just back-snorkling with coral breeze

[teacup754]

As promised I am writing about our recent(Dec 22) tour with coral breeze.

Recent reviews have not been positive and I was very concerned to see what we had got ourselves into.I'll try and preface this with something about myself and group,because it will play into some of my observations. We had minimal snorkling exprerience before going out. Only a part day in Roatan, so i wouldn't call myself an expert by any means.I'm 50, husband 59, teenage daughter and grown son. We met the tour guide Monique early and were told to go to the bathroom and have our swimsuits on before we got on board in 40 minutes.Time to do a little shopping and take a potty break.On to the boat, there were 34 of us. We were probably the oldest, all the way down to some 8-10 year olds. Most of us were beginner snorklers. Some with no experience at all.Our main guide was Ivar. Really funny, interesting talk on the way out. Some history of the country, info on coral.. do's and don'ts of snorkling.Passed out water bottles while giving us his talk.Very good guide. There were also two others(Henni and Polito) to help everyone in the water.

 

I think this tour is best suited to someone who is comfortable in the water. i would not recommend this tour to anyone who is physically challenged in any way or someone that is a bad swimmer. They help pull you back onto the boat, but it is a small ladder and somewhat difficult to negotiate.There is a strong current and it was real work to get and stay in line and navigate through the coral. In fact some of the small children were not allowed off at the first stop due to the current(smart call coral breeze, it would have been dangerous)After snorkling in Roatan, i would not recommend this tour to someone who is an expert and wants to spend a lot of time on their own.

Due to safety concerns and time restraints with this size group, it is better for someone who wants a "taste" of what snorkling is all about. We saw some nice coral. some fish etc at the first stop.If you were really an expert snorkler I don't think this would have satisfied your desire to snorkle on this reef.Better to find a private guide to let you drift snorkle so you don't have to fight the current so much.And that would let you determine how much time you wanted at each place.

 

We got back on board and went to the shark/ ray alley place. That was my favorite part of any excursion of my cruise. lots of rays/ some sharks. easy to touch the rays etc...It was awesome...Then on to lunch at Caye Caulker. We had made our selections on the boat and they were turned in while the guides got smaller fins for the kids on board.Lunch was nice and I would recommend the Belize chicken/ rice and beans..Then we had some time on the island to rent a golf cart, drive around and just soak in the beauty of the place. Very laid back place. Shop people not pushy etc..Back on board and back to the main dock. We stopped midway because they saw dolphins around us and we watched them play for a while.We had about 45 minutes before the last tender to our ship, so it as enough time to check out a few shops, but I'm not a big shopper, so it was back to our ship for me.

All in all we had a really good time, and it seemed everyone else on board did too. Fighting the current made it a tiring swim, but I have no idea if that is "normal" for Belize waters or not.It was a fun day for us beginners. Thanks Coral breeze!

[Bequia]

Thanks for the heads up. We're booked with CB next week and glad to read an positive review.