Dive Operators in Belize - Corozol to Punta Gorda

[KeriMe]

We're headed to Belize for 2 wks in Sept. and will be splitting our time between Corozal, San Pedro, Hopkins and Punta Gorda as we investigate places to relocate. I haven't found any operators in Corozal or PG and I haven't been to Hopkins of San Pedro before. Any recommendations would be appreciated.

 

[Downing]

I don't know of any in Corozal, but I've only been there once. Beautiful bay.

In Hopkins, check out Splash Dive Center - Belize Scuba Diving Packages | Whale sharks | Splash Dive Center, Hamanasi - Discover Hamanasi Resort | Award Winning Resort in Belize and I think there's one more that's not coming to mind. Splash is based in Placencia but will pick you up and drop you off in Hopkins at the marina. I dive with them every year (highly recommend) and we often swing by there for the Hopkins divers. They have a satellite office in Hopkins at one of the hotels. I'm not sure if you have to stay at Hamanasi to dive with them. I've never stayed there, but the grounds are beautiful and they get rave reviews.

In Punta Gorda, you can dive with Garbutt's Marine & Fishing Lodge - Garbutt's Marine & Fishing Lodge Home or maybe with Reef CI - Diving and Marine Conservation Trips in Belize if they're still operating out of PG.

I've never been to San Pedro but it's a popular destination with a bunch of dive shops so I'm sure someone will chime in.

Emails to/from Belize sometimes don't go through, so if you're having trouble making contact it can be best to at least start with a phone call.

Looks like you'll be taking a north to south tour of the country. Good on ya' for doing that. Belize has to lot to offer. As far as relocating, the popular spots for ex-pats are SP, Hopkins, Placencia and, further inland, San Ignacio in the heart of the Cayo District. Corozal and Punta Gorda, not so much, especially PG.

 

[KeriMe]

Thanks for dive the recommendations. I'll definitely check them out. It's been a while since I was last in Placencia so I'm curious to see if it's changed much. I dove with Robert's Grove and It was the very first diving I did after obtaining my certification.

This will be the first trip to Belize that doesn't include a visit to Black Rock Lodge near San Ignacio. It's a great spot on the river and perfect base for inland exploring. But this trip is all about visiting places we haven't seen yet. I'm really curious about PG but I suspect that it may be too quiet for me from a relocation perspective. So Hopkins will be my southern base while Corozal will be the northern base. Corozal/Consejo actually has a large expat community now. It's 9miles from Chetumal and there's a free trade zone there. It's supposedly one of the cleanest, safest, most laid back little towns in Belize. As you said, Belize has a lot to offer so I'm sure we'll find a spot.

 

[Hank49]

Not sure how long the "while" has been since you went to Placencia, but in the 17 years I've been in Belize, Placencia developed quite a bit.
Have you checked out Sittee River? When I was working near Placencia in 2002 or so, I took a drive down the Sittee River Rd and decided then that if I stayed in Belize, (which I've done although am in Thailand until Dec or so) THAT is where I'd want to live. You have the river, and some of the most fertile soil I've seen anywhere....except maybe Lombok, Indonesia...and access to the sea. It's a quiet little village but not too far from Dangriga and good markets.
And it's about 10 miles out to the reef but you have a chain of islands about halfway out so with the trades blowing, it breaks up the waves and you don't take a beating like up around Dangriga and north of there.
Hopkins is about a 15 minute drive if you're into restaurants or bars.
Anyway, I've built a house in Orchard Estate. About 3 miles in. You can't miss it. Nice, half acre lots. Great water souce with excellent drinking quality.
Boat ramp.
Belize is for water people. If you don't dive or fish, there isn't much to do there. I guess bird watch and hiking....

 

[KeriMe]

Hi Hank, It's been 6 years since I was last in Placencia and from what I can tell from online it looks like more condos are there than I remember. I'm really curious to see if it still feels like the sleepy little beach town I remember.

I am planning on exploring Sittee River because I've found a couple houses for rent there and the proximity to Hopkins is appealing. Plus we are very much water people. Ideally, I'd like to find something that has some fruit trees and that I can plant a small garden. Any issues with flooding near the river?

Finding long term rentals in Belize has been a bit of a challenge but I'm optimistic that we'll find something.

 

[Hank49]

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Hi Hank, It's been 6 years since I was last in Placencia and from what I can tell from online it looks like more condos are there than I remember. I'm really curious to see if it still feels like the sleepy little beach town I remember.

I am planning on exploring Sittee River because I've found a couple houses for rent there and the proximity to Hopkins is appealing. Plus we are very much water people. Ideally, I'd like to find something that has some fruit trees and that I can plant a small garden. Any issues with flooding near the river?

