AmbergrisCaye.com Home Forums The Cayes Ambergris Caye Blue Hole at Bing.com

http://www.bing.com/
For the info run mouse over it until you find a hotspot:
There are 4 .
http://www.bing.com/

A little of the info;
The Great Blue Hole is a large underwater sinkhole off the coast of Belize. It lies near the center of Lighthouse Reef, a small atoll 100 kilometres (62 mi) from the mainland and Belize City. The hole is circular in shape, over 300 metres (984 ft) across and 125 metres (410 ft) deep.[1] It was formed as a limestone cave system during the last glacial period when sea levels were much lower. As the ocean began to rise again, the caves flooded, and the roof collapsed.[2] Believed to be the world's largest feature of its kind, the Great Blue Hole is part of the larger Belize Barrier Reef Reserve System, a World Heritage Site of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).[1]
Exploration
This site was made famous by Jacques-Yves Cousteau who declared it one of the top ten scuba diving sites in the world. In 1971, he brought his ship, the Calypso, to the hole to chart its depths.[3] Investigations by this expedition confirmed the hole's origin as typical karst limestone formations, formed before rises in sea level in at least four stages, leaving ledges at depths of 21, 49 and 91 meters (69, 161 and 299 ft). Stalactites were retrieved from submerged caves, confirming their previous formation above sea level. Some of these stalactites were also off-vertical by 10°-13° in a consistent orientation, thus indicating that there had also been some past geological shift and tilting of the underlying plateau, followed by a long period in the current plane.
Tourism
This is a popular spot amongst recreational scuba divers, who are lured by the opportunity to dive in crystal clear water and meet several species of fish, including giant groupers, nurse sharks and several types of reef sharks such as the Caribbean reef shark and the Blacktip shark. Other species of sharks, like the bull shark and hammerheads, have been reported there, but are not regular sightings. Usually, dive trips to the Great Blue Hole are full-day trips, which include one dive in the Blue Hole and two further dives in nearby reefs.
On-shore caves of similar formation, as large collapsed sinkholes, are well known in Belize,[4] and in the Yucatan Peninsula, where they are known as "cenotes".

Yes but is

Belize's Great Blue Hole Really Worth Diving

Gaz

i sure think so. also snorkeling the rim is unbelievable.

You may be surprised at the number of divers who have not dived it but still say its not worth the effort.

That is exactly why I wrote the article above to explain why the majority of divers on the diver forums say its not worth diving when the reality is very different.

Gaz

People have to make lots of decisions on how to spend their money and their time. By definition those decisions are made without having experienced the "attraction" in question. They consider the facts available to them, including listening to others who have had the experience and deciding how much weight to give to their opinions, then make their own. Quite a few people go through that process with the Blue Hole and come to their decisions.

In my experience quite a few people, probably the majority, who dive the Blue Hole say afterwards that it wasn't really worth it for them. That isn't to say they didn't enjoy it, but that armed with the knowledge they now have they wouldn't have done it. So when someone else asks them if they should dive it they will often get the recommendation "no".

To say blandly that the Blue Hole is "worth diving" is unhelpful.

This only relates to the Blue Hole if you have your country in "Bing" set to the USA. If you have it set to another country you'll see something completely different. My country was set by system default (not by me - I've never visited the site) to UK and all I saw was about Dunkirk.

http://www.bing.com/
Peter are you saying when you click on the link above you dont see a helicopter over the Blue Hole?

You don't see the 4 hot points I saw the Blue Hole but not the hot points until I changed to the US Bing site.

Gaz

Odd.
Yes i hear the remark 'Isn't the Blue Hole just a big blue hole' , but only from people that haven't been. amazing dive and well worth the ticket.
like the article says , one of the top ten in the world.