The smallest country in Central America — about 200 miles by 50 miles - Belize is also the only English-speaking territory in the region, a legacy of its colonial past. The land that's now Belize was once part of the vast Maya empire. Many significant archaeological sites, including Altun Ha, Xunantunich and Caracol, are located here. The Maya Mountains encompass eight major national parks, including the Jaguar Reserve and several collapsed underground river caves (blue holes).
Offshore, the Belize Barrier Reef is second only to Australia's Great Barrier Reef in size and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The Maya presence stretches back into pre-history, and the city states of the area were enormous and sophisticated, rivaling the size and complexity of London or Paris in the 15th century. The first Europeans to settle in the coastal lands sandwiched between Mexico and Guatemala were English pirates who'd been driven out of their traditional home base, the island of Tortuga north of Haiti, by the Spanish. Britain secured its hold over Belize — then called British Honduras — in 1798 and granted it independence in 1981.
Your cruise ship will dock in Belize City. Most visitors head offshore to one of the unspoiled cayes ("keys") or up into the mountains to climb Maya pyramids, hike the rainforest or tube down underground rivers.
Tip: Despite the Belizean government's strong commitment to the environment, you may see items made of tortoise shell, black coral or Triton's trumpet shells for sale. Don't buy them as these items can't legally be brought back into the U.S.
Tip: Most areas of Belize City are very sketchy, even dangerous, so walk in a group or take a taxi if you're venturing beyond the immediate cruise terminal zone.
Adventurer
Belize City is the armpit of Belize but has interesting attractions for cruise ship passengers outside the city proper.
Belize is adventure central: You can dive and snorkel the barrier reef, swim with sharks and rays, tube through caves, bird-watch and hike the rainforest, and explore great Maya cities. To really get down, though, you're going to need a lot of rope. Hook up with Belize Jungle Dome and head for the Black Hole Drop. The trip starts with a hike into the foothills of the Maya Mountains up to the rim of the Actun Loch Tunich sinkhole. The floor of the sink is 300-feet below; your guide straps you into a harness and you drop on ropes —100-feet to the canopy of the rainforest growing out of the hole, then another 200-feet through the canopy to the floor.
Eat lunch, explore the caves, then hike back to camp; the experience is not for the out-of-shape.
Belize's caves are unique and there is nowhere else on the planet that has caves with Maya artifacts. So if you don't want to plummet into the canopy at Actun Loch Tunich, try Actun Tunichil Muknal (ATM) instead. Any tour guide in Belize City or Cayo will will take you inside the enormous cave complex. At the entrance, you wade through chest-deep water to reach the dry caves beyond. You expect stalactites and stalagmites, but here you get more - a lot more. ATM was used as a ceremonial site by the Maya and there are ceremonial objects, skulls and even the fully exposed skeleton of the "Crystal Maiden" along your route. Was she sacrificed to the gods, or just unlucky? No one knows for sure.
You may tempted to go for surf instead of turf, and if you do, there are boat trips out to the barrier reef run by Sea Sports Belize that are a lot more affordable than the helicopter excursion by Astrum Helicopters (See "Luxury Lover.")
Entertain Me
Belize City is never going to be mistaken for Las Vegas. The best advice is to get up early and get in a full day touring the jungle. If that's not on your dance card, check out the small casino at the Princess Hotel & Casino in King Park. It's small. And it's in Belize City. So keep your expectations in check and you'll do fine. The cocktails-and-conversation action is mostly in the hotel bars.
If you're looking to jam as much entertainment as possible into your shore time, sign up for the Jaguar Paw Outpost adventure. Start with a zipline ride through the rainforest canopy, follow that up by rappelling down a 150-foot cliff to the Caves Branch River and tubing through a cave. End the excursion at the Jaguar Jungle Café with a typical Belizean lunch. Just don't forget your camera.
Family
Take an underground river adventure visiting the Caves Branch River - several tour companies offer this popular outing. Most of Belize is composed of limestone karst, leftover reef from the time the country was underwater millennia ago. Over the centuries, rainwater seeping down through the limestone created thousands of caves; some of these have rivers running through them. Where the cave ceilings have collapsed, the rivers are open to the sky, while in other places, the rivers run through long caverns complete with stalactites. The Caves Branch system is the most popular. There is some limited hiking involved and you can choose the three-cave trip or the five-cave trip, depending on how much time you have.
Cave tubing at the Belize Caves Branch - it doesn't get any better than this folks!
As many as a third of the caves in Belize were used by the Maya, some as ceremonial sites for human sacrifice. But you don't have to go underground to see Maya artifacts; prior to the arrival of the Europeans the biggest cities in the hemisphere were the Mayan cities of Belize. Altun Ha, close to Belize City, was a major religious and trade center. There are two main plazas and 13 structures, including the Temple of the Sun God. A 10-pound jade head representing Kinich, the sun god, that was found here is the largest jade Maya object recovered to date. There's a bit of a walk involved, but it's not too strenuous and well-worth the chance to a see a civilization that endured for thousands of years.
