Cruise Post 2 of 2: Belize & Cozumel

Read part one to get caught up.

Belize City, Belize

Belize City was the second of the three ports of call we visited. The coral reef is protected, so our ship couldn't dock on the port. We had to anchor out and take a 15-minute tender boat ride to the port. The water where we were dropped of was very brown and had a lot of trash floating in it.

There are huge gates that separate the port shops from the city itself. From what I've heard, this is for the best. You can go into town, but nobody recommends it. The prices are dirt cheap (I hear) but it's extremely dangerous. Even being in the shops outside the gates, there were people with flyers crawling on the huge gate and laying on the ground, sticking their hands through, trying to lure you into town to take their $10 tour.

Don't know who that man is, by the way.

Drink stand.

It rained for a solid 5 minutes, and the rest of the time was perfectly warm and sunny. The prices were decent, but they weren't cheap enough to make me return for the shopping. They have a restaurant/bar called the Wet Lizard, which seems like a fun place, but we didn't eat there. We got back on the boat and headed to the ship much earlier than we planned, which ended up being for the best, because many people nearly got left behind! (We believe this was because of the people running the tender boats. The last boat ran at 4:15pm ship time so the ship could leave at 5 - which it did. However, when the ship stopped, we were on our balcony, watching 4 loads of people get dropped off from the boats. They had no idea. They were all taking pictures and waving at us, having a grand ol' time. Ignorance is bliss, I guess, until you watch your ship leave without you.

Catch a fish, drop a fish, catch a fish, drop a fish...

Cozumel, Mexico

Cozumel is a more popular port. That's nice for them, but not for us Americans. From the port where we docked, there all kinds of shops and a couple of restaurants to see. It's all very pretty, and just strolling around is nice. It's extremely commercialized, though, and the prices are astronomical. You can take a 10-minute taxi ride into town, but we have yet to do this in the two times we've been there.

Our prepaid excursion was for snorkeling and a beach party. However, because it was so cloudy and rainy, we had the option to get a refund instead. I will not deny that, at the time of the offer, I was very much in love with the idea of getting back on the ship and taking a hot shower & a long nap. But, since we had so many people in our party, we decided it was all or nothing - either we all went on the excursion or we all got back on the ship. The majority, myself included, voted we ignore the crappy weather and do the excursion as planned. I am SO glad we did, too, because snorkeling was amazing!

We boarded the catamaran, which holds 130 people and is usually full for this excursion, ended up having around 20. When we got to where we were snorkeling, we got our gear on and jumped in the water. Between the cloudy sky and the rain, you couldn't see below the water's surface. When I jumped in, I was not prepared for the beautiful sight. I jumped directly into a school of fish! I'm sure the water was not a clear as in the daytime, but you could see all kinds of coral and other fish in the distance. The salty water was disgusting, and eventually the waves made me seasick for the first time in my life, but I can't wait to see the photos we took. I'm excited to snorkel again someday.

The only sun we got all day.

We got back on the boat and went to the beach, where we played on the huge inflatables in the water and ate an $11 meal. (Yes, $11 per person: big burger with potato salad and pasta salad.)

Overall, the whole trip was amazing. Honestly, I could go on a cruise and never get off the ship and be perfectly satisfied, but now I know I can never pass up another opportunity to explore Roatan or go snorkeling. I can't wait until our next cruise.