Hello divers
my future wife and me are planning our wedding vacations in San Francisco (short stay one week) and two weeks in Belize like diving and beach vacations!
but now i'm insure. july/august is also a raining season over there. is it really unbecomingly to dive in this time? visibility, rainfalls, thunderstorms ...
is there anybody out there which can give me informations for all my questions?! thanx a lot and sorry for my english!
greez from the far and cold switzerland!

If there are no hurricanes in the area July and August are good diving months. What makes it so good is that the wind tends to die down and the water flattens out. Those tend to be hot months so the water is very warm.

Sounds paradoxical - come in hurricane season! But ScubaLdy is spot on. Another plus is that prices are well down then. A negative is that for certain trips the customer base may not reach critical mass so the trip doesn't happen.

It's officially dry season now, and I haven't seen so much rain in a long while. Weather patterns are changing - as I said on another thread, it'll probably be snowing in July!

muchas gracias pedro! ;-)
i check up every nice place in the world as seychelles, mauritius, maldives, indosia... and that stuff...

You'll like it here, but possibly not getting here.

Siculu,
scubalady and pedro2 are on target. Actually I like diving Caribbean in Summer best. visibility and water temps are at best. Very little chill on the boat. Rain is more frequent, but generally shorter duration, unless it's a tropical storm. But AC is one of the best places anywhere to do nothing in case the weather doesn't agree with your plans from day to day.

You'll enjoy it no matter what!

DB

Congratulations on your upcoming wedding!

Can you give more details about "customer base may not reach critical mass"? My family is visiting Aug 17 through the 27 and both my husband and I are experienced divers but our kids (18 & 12) do not dive. We were hoping to be able to dive as much as possible but combine the diving with snorkeling so our kids can be with us. I've emailed a couple of dive operators that I think are located to the north of San Pedro but I never received any response.

Boat fuel is expensive, so whatever the trip there will be a quorum below which the trip is uneconomic. For example, no BH dive trip will leave with less than 10 divers on board. Some trips are less in demand than others, such as a dive trip to the Elbow on Turneffe, and it could be that at that time there wouldn't be the minimum number of potential customers.

PM me if you'd like me to help you with contacting dive centers or arranging diving. Make sure to give an email address. I run a dive center in San Pedro, though south rather than north. Where will you be staying?

Pedro2 - We're staying 4 miles north of SP at the Stella di Mare. I'd appreciate any assistance so I'll PM my contact info.

A short note about San Francisco. I am in SF and July is cold, foggy and windy! Middle of August starts to get a little warmer in the city. A day trip to Napa Valley is great (warmer weather) and another day or day/night trip to Montery is great-check out the best whale watching cruise in California- www.sanctuarycruises.com They leave out of Montery Bay. Gone with them a couple times and once a huge grey whale swam under the catermeran (don't think I spelled that correctly??) and everyone runs to the other side and up he pops on the other side - spitting out it's spout hitting folks with snot!! yeah sounds gross, but they were so close.. lots of fun-they are such great creatures. Congratulations on your upcoming wedding!

The calmest water I have ever experience anyplace in the world has been here a day or two ahead of a big tropical storm. It seems that the water is actually sucked out to sea and the reef area looks like a lake.
When the "loads" are down, the various smaller dive shops usually contact each other and arrange for one of them to take a group out.
It gets too expensive for everyone to be running their boats up and down the island just to pick up a few people. Because I like to dive with Everette Anderson of Belize Diving Adventures I take my guests into town on the golf cart saving them the expense of coming north to pick us up. That is, unless they plan to dive up north then they do pick us up. Many people have certain dive sites that they insist on diving, usually because it is what they have done or heard about. Personally I prefer the lesser known sites up above the Boca Cut instead of going down to the Hol Chan cut. The canyons are narrower, steeper, and more water movement resulting in more sponges, sea funs and soft coral. The Christ of the Abyss statue has been resurrected! (That means there is once again a buoy marking the spot.)
Keeping an open mind is important - try some new things.

ScubaLdy - Can you give more info on the Christ of the Abyss statue? Only been to Belize twice, and hubby is the diver, but it sounds very interesting. I've read about others, but this is the first time I've heard of one in Belize.

This is a cement statue that has survived many storms; however there is some damage (like missing hand). At one time it was actually knocked onto its back but has been set upright again. I have some really good video of divers descending. Too bad people like to pose behind/beside it and look at the camera. It is much more interesting to video people investigating things then posing. Oh well; what is one to do? LOL
Many of the dive operators in town or south of town do not like to make the trip north so be sure and ask. When I get Belize Diving Adventures to take a group I have them put tanks on the boat for two dives and simply put in at one of the resorts up here for the surface interval. In this way they don't burn up all that gas going back and forth to their dock.