Belize Trip - Day #2 Afternoon Visit to Carrie Bow Caye

After spending the morning snorkeling outside the reef, we headed back to Ricks place to grab lunch. It would have been nice and easy to flake out on a hammock for the rest of the day, but you have to take advantage of every minute when you are on a trip like this. We hopped in our boats and made the short hop south to Carrie Bow Caye.

Short hop, 1.66 kms each way

Carrie Bow Caye is in the middle of the picture, off in the distance

 On Carrie Bow Caye sits one of the worlds foremost marine research stations, owned by the Smithsonian Institute. We were told that if no scientists are present, we may be able to visit and get a tour, so we decided to check it out.

As we got closer, a couple who are caretakers of the site approached us by boat to tell us that we couldn't visit the island, but Rob talked them into giving us a little tour, as no scientists were present at the time.

2 families that were anchored nearby on a sailboat were also invited for the tour

The wet lab. The entire building was built to be hurricane proof

Not a bad spot to do some research

The outhouse. What a view when taking care of business! Apparently outhouses like this are no longer allowed to be built on the cayes. When this one is wiped out by a storm, or collapses, they are not allowed to replace it.

Trees are so important here, whenever they see a coconut tree sprouting, the put shells around it to protect it.

After the tour, we headed back to Water Caye, with a stop along the way for some snorkeling

My plan to protect my toes this time, duct tape!

While snorkeling, we had a visit from this huge remora. I didn't know they got that big. This guy was about 3 ft long, and had a hook hanging from his mouth. Looked like somekind of demon fish to me!

Some nice little reefs with lots of fish in between water caye and Carrie Bow Caye, but the current is strong there, so its easy to get drifted off the reef and onto eel grass.

Amazing colours. The pictures just don't do it justice of course

That concludes Day #2 on the cayes. More to come tomorrow hopefully.