SAILING BELIZE BARRIER REEF

After leaving Mexico we drove down to Belize City, from where we took a small plane (Cessna) to Placentia to meet the rest of our sailing crew. 

Since we stayed already 14 days in Yucatan we felt much better acclimatised than they did. The catamaran of 44 feet we chartered resembled more to a flat on skids than to a sailboat. A separate engine provided us with 220V current and gave us the possibility to run the air conditioning even on anchor. We did not use it. The deep freezer was more interesting because we were able to deep freeze bred for the whole voyage.

Before leaving, Luss and I checked the boat while the rest of the crew went to Placentia village to buy provisions for our ten days sailing trip.

The way out of Placentia Lagoon took us several hours and was rather exciting, since the depth sounder announced a few times just one foot of water below our keel.

When we left Placentia the weather had changed. The wind was blowing out of northerly directions at a speed of 25 knots and the sea was very choppy. After the long and tiring trip from Europe via Atlanta to Placentia the whole crew was rather suffering from these bad weather conditions. The anchorage they suggested to us in the cruising guide was very bumpy and really poorly protected. Since all of us were rather tired and we did not want to spend the night on anchor in these bad conditions, we decided to head back to Placentia Bay and look for a well protected anchorage. Unfortunately the weather forecast announced the same weather conditions for the next 2 days.

The following day we found a nice day-anchorage south of Harvest cay. Here we did some snorkelling, but the strong wind churned up the sea so that the visibility was rather bad. After the snorkeling we headed south and dropped the anchor at No Name Point close to Monkey River, a place we knew from our sailing trip 10 years ago. Generally the sailing conditions we met this time were all different from those ten years ago. The very interesting places we had seen on our first trip were closed or only allowed to be visited with a professional skipper.

After leaving No Name Point we drove north to drop the anchor at Lark Cay. Here we did some snorkelling as well; saw some nice underwater scenery but the visibility was still rather poor. Probably due to the bad weather conditions our provision of Rum came to an end prematurely. In such a case a mutiny can never be excluded.

We went on heading north to Pelican Cay. To enter the well protected “lagoon” we had to follow the way points on the plotter since the sea charts are not accurate at all. It is a funny feeling when you see that on the digital map you are sailing right over an island. With the dinghy we went to explore Cat Island, a marvellous place despite of some trash dumping.

To get out of the lagoon we did a back track and then we turned north along the Inner Chanel into the direction of the Blue Ground Range. To enter the Blue Ground Range eyeball navigation is the only possibility to go on safely, since there are numerous shoals and corral reefs. 

From here we took an easterly course and anchored near South Water Cay. On these little islands there are some resorts but no shops to buy any provisions. For the first time we found an excellent snorkeling place with crystal clear water, nice coral reefs and all the classical fish: Angelfish, Butterfly, Blue Tang, Perrot-, Trigger-, Hogfish …,  you can see while snorkelling along the reef.

The next morning we decide to move north, but to stay close to the reef. We found a place to anchor right behind the barrier reef close to Tobacco Cay. The snorkeling here was very interesting because we were able to watch different swarms of bigger fish, like Barracudas, Tarpons, and big Perrot fishes.

Because the place was really beautiful we decided to go for a second snorkeling in the afternoon. Jacqueline and I chose to swim to the reef and not to use the dinghy. On the reef we saw our first Whitetip reef shark. In the afternoon we tried to find a nice anchorage around one of the numerous islands around Tobacco Cays. Unfortunately all the places we had in mind turned out to be very shallow so that we decided to go back to the place behind the main reef where we had stayed this morning.

Tobacco Cay was the northernmost part of our trip. From here we sailed back to the Inner Chanel to spend the night on a nice anchorage near the Pelican Cays. The next day we sailed back to Placentia Cay where we had to follow the way points on our plotter to find our way back into the Placentia Lagoon and join Sunsail Marina.