Finding long term rentals in Belize has been a bit of a challenge but I'm optimistic that we'll find something.

Placencia is basically a sandbar. And it's far from the barrier reef by boat. 20 miles or so. NIce place but....Hopkins is a bit the same but with a smaller lagoon on the backside. There are lots for sale but a lot of them need fill, or have been filled. Beach front....expensive and to me, a pain in the butt. Salt gets on everything and shortens the life.

Re flooding in Sittee, there was a "100 year flood" in 2008..? The river brought down a bunch of logs and debris that stacked up at the Kendal bridge. It broke loose, and broke the bridge, and a bit of a tsunami came rushing down. The water reached up to where my house now stands but it was maybe a foot deep and went down quickly.
After you get a bit down river from where I live, it flattens out. Almost all houses down there are built up 6-10 feet on stilts.
But it is great soil and you can grow anything there.
I like living on the river. My boat trailer has never been exposed to seawater, which will give it a much longer life. And as we come up river, we dip all wetsuits, spearguns etc, into the river. And the motor gets a good flushing. When I arrive home, we just have to clean fish.
Don't know about long term rentals though. Never really looked into that.

Here's a shot of the river right off the boat ramp. It's about 5 miles down river to the sea and another 10 miles or so out to the reef. Can't wait to get back home there and get out diving. Phuket is nice but Belize is home now. 17 years there.

 

[Downing]

Hank, be prepared to be surprised. Hopkins is growing fast. Almost all the beachfront lots are built now, and the activity's now moving in the direction of the marina.

I really wanted to buy Debra's property. Three cleared lots strung together. You could throw a rock in the river. But the house was just not up to my wife's standards, and I couldn't convince her we could just knock it down and rebuild. I continued to hold out hope that I could bring her around, but I think someone may have finally bought it after a year on the market. They'll probably put up a new house, and I'll have to resist the temptation to tell her, "Told ya."

I remember that flood. When the bridge went down, it effectively cut off southern Belize from the rest of the country. The new bridge is pretty impressive and building it gave me a chance to take one of my favorite pictures.

 

[Hank49]

Downing, build a house !! haha.

The beach front of Hopkins is well developed. When we were looking to build or buy a house 3 years ago, we looked at some off the back streets. I wasn't impressed. Pretty swampy, as is the road from Sittee River as it approaches the main Hopkins road right near Jaguar Reef Resort.

But man, Harvey is a rude awakening to what a catastrophic storm can do. I think my house would probably have a couple feet of water around it if 30 inches of rain fell back in the Jaguar Reserve valley.

If a hurricane is coming, there are only two roads in and out of Hopkins. One out of Placencia. brrrrrr
Hurricane & Tropical Cyclone Details

 

[Ralph Capeling]

When I was first thinking abut moving to Belize, I worried about hurricanes as I had no experience with them and was considering going to Cayo rather than live on the beach and mentioned that to a Canadian lady in Hopkins when I was doing my first reconnaissance. She said it is better to have a hurricane every 30 years rather than mosquitoes every day. I bought a lot and built a house on the beach 12 miles north of Placencia. I bought the lot in 2000 but had not built when Iris destroyed most of the village of Placencia and started my 30 year clock. Since I moved here in 2005 there we have been directly affected by two hurricanes but they were not major ones and we staid home (well at the house for one and at the dive center for the second). We have prepared for couple more by moving our boats up the river near Independence to weather the storms. Both our house and our dive center are built to hurricane standards so all we really had to do was move things indoors or tie them down. The only damage suffered was one potted plant in what we thought was a well protected area fell over and cracked the pot - the damage being that we had to suffer crackpot jokes for several days after. The US National Hurricane Center does a good job of tracking and predicting hurricanes so I am comfortable living in Placencia with the caveat that if a category 3 or more is coming this way, we will be out of here well before it arrives.

This link provides a good history of hurricanes in Belize: Hurricane History of Belize

For those who, like the Canadian lady who told me hurricane every 30 years, do not have time to look at the link, the summary is:

Since 1930, there have been 16 Hurricanes, 8 of which were Major Hurricanes, that have either made landfall in Belize or passed close enough to cause damage or loss of life. Additionally, 17 systems made landfall in Belize as Tropical Storms.

Regards
Ralph

 

[Hank49]

I came to Belize in Dec, 1999. I was told the same thing about "every 30 years". I guess I have bad luck. (Not only in Belize) the eye of H Iwa passed over my house on Kauai. I was in the middle of Typhoon Ruping on Cebu. The 2nd strongest typhoon to make landfall in the Philippines....and was in San Pedro when Keith hit, Belize Aquaculture Farm when Iris hit, a half mile from the eye of the one that passed Mullins River in 2010..so this 30 year thing....not sure about that.