Snorkeling Glover's Reef - BelizeSnorkeling Glover's Reef was one of the highlights on our snorkel tour of Belize. It is not easy to get to, but as you will see from the pages and pages of underwater pictures we took, we loved it. Glover's is a circular reef that is very shallow within, and outside the ocean drops away quickly to over two thousand feet. The maximum depth within the atoll is around 50 feet, with most areas being much less. And what makes it a snorkeler's heaven is that there are about 800 patch reefs within the atoll in these shallow, calm waters.
Glover's Reef Atoll is considered the most remote of the three major atolls off the coast of Belize. While Lighthouse Reef may be the farthest out, Glover's is farther away from more populated areas and has less traffic venturing out to it. This atoll is also a World Heritage Site (which means it is listed by the International World Heritage Programme of UNESCO, and can receive funding and special protections). It is also a Marine Reserve of Belize. Most people who visit Glover's Reef tend to stay at one of the little resorts or camping locations on a few different cayes. We were fortunate to charter a sailing catamaran out of Ambergris Caye, and made a point to sail out to Glover's for a few days of snorkeling.
While there, we stopped in at the Glover's Atoll Resort on Northeast Caye (pictured below) and had a nice walk around the small palm filled island.
We snorkeled both the outside of the west edge of the atoll, and a handful of patch reefs inside. And it was all fantastic. The waters within are almost always pretty calm because of the protection of the reef. We were anchored in twenty and thirty knot winds, and the waves did not pick up much. The reef is particularly healthy here. There is an abundance of fish life, healthy corals of types you don't see commonly elsewhere (like Pillar Coral), tons of interesting shapes and colors of sponges, and lots of alga. The picture below is of the very narrow and shallow reef break on the west side called Swash Channel. We snorkeled the stunning waters outside of the reef here, and then very carefully made our way into the atoll in just a couple of feet of water with lots of current.
One of the neat things we got to see here was the Pillar Coral you can see below.
So enjoy the pictures below. We took so many pictures snorkeling Glover's Reef that there are even two more pages of pictures to enjoy.
Below is a beautiful Star Horseshoe Worm, followed by a Banded Butterflyfish and a Blue Tang.
Can you make out the Scrawled Cowfish using it's color changing ability to hide in the picture below? They are amazing at changing color. They somehow know what direction their viewer is looking from, and change to match the background.
Check out more pictures and videos from snorkeling Glover's Reef - click here.
Continue to Glover's Reef Extra Pictures Page 2
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