Foodie
Belize is a melting pot, so you have your choice of cuisines, from Turkish and Lebanese to Creole and international. However, Belize lacks the culinary sophistication of St. Lucia or Curaçao. While there are plenty of styles to choose from, the most abundant local produce is seafood. You can walk from the cruise ship terminal to Bird's Isle, an open-air, oceanside palapa in the south end of Belize City. The restaurant is reached via a small bridge. While the surrounding area is gritty and commercial, the view from beneath the thatched roof is terrific and the seafood is fresh and locally caught: pan-fried red snapper, conch ceviche, conch fritters.
The Smoky Mermaid, closer to the terminal on Fort Street, has been in the Great House, a rambling Colonial style guest house, since 1998. The restaurant even has its own cooking show with segments posted on YouTube, so you can see how they do things before you go (or after, if you want to duplicate them at home). Get your fish blackened, Creole-style or sautéed in butter, or opt for a burger (beef, pork, fish or shrimp). There's even a selection of Tex-Mex available. Save some room for the Mermaid's over-the-top Bananas Chimichanga: a fried crepe filled with cinnamon soaked banana and topped with a caramel rum sauce. You may not be doing so much mermaid-esque swimming afterwards, but you'll be singing for sure.
Luxury Lover
There are few true coral atolls in the Caribbean, and without doubt the most spectacular is Belize's Great Blue Hole at Lighthouse Reef. Located about 45 miles from Belize City, this is a circular hole a thousand yards across and more than 400 feet deep. It formed when the ceiling of a deep cave collapsed millennia ago. The Blue Hole was popularized by explorer Jacques Cousteau and it's now a World Heritage site.
To get there quick and make the dive, book a helicopter fly/dive trip with Astrum Helicopters. You'll fly from a base in Belize City, skimming over the lush reefs of the Drowned Cayes and the Turneffe Islands before heading for the Great Belize Blue Hole - the Largest Sea Hole In The World. From the air, the Blue Hole looks like an enormous, cycloptic sapphire eye, staring unblinking into space. Landing on the atoll, you transfer to a dive boat for the descent into the Blue Hole. The dive goes to 130-feet; at that depth there's not a lot of bottom time — 8 minutes — but it's long enough to see the stalactites that formed when this was a cave. After a bit of deco time at 50-feet, it's back up to the surface for lunch, then a second dive at the spectacular Half Moon Caye Wall.
To get spectacular beauty like this, yes, you need venture out of Belize City and hit the Keys (Cayes).
Prefer to stay on top of the water? Belize has some of the best fly fishing in the hemisphere. Several fishing tours are available and will put you on top of huge permit, tarpon, bonefish and snook. The trip leaves from the Radisson Hotel dock near the cruise terminal; your guide will meet you with a 23-foot panga loaded with everything you need. Once a big bonefish hits your fly and rips a couple hundred feet of line off the reel in seconds, you'll be the one who's hooked.
Romantic
Grab a water taxi from downtown Belize City and head for Caye Caulker. Hook up with your tour guide of choice and head out to snorkel the Hol Chan Marine Reserve on a small sailboat. Specific locations are weather dependent, but the menu covers all the bases, including Shark Ray Alley. Don't worry; the big guys here are nurse sharks that dine on crustaceans, not swimmers. You'll see parrot fish, turtles, tropicals and even some unusual ones, including manatees. And because nothing says "not tonight" like a three-alarm sunburn, bring loads of sunscreen, a hat and a shirt; the summer sun can be brutal. Back on the caye, head over to the Lazy Lizard at The Split to chill out. Nothing fancy, but it has great views, cheap ice-cold Belikin Beer and a great second story balcony.
Belizeans are some of the friendliest people you will find. Schoolgirls from western Belize splitting a cab to the bus station and home.
Wallet Watcher
The shore excursions in Belize involve distance travel and, often, special equipment and specially trained guides. There isn't a Belize City public beach to zone out on. That makes the excursions a bit pricey. If you don't want to take a bus into the hills or a boat out to the cayes (although we strongly recommend both), walk from the cruise terminal over to the Belize Museum. Like most things in Belize, it's small, and if you're accustomed to the Museum of Natural History in New York or even the much smaller Wolfsonian in Miami, you're not going to get that. What you will get is a tour of a beautifully restored 19th century building that served as the country's main prison until 1993. The bricks were brought from England, and there are a few prison cells on display, but the bulk of the building is given over to explaining the history of Belize, including priceless Maya artifacts.
It's a half-hour drive to the Belize Zoo. This isn't a traditional zoo; it's a rescue center that houses and rehabilitates injured animals. However, it's a great place to see 150 native species such as tapir and even jaguar, up close.