Snorkeling Rendezvous Caye - BelizeSnorkeling Rendezvous Caye is well worth it, if you can get out to this little piece of tropical heaven. It is located right on the barrier reef. And the snorkeling is top notch! It is about about half way between Belize City and Dangriga, out on the reef between Middle Long Caye and Bluefield Range. Rendezvous Caye is a tiny tropical island with palms and a small shade shelter or two.
You might think based on the picture above that the island has more to it, but you are actually seeing eighty percent of it. This little Caye is a popular camping spot for several sailing tour companies (the boat below is one of them). It is pretty amazing to see how many tents they get on this little tiny piece of sand.
There appears to be a couple of different Rendezvous Cayes in Belize. The cruise ships sometimes book folks on a snorkel trip to a "Rendezvous Caye" that reportedly has no trees, so it is not this one. And there are a few more. Rendezvous Caye was one of the locations we stopped at on our week long catamaran sailing tour of Belize snorkeling spots. But you can get out there with a tour company or a sailing camping group. The snorkeling is really pretty fantastic. The reef is particularly healthy here because it is basically right on the ocean, so it gets lots of fresh flowing water and a variety of species frequent the area. The snorkeling is along the north and south sides of the island, more to the open ocean side of things. There are some very beautiful shallow reef areas close to shore, and then it just drops off into the blue depths.
We saw a very nice variety of hard and soft corals, fans, sea rods, and sponges here.
When snorkeling Rendezvous Caye there was not a ton of fish, but we did have our first experience with a group of Caribbean Reef Squid (see below).
These amazingly color changing creatures were so evidently intelligent that it was simply amazing. You could just see how interested they were in us, and how family oriented they appeared to be. It was a wonderful experience hanging out with them, and fortunately not our last in Belize. Check out the video below that Nicole got of the Caribbean Reef Squid. Get Flash to see this video player. After we got home I confirmed that these are considered one of the most intelligent invertebrate species. Their color changing ability is nothing short of astonishing to watch. They can literally take on the color of any background (including a checker board), and then can even oscillate colors back and forth, making a hypnotic flashing rhythm to place prey into a trance. They can also change the shape and texture of their skin. OK. Enjoy some more pictures on this page, and a second page of pictures from snorkeling Rendezvous Caye follows.
Move on down the coast - Snorkel Colson Caye
Return from snorkeling Rendezvous Caye to the snorkeling Belize main page.
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