prefered site to book belize

[Downing]

Good point.

In the grand scheme of things it turned out to be no big deal. But mainly I didn't like being separated from my bags. Tropic and Maya both require all bags bigger than a satchel or a pocketbook be checked, so everything I brought with me, including all my clothes and all my scuba gear, was left behind in Belize City, not really a place that inspires confidence, lol. (In fairness, both airlines have very tight security and do a much better job of confirming ownership of bags than we do here in the US.) The chances of something going really wrong were pretty small but it would have been a disaster if somehow my luggage just disappeared. Plus, I didn't like being rushed along and chided like it was my fault.

And frankly, if you have to get stuck somewhere killing time for an hour, Placencia is a pretty good spot to do it.

Although very unlikely to happen again, if there is a next time I probably just won't report early but instead just wait for my scheduled flight.

 

[ReefHound]

But weren't you already separated from your bags? If they were checked then they were out of your sight and control. Not seeing how you sitting in the public area of Belize City gives you any more control over your bags than if you're in Placencia.

 

[Downing]

Ha ha. True. But when I was at Goldson, I knew my bags were there because I had wheeled them over from Customs to the Maya/Tropic counter and turned them in.

When I got on the plane, I assumed my bags did too. That's how it's always worked before and since.

But when I landed at Placencia, that's when I found out my bags didn't make the flight. So now my bags are in one part of the country and I'm in another. I've been to Belize many times and will go back many more. I'm very comfortable there. But I'm not very comfortable when everything I brought with me besides the clothes on my back are not accounted for. So for the next hour I had to just take it on faith that my bags, including my scuba gear, would be on the next flight. I didn't want to think about what I would do if they weren't.

I didn't mean to make more of this than it is. All's well that ends well. But this was more like the icing on the cake. The cake being rushed along by them, nattered at for being late, which I wasn't, glared at by the other passengers like I was a d*ck and crammed onto half a seat with my knees up to my chin. The icing being that after all that they then left my bags behind without telling me. On a scale of annoying down to disaster, it was just annoying. If they had told me my bags would be going on the next flight, I would have refused to get on the earlier one. I prefer to be in the same city/town/village as my luggage. Next time, I'll ask.

 

[Eric M]

Like with any vacations, I check out TripAdvisor for hotels, dive ops, etc. and then contact them directly. Can't always rely on user reviews, you have to evaluate many factors of the reviews and/or the reviewer. it takes a little browsing and research but for it pays off. I mean, I subscribe to a scuba travel site and get regular emails and every-time I can beat their price for Cozumel, for example.