How to Dive the Great Blue Hole

Getting To Belize

JetSet and Travelers Way: You can fly to Belize City via most major airlines and jump on a hopper plane from Tropic Air. One note, If you fly into the international airport you don’t need to transfer to the domestic airport.  Just ask Tropic Air to pick you up from the international airport.

Backpackers Way: Check out our post on how to get to Belize HERE!

Where to Stay

Dive Trips are run from the town of San pedro on Ambergris Caye, Caye Caulker, Turneffe, and Placencia. We recommend Ambergris Caye or Caye Caulker for most people. If you’re a Hard-Core diver we recommend Turneffe as it’s the closest to the Hole but there aren’t many other activities on Turneffe. Placencia is a great place to stay but it has the longest boat ride to the hole.

Ambergris Caye has plenty of activities, restaurants, and resorts to chose from to keep you and your family active during your stay.  We stayed at Xanadu Island Resort and loved it.  It’s in a great location and the staff was very helpful with organizing our dive trip.  One other benefit is they have their own dock where the dive company picked us up and dropped us off after our dive. (talk about door to door service!)

Caye Caulker is a beautiful remote getaway for luxury resort seekers or backpackers.  If you looking for a “hide-away,” sleepy, island this is the place for you.  There are plenty of restaurants on the island, but you may find yourself looking for more if you like lots of options.

Which Dive Company to Choose

We stayed in San Pedro on Ambegris Caye and there were numerous dive shops to chose from. After asking around Amigos Del Mar came highly recommended to us. One of the best things about them, besides the great staff, is the size of their boat. They have the largest boat serving the blue hole. You’ll appreciate this during the ride to the hole as it can get very rough at times.

If you’re staying at another location in Belize and you’re looking for a dive company, ask around, check Trip Advisor, and make sure they are properly certified in Padi and or SSI.  Also, ask to see their boat and equipment if you’re at their shop.  When diving, you don’t always want to go with the cheapest company as your life is in their hands.

Diving the Great Blue Hole!

The time has finally come after numerous plane, taxi, and boat rides you’re at the world-renowned Blue Hole. A few things you must know before diving the blue hole are:

• The blue hole isn’t about marine life.
  • The blue hole is more like spelunking as the it used to be a cave. The main interests are the massive stalactites and stalagmites. You will see plenty of coral and marine life during the next 2 dives.

• The depth of the dive is 130-135 feet deep.
  • As with most divers, I’m only open water certified, and this means I’m not certified to go that deep. Don’t worry if you are only open water certified or junior water certified. As long as you have your scuba certification they will take you on the dive.

• The dive is very short
  • When you’re diving to 130 feet, your bottom time is only 8 minutes due to time table limits.

Finally, RELAX and enjoy your dive.  It can be very stressful after all the time and money spent to get to the Blue Hole.  If you have a GoPro take it.  Even though the depth may be beyond the limits, I did as well as numerous other divers and no one had a problem.

*My recommendation.  If you’re not diving with a friend.  Ask someone before you go down to take your picture by the stalactites when you get to the bottom.  Tell them you’ll hand them your camera at one point.  I didn’t do this for the blue hole but I did for the last dive.  This picture was much better than any I took with my “selfie stick”