Show me the whalesharks: the colourful Caribbean and diving the deep blue in Belize

We'd splashed out on one more flight to avoid the long trip to Belize of multiple buses and ferries through Guatemala, although the morning needn't have been quite so early because when we arrived at the airport at 5am, two hours before the flight, we found it was empty and had to turn the lights on and wait an hour for staff to arrive.

Once we were on our way on Tropic Air's tiny single propeller Cesna plane we had a great view over the Mesoamerican barrier reef and soon arrived at Caye Caulker, a tiny island off Belize City with only three sandy streets and no cars. Golf buggies are the only means of powered transport allowed here, a nice change from noise (and the vehicle which doesn't see to work well for the youths that are trying to act all gangster). We stayed in a very nice brand new guesthouse recommended by girl we met in Honduras who had lived here for six months and seemed to know everyone. Most of the people on the island seem to be tourists but in this small community, virtually all locals seem to know each other by first name. It seemed a relaxed and friendly island in a country far more Caribbean than its neighbouring latin american countries, similar to Roatán. Belize is a former British colony and English remains the official language although most locals speak Creole or Garifuna primarily as well as Spanish and English.

We spent a day on a dive trip to and around the 'Great Blue Hole', a collapsed sinkhole that used to be above water, and now flooded still contains caves with stalagtites. The site was made famous by Jacques Cousteau who declared it the greatest dive in the world. Our journey there was long and rough, however, and after trying several worn or leaky regulators Ali was annoyed by how unprofessional the unfriendly divemasters were. But in the end, the dive was certainly pretty cool - we descended rapidly to 40m where it is dark and errie and pass around the stalagtites whilst some large reef sharks pass by. That said you can only spend 8 minutes at depth on air so its only a short dive and you don't see much else. However we had two other dives on the same trip and saw some incredible coral life in fantastic condition and visibility, and also saw the rare red footed boobies (only elsewhere seen in the Galapagos) during our lunchstop at Half Moon Caye.

A snorkelling trip the next day to Hol Chan marine reserve promised large numbers of sharks and sting rays but presented a dilemma because it became apparent that most of the very many boat trips on offer feed the sharks. We eventually decided to go with the lone crazy guy who promotes his trip as not feeding or harassing the animals. We'd rather have an experience that doesn't meddle with the ecosystem even if you don't see as much. As it turned out he was not around, so these principles had to be put aside and we went with Carlos, but challenged him on the feeding. Apparently they have been traditionally attracted by fishermen washing their catch and the noble snorkel boats keep this tradition up to prevent the sharks dispersing and being caught in fishermen's nets. Not so sure about that, but we did see a lot of nurse sharks grappling for food, as well as many large stingrays and some very large and beautiful hawksbill turtles. As for holding the sharks, turning them over and tickling their tummy - that seemed a bit too much.

Hundreds of years of Mayan civilisation seemed to provide a worthwhile diversion before the next dive trip and we we took a trip inland down a long winding river deep into the jungle to Lamanai, one of the largest sites of Mayan ruins in Belize where we climbed a tall pyramid temple for a great view and learned how the civilisation was only eventually overcome by famine. We were joined by some cruise ship passengers who were seeing the region on a whole different budget, and got quite worried when the guide told them he'd seen a most deadly snake on the path a few days ago.

One night in Belize city proved more than enough as it felt rather a lot less safe than elsewhere in the country, especially getting back to the hotel just after dark and we decided to stay in and make our own rather sad cold tinned vegetable burritos in our room for dinner rather than go back out. Although we didn't have any trouble, we were starting to hear lots of people who had been robbed at some point. 

Our long bus journey down south to Placencia by slow local stopping bus wasn't nearly as uncomfortable as we'd been led to believe and turned out to be something of a party bus as loud reggae music blared and smiling people chatted in their language that sounded so almost recognisable. At Lydia's Guesthouse we found a small but nice, clean and cheap room near the beach.

