Hol Chan vs Caye Caulker Snorkeling and Shark/Ray Alley

We are very conflicted which choice to make as far as which excurions to do.

Hol Chan is supposed to have an amazing reef and the ray shark alley is supposed to be amazing. Downside is have to make a flight out to San Pedro. Upside is get to take a cool flight over the reefs.

Caye Caulker has a not as nice reef and no clue about the difference between the ray shark alleys. Are they the same? Downside: long boat ride. Upside: less $$$$.

We have a total of 8 people going. 4 adults and 4 children.

Thank you for any input.

I struggled with the same decision and researched and compared a lot of options. Finally decided to go with Caveman tours. We will take the water taxi there and then fly back to balance the time and cost. He can take up to 8 as a private tour where you snorkel several spots, and since it's just your party, you have more say in how you spend your time.

Great reviews everywhere I checked and he responds well and answers any questions. Doesn't require a deposit.

I don't cruise until the end of May, so can't tell you how it goes until then!

How much is the return flight from San Pedro?

I think it came out to ~$200 for the four of us, and the kids were old enough to be at the adult price (I think the one-way fair for the water taxi will be $15/pp). Check out the Tropic Air website, though, as I don't know if the costs are different depending on the time of year, etc.

But what makes it comparable to other tours is that Caveman's fee is $80/pp for the five hour tour or $50/pp for the three hour tour and includes lunch. This doesn't include the transportation getting there and back, but once I added it all up and compared to the others, it was roughly the same. Plus, the others I looked at either didn't include lunch and/or had up to 90 minutes just on the cay, or were not private.

Caveman tours is fantastic. We were just with him in January and had a fantastic day on his half day option with 3 stops plus the tarpon and seahorses. Shark/Ray alley is included in his day. If you check out his website, you can see all the details and I fully recommend him.

Caveman tours is fantastic. We were just with him in January and had a fantastic day on his half day option with 3 stops plus the tarpon and seahorses. Shark/Ray alley is included in his day. If you check out his website, you can see all the details and I fully recommend him.

So glad to hear that!

Caveman tours is fantastic. We were just with him in January and had a fantastic day on his half day option with 3 stops plus the tarpon and seahorses. Shark/Ray alley is included in his day. If you check out his website, you can see all the details and I fully recommend him.

Hi!

We'll also be using Caveman for our stop in Belize and was wondering if you can tell me what time your 1/2 day tour started and ended? Also, is his place easy to find? We are planning to get on the water taxi to get to Caye Caulker.

Thanks!

First thank you all for the excellent advice.

We decided to go with Caveman. We are going to fly over and back and do the 5 hour tour.

I will report back after our trip and let everyone know how it went.

Cheers.

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Great! When is your trip?

We leave in 3 weeks

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We are very interested in doing something similar to this. What is your plan if a flight is cancelled? Any idea if that happens often? That's my one fear. I really want to see the reefs and all from the air. Just very nervous that if there is weather or anything - what is plan B to get back in time for last tender??

I think if the weather forecast is bad enough, we either don't even go out or just head back earlier. I have seen where if weather is too bad the ship won't even make the port as tendering would be dangerous, so in that case you could be out the flight cost unless you know in advance to cancel our have travel insurance. Do be sure to check what the ship time and port time will likely be as Belize does not follow daylight savings time.

I struggled with the same decision and researched and compared a lot of options. Finally decided to go with Caveman tours. We will take the water taxi there and then fly back to balance the time and cost. He can take up to 8 as a private tour where you snorkel several spots, and since it's just your party, you have more say in how you spend your time.

 

Great reviews everywhere I checked and he responds well and answers any questions. Doesn't require a deposit.

 

I don't cruise until the end of May, so can't tell you how it goes until then!

We did this same plan a little over a year ago. The one pitfall that we had to traverse was to make sure that we would catch the 9:00a water taxi over to Caye Caulker -- in order to maximize our time for the longer custom tour that I had set up with Caveman. Had we been unable to make the 9:00a, the next available water taxi wasn't until 10:30a. Caveman would have waited for us to arrive, but it would have likely meant that we wouldn't have had enough time to include Hol Chan on our tour.

We were fortunate that someone on our CC roll call was able to provide our group of four with priority tender tickets so that we could be the first people on the first tender and the first people off of it when we arrived to the Belize tender pier.

With the first (shore contracted larger)tender not leaving until it was full, it was closer to 8:20a before we actually pulled away from the ship. With the 35 minute tender ride, we got to shore at 8:55a. It was like an episode of the TV show 'Amazing Race' with our hustle to run to the water taxi dock in time to catch it. We barely made it with only seconds to spare.

After that, the day was absolutely great. We went to Shark Ray Alley, Hol Chan (seeing plenty of sealife and coral), fed the Tarpons and searched for Sea Horses upon our return to Caye Caulker. Caveman is a great guide. He made a strong effort to take care of us and make sure we got to see some cool stuff. Afterwards, we had about an hour on Caye Caulker to walk down to the Lazy Lizard at the Split for a couple of beers, a chat with some of the locals, and then a leisurely stroll back through town.

We ended up taking the 3:30p water taxi back as our last tender to the ship was at 5:30p.

So my advice to you(if considering the water taxi) is take a good look at your ship's schedule in coordination with the Caye Caulker water taxi schedule and be prepared to be spontaneous if needed. Make sure to get yourself(and your party) in line as early as possible for the first tender available if necessary, and make sure you have a good understanding of where the water taxi dock is in relation to the tender pier(about a 5-10 minute walk at a normal pace).

