Diving the Blue Hole*

I went SCUBA diving in the blue hole today.  That's a picture of the blue hole on the right.  It was created thousands of years ago when an the roof of an underground cave collapsed under the weight of the Caribbean.  The depth goes from less than 20 feet all the way to over 400 feet in just a dozen feet of lateral distance.  Surrounding the hole is a ring of rock and reef.  (Despite what it looks like in the photo, none of the green areas is above the water.  It is just very shallow).  The day I found out I was going to Belize, I vowed to SCUBA dive here.

From the surface, the Blue Hole doesn't look all that impressive.  But once you get underwater, it is amazing.  The dive was more than twice as deep as any I had gone on before.  There was not a whole lot of aquatic life in the hole, but the amazing rock formations more than made up for the few fish.  A few months ago, there were ads for some thriller movie where these people go diving in a huge cave system.  That's what this felt like.  You don't expect to see stalactites underwater, which makes it all the more beautiful.

After we left the Blue Hole, we went diving in two more locations.  The first was called the aquarium and the second was Half-Moon Caye.  I could try to tell you how awesome these were (especially the aquarium), but pictures speak louder than words, so I will let them talk.

Our guide was blowing "air rings"

This fish had no side fins, only a dorsal and bottom fin.  Really interesting looking.

Spotted Eagle Ray - unfortunately kept moving away from me

A red Squirrel fish

*When I posted this as my status on facebook today, one of my friends thought I was making a dirty Avatar joke.