on the island. We ate at the Sand Box and the food was great. A good web site for listing all the restaurants is www.iguanareefinn.com. I do not believe the tour lunch was at the Rainbow Restaurant based on where we docked (about three blocks below the Sand Box and another 3 blocks to the Rainbow Restaurant). This is another reason I believe we were on a Star Tours excursion. We ate at the Sand Box for less than half what CB charged. The total time on the island was about 90 minutes so we had very little time to explore the island.

 

Positives from the CB trip are that they will wait for you if you tender late so keep that in mind if tendering might be a problem on yoiur ship. Also, the CB trip leaves from the tourist village pier which is where the cruise ships tender , thus making the process easy.

 

Potential, negatives are the fact that there is no guarantee you will get a fully covered boat but if this is not a problem for you so much the better.

Also, if you can't make the 9 am departure time be prepared for a crowded tour as you might get put in with another tour group (Star Tours?).

 

Hope this helps you make a decision on using CB.

[verab]

This sounds exactly like our trip with Coral Breeze. We were on the June 20th Elation too. I have to say that I was not a happy camper because of the boat and I was one of the few that they did not have fins for and had to walk down the street to another shop and borrow fins. The crew tried really hard, but the boat was way too small and we were all stuck in there like sardines. We did however make the mistake of buying lunch, I had the shrimp salad and it was not good. I was told also that the hamburgers weren't good either.

As for the snorkeling, I agree there is not much to see at coral gardens but the sharks were cool. Our kids enjoyed it and that's what counts. All in all we loved Caulker Caye but I would not book Coral Gardens again because of the boat. I know things happen but we should have had other options.

[charyoung]

I am considering booking with star tours. A 10;30 to 1;30 snorkle only is $20pp. If we want to visit the island for 3 hours its $35pp. Is it worth the extrs $$ to see Caye Caulker and buy lunch there, or just go back to ship after snorkle? Thanks!

[porschenut964]

Depending on your time ashore you could get the 9 am water taxi to Caye Caulker (unless you can book a direct trip to Caye Caulker from the ship) and catch the 3 pm taxi back to the village pier.

[kapcruiser]

Does star tours have a web site that I can information from? We want to go to caye caulker - we were planning on just taking a water taxi over there, but for a little more money maybe my boys will want to go snorkeling first. I will have to weight the options.:confused:

[mert461]

We just did the Coral Breeze Shark/Stingray tour. You can read about it on the Royal Caribbeaan site under Enchantment of the Seas review. But here are the highlights:

 

RCCL didn't change clocks to Belize time, but kept saying to keep your watch on ship time so as not to get confused.

 

CB employee met us at the flagpole right on time. Although we had to wait about 1 hour to start because of a Carnival ship that wasn't in yet.

 

Our CB bloat wasn't covered. It was an overcast day, so that wasn't a problem. We had about 16 people on the excursion with 3 CB staff. Worked out fine. Also stopped at Caye Caulker for snorkeling equipment and drop off lunch orders.

 

Loved seeing the sharks and stingrays. Didn't like the barrier reef snorkeling. The current was too strong and we didn't see that many colorful fish. Not CB fault though. We did have bottled water on the boat; could have been colder though.

 

Lunch was at the Rainbow Cafe. The Belizian chicken was good. Everyone who got it liked it. I had a chicken burrito. It was good as well. A few had grilled cheese sandwiches. Liked them. Very cold sodas were served. (YEA!)

 

We had time to walk about the island, which was quite small. The trip back to Belize City went fine and we had about 1 hour to shop if we wanted.

 

So all in all, it was an acceptable excursion for us.

 

Donna

[snadfamily]

We just returned from a cruise through Belize as well. We did the Coral Breeze Tour to Caye Caulker/Shark Ray Alley. The boat we were on was named "Coral Breeze" and was fully covered. The captain is actually on the roof in the captain's chair.

The day was really nice. The snorkeling was beautiful as was the Island of Caye Caulker. Lunch was also very good. This is the second time we took this tour in Belize. We did it last year when we stopped in there.

We asked about the problems that we read about before we left. Monique (I think that was her name) the tour manager told me there had been issues with the weather and their boat and the replacement boats had not been what they had expected. But like I said, we were on their boat and everything was as great as it was last year when we did this tour.

Some of the people in our travel group did Cave Tubing with them and really enjoyed that as well.

I recommended these guys to many of my friends and family and will continue to do so.

[danfiveoh]

kapcruiser:

here is the web site for star tours:

http://www.startoursbelize.com

I e-mailed them and they got right back to me.

[danfiveoh]

charyoung:

looks like we are on the same cruise. Just in case you weren't aware, the $20 snorkel trip from star does not go to Shark Ray alley, just to the reef. The marine park and shark ray alley is $35 from the Caye or $40 if they pick you up at the ship tender. Here is the e-mail that they sent me when I asked about the cruise tender pickup:

 

 

We would meet you where you are tendered. The cost per person would be $40.00 US including your transport to and from Caye Caulker. We would pick you up around 8:00 - 9:00 a.m. and you would return around 1:30 - 4:00 p.m.

 

Ramon

 

The Tropics Hotel

Star Tours

P.O. Box 4

Caye Caulker

Belize, Central America

 

http://www.startoursbelize.com

E-mail: startours@btl.net