Thank you for all the details! I think we'll actually have a bit of a buffer. We're supposed to be in port from 8-5. The ship will be out of TX which will be on daylight savings time, but Belize will not be, and thus it should only be 7 local time when the tendering starts. I accounted for that when booking the flight back, too. Tell me if that sounds wrong, though :)

Ship time vs Local Time:

This was information I had to finally get a definitive answer on. From what i have been informed your itinerary will show you your arrival time in local time. For us (we are on RCCI) our itinerary shows 9 am to 6 pm. While the ship may remain on Miami time, it will still be getting to Belize at 9 am local time and departing at 6 pm local time.

Granted this is what I was informed by Royal.

While I don't think I can get a "priority" departure, I will try and get the first tender after those with a Royal excursion.

Thank you for all the details! I think we'll actually have a bit of a buffer. We're supposed to be in port from 8-5. The ship will be out of TX which will be on daylight savings time, but Belize will not be, and thus it should only be 7 local time when the tendering starts. I accounted for that when booking the flight back, too. Tell me if that sounds wrong, though :)

Ship time vs Local Time:

 

This was information I had to finally get a definitive answer on. From what i have been informed your itinerary will show you your arrival time in local time. For us (we are on RCCI) our itinerary shows 9 am to 6 pm. While the ship may remain on Miami time, it will still be getting to Belize at 9 am local time and departing at 6 pm local time.

 

Granted this is what I was informed by Royal.

 

While I don't think I can get a "priority" departure, I will try and get the first tender after those with a Royal excursion.

Until I also finally decided to contact the cruiseline directly, I had the hardest time getting any definitive answers as to ship time vs. local time when I was planning to book this excursion. We've been on sailings where ship time and local time were an hour off from eachother.

Belize is CST (as is NOLA-from where our ship departed from), but the whole DST thing threw me for a loop. We were scheduled to be in port from 8a-6p and I wasn't sure if that meant 7a-5p local time or not.

It made a significatnt difference in whether we would be able to take the 9a over and the 3:30p water taxi back or if we would have to take the 8a over and the 1:30p water taxi back -- Which the latter might have not made booking the tour worth it in my mind, considering also visiting Hol Chan (in addition to Shark Ray Alley and the turtles) being the primary draw for us.

You may be OK if sailing from TX with DST in effect, but I would suggest double confirming with your cruiseline that your scheduled port time is indeed 1 hour different than local time as to be correct with your return flight plans.

Have fun on the tour. Caveman ought to take good care of you.

 

It made a significatnt difference in whether we would be able to take the 9a over and the 3:30p water taxi back or if we would have to take the 8a over and the 1:30p water taxi back -- Which the latter might have not made booking the tour worth it in my mind, considering also visiting Hol Chan (in addition to Shark Ray Alley and the turtles) being the primary draw for us.

 

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I am struggling with this right now. We have him booked for July 9th on Carnival out of Port Canaveral. It says we are there from 8-5 but I have heard that Carnival stays on ship time which means local time will be from 6am-3pm? The first ferry local time is 8am and if we did his half day tour we would have to take the 1:30 ferry to make it back by the last tender. We always do excursions on our own but this one just has me thinking its too rushed to be worth it?? plus with the half day we don't see Hol Chan even though Ive hear the half day is great without it. Soo conflicted!!

I would call Carnival and see if their itinerary lists local or ship time. Royal Caribbean lists as local time. Though once we arrive the ship stays on Miami time.

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I am struggling with this right now. We have him booked for July 9th on Carnival out of Port Canaveral. It says we are there from 8-5 but I have heard that Carnival stays on ship time which means local time will be from 6am-3pm? The first ferry local time is 8am and if we did his half day tour we would have to take the 1:30 ferry to make it back by the last tender. We always do excursions on our own but this one just has me thinking its too rushed to be worth it?? plus with the half day we don't see Hol Chan even though Ive hear the half day is great without it. Soo conflicted!!

Hi, I know this is an old post of yours but I'm struggling with the same issue for my Carnival cruise this week. Did your cruise end up being Florida time leaving you with 6AM-3PM at Belize? What did you end up doing for the excursion?

Hi, I know this is an old post of yours but I'm struggling with the same issue for my Carnival cruise this week. Did your cruise end up being Florida time leaving you with 6AM-3PM at Belize? What did you end up doing for the excursion?

I would also be interested to know about this.

I would also love to know regarding the time...

Hi, I know this is an old post of yours but I'm struggling with the same issue for my Carnival cruise this week. Did your cruise end up being Florida time leaving you with 6AM-3PM at Belize? What did you end up doing for the excursion?

Can you tell me if you took this excursion and how it worked out? Did you feel you had enough time to enjoy it? I have researched the ship time vs local time and figured out we will actually be in Belize from 6am-3pm local time. Thanks for any help.

I am struggling with this right now. We have him booked for July 9th on Carnival out of Port Canaveral. It says we are there from 8-5 but I have heard that Carnival stays on ship time which means local time will be from 6am-3pm? The first ferry local time is 8am and if we did his half day tour we would have to take the 1:30 ferry to make it back by the last tender. We always do excursions on our own but this one just has me thinking its too rushed to be worth it?? plus with the half day we don't see Hol Chan even though Ive hear the half day is great without it. Soo conflicted!!

Do you remember what time you were in Belize? Ship time 8am-5pm, was that 6am-3pm Belize time?