Last visit to Hol Chan

These last few days here on Amberguis Caye have been very nice, sunny days, with little clouds. We headed out a little early this morning to stop at the store and to take some extra photos.

Corner store

Our daily walk to the boat

 As I sat on the rock wall by our dock this morning, I took some time to appreciate the beautiful world that we live in! It is so amazing that our planet can support so many different species of life and can be so different in various parts of the world. Our captain and his son, Jeff rode up on their bicycles to get the boat ready.

Captain Norman and son, Jeff

Last trip to the boat

The boat ride out today was sort of sad because we knew it would the last one of our trip. Our first stop was to revisit Turtle Rock Island and do a fish count. There were many rays here to check for chum from the boat.

 French Grunts trial one - 7. Trial 2 - 16 After my count was over, I swam to the conch shell graveyard of thousands and looked for the turtle, but did not see him there today. However, We did see a whole school of about 4 inch French Grunts, but couldn't count them because the time was already up on our counts!

Oh, well! There were again, lots of fish around the conch shells. Big ones, little ones, tiny ones of all types. I waited awhile for the turtle, but guess he was busy today. The next stop was Shark Ray Alley. When Jeff set out the chum bucket, we ended up counting 23 sharks at the back of the boat!

Nurse sharks!

These are nurse sharks that are basically harmless to us. They feed on conch shells and seem to "nurse" on them to get the stuff out so I think that is why they are called nurse sharks. The horse eye jacks were all over the chum. As Jeff threw out pieces of fish, they were beating the sharks to most of the food. Also, some blue tangs came up to try to eat. We did one count here. French Grunts - 5          I was able to get some good shark photos here.

 Finally, our last snorkel of the trip was at Hol Chan channel. Once again, this place was amazing. The size of the fish were so much bigger! There were schools of fish all over the place. My buddy was counting blue striped grunts like crazy!

 I could not see as many French grunts here. French grunts trial one (channel) - 26 I did see more in the back coral of the channel. French grunts back channel - 69 We went by the underwater small cave to let some people attempt going through it. Not me! I will need more practice diving lower! We were also blessed to get to see the green turtle again! This time I had my camera and tried to get photos! (last time, my battery went out and I missed the good photos) It was fun watching it eat! It would go down to the bottom and eat some turtle grass then would gently float up to the surface to get a breath of air.

We saw rainbow parrot fish today! I saw a Spanish grunt today also. This marine reserve was full of so many different types of fish that it is difficult to remember all of them. When we were done and headed back to the boat, there were a lot more boats and people there to see this amazing place.

Every time you come into the reserve, you must pay a fee sort of like going to state parks in Texas. This money goes to helping to protect the park so it is well spent. It was tough getting back in the boat knowing that it was our last time to view the underwater wonderland. If I could explain what it is like to snorkel along the reef, I would have to say that it must be like being an astronaut exploring the surface of a new planet, but in reality, the new planet is Earth! I have studied about coral reefs in books, but that is nothing like experiencing the real thing!