I realized that I should probably make this trip report it's owm topic. Part 1<br>After sailing several times in other area's of the caribbean we were looking to try something new. After a few suggestions from the BVI board we looked into Tahiti and Belize. After reading several trip reports we decided on Belize. There seems to be two companies doing most of the chartering in Belize. Moorings which is out of Placencia and is fairly new to the area. And TMM which has been chartering in Belize for many years. As you can imagine Moorings is a much bigger operation. TMM has a base in Ambergris Caye and a new base further south in Placencia. We were set to go with Moorings till we hear about TMM. The layout of the TMM boat fit us better and the prices were lower. Previousy we have used Sunsail. Both companies charter Cats as the water is quite shallow, though we did see a few monohulls anchored in Placencia(Moorings)<br>This was our first time with a cat and we were very happy with the space. We had a 38 ft Lagoon the Cala Mia. 4 cabins and 2 heads. We were 2 adults, 3 teens and 1 9 year old we never felt on top of each other. The main salon is nice and you get a nice breeze through the windows. Since the Cat doesn't roll like a monohull we were able to keep alot of things on the counter while we were underway. This helped not having to find a place for everything.<br>Some sites that we found helpful were
www.belizeforum.com and
www.ambergriscaye.com they are no where near as active as these forums but they will give you some ideas especially for a land based portion of your trip.<br>The cruising guide we used was Cruising guide to Belize and the Mexico's caribbean coast by Freya Rauscher. 1996<br>It is not like the cruising guides of the BVI. It is a bit harder to use and we found several headings were off. It was written several years ago and some things have changed due to hurricanes and such some of it is dated. <br>We decided to go out of Placencia and to head south towards the Sopadillas as we had heard they were beautiful and relatively unspoiled.<br>Due to school schedules we had to go in late June which we knew was the beginning of hurricane season and the rainy season. We were a bit worried about the rain we ended up getting lucky and having no rain at all. some days the sky was overcast part of the day. The weather was warm and muggy, It did not cool off much in the evening, so it made for some very hot nights. Especially due to the design of the boat in the rear staterooms even with the hatches open you got no breeze at all. The water temp was delightfully warm, I am not sure of the exact temp but if felt like a swimming pool.<br><br>part 2<br>If you are interested in details as to airport details see Belize more trip reports a few days back<br>night 1 was spent in Placencia lagoon. After a calm night we were picked up by dingy to go over to TMM for our briefing, and to pick up a few items that were missing. We did not bring our own snorkeling gear and luckily the few that they had fit our group. The majority of TMM charters are still going out of San Pedro and we were the only boat going out of Placencia that week. One goal of the two bases is that you can pick up in one and drop off at the other. The briefing was pretty brief and casual. The person doing the briefing had little knowledge of our particular boat. He had some ideas as to where to go but had not yet been to alot of the cayes in the area. I would expect that would have been different if we had chartered out of San Pedro. Also at the last minute we noticed that a e mail we had sent regarding adding another person to our provisioning had not been recieved so we were short a bit of food. Also we had made a few request no pork yet we had pork chops. So at the last minute I ran to the local market and grabbed a few things. The selection was sparse. A few onions and oranges were the only vegatables available. I would definitely not been able to provison a boat for 7 days with what was available in the market. There is a larger market that was closed so they might have more available. The homemade banana bread was great though.<br>The small market is just up the street from the fuel dock. There also was a internet cafe across the street which we did not go in.<br>Since the VHF reception is not great you are given a cell phone with preloaded phone cards. Though once you are out a bit even the cell phone doesn't work. The unusual thing in Belize is that you don't have a morning weather report on the radio. so that is a bit scary. Though we were told that Moorings did a morning report for their charters that we were able to pick up some days as they had a stronger VHF.<br>So for the most part you are on your own.<br>Will add more later <br>