Everywhere we have dived on our travels to date we seemed to have brushed so close with many places with great possibilities for seeing whale sharks, but always missed out due to timing, not quite being in the right place, or just being unlucky. This most magnificent creature - the largest fish in the sea - was top of our list to see and now we seemed to have hit on our best and last chance yet. A few days after the full moon in just a few months of the year, black snapper fish spawn eggs in huge numbers around Gladdens Split, around twenty miles off the coast of Placencia and this attracts feeding whale sharks. We'd timed our diversion down here spot on and set off for two dives full of anticipation with the sole objective of spotting them. The boats look for large shoals of snappers and the divers all drop in. Within ten minutes, we saw the distinctive spotted pattern and enormous size of a whale shark swoop past beneath us and it was worth it. We managed to track it for a minute or so before it moved away and we continued looking for others. The guide claimed he'd seen two others but they were must have been just beyond our sight and the second dive was just a whole lot of blue water but we still count it as a pretty special day. Now we want to see more!

On our final day in Belize, we killed some time in the rather nice Belize Zoo, where rescued animals and birds are looked after pretty well in nice enclosures actually part of the forest and we finally got a close up view of the keel-billed toucan. From there we took the overnight bus into Mexico.

A quick hop into Honduras

Worrying that we have only a couple of weeks left to pass through Honduras, Belize and Mexico to Cancún, where we have a flight booked home, we did some serious prioritisation and made a flight from Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras, to the Bay Islands off the Caribbean coast from where we would work our way along towards Mexico and were eagerly anticipating some fantastic scuba diving.

Roátan is the larger of the Bay Islands and away from the mainland the culture is distinctly more Caribbean. Many locals are Garifuna rather than latino and their own language is spoken as much as Spanish and English. The west end of the island is the main spot for tourists and many colourful houses, shops and restaurants are packed tastefully along a white sand beach. Although the diving is said to be the cheapest in the world, Leila had to be strict to prevent Ali from blowing the budget. We checked into Casa del Sol, which provided us a comfortable room with kitchenette in a nice garden and just around the corner from the main street.

The island is packed with dive shops and we had to try a few before eventually finding Sun Divers to be the most helpful and professional. We made a few dives and it was pretty fantastic - we explored a wreck as well as some reef walls and canyons with many swim throughs and small caves. The visibility was incredible, the coral healthy and we saw many lobsters, and some very bold eels that followed Leila around, as well as turtles, lots of fish and some unusual small things like the lettuce slug and fireworm.

For our last day in Roatán, Leila found a nearby resort hotel with a big pool that we relaxed at, however the highlight for Ali was his sweetest taxi bargaining victory yet. The lazy taxi driver mob in this resort thought they could demand $12 for a 5km drive home and the front man wouldn't budge. Not realising that this tourist would take the steep hour long walk on principle, we began hiking and sure enough the more junior of the group caught us up a few minutes later and took our offer of $6. This more friendly taxi driver learned a valuable lesson in business as he was rewarded with our $20 airport run the next morning, which he was delighted with, even though it was at 4am.

Show me the lava: Fire and dirt in Nicaragua

Our Costa Rican taxi driver had warned us to be careful in Nicaragua as it is a poorer country and the children will pick your pockets and cut open your bags and there were even warnings about avoiding taxis in Nicaragua, so we were feeling cautious as we arrived in Granada, a major colonial town. The only problem we had was that getting off the bus Ali put his foot in a big muddy puddle, but as it happens he soon found a local was helping clean his feet with water from a dripping fire hydrant. Later we had a friendly conversation with a local old man on his bicycle telling us about the town, and although he was also warning us to be careful with our valuables, we felt pretty comfortable in the town centre.

So we arrived safely at our hotel, with all our belongings, to enjoy a little more luxury as as a birthday present, Malcolm had kindly booked us into a grand spa hotel in large colonial buildings with tall rooms and quiet courtyards with gardens and a pool. We were soon refreshed and took a tour of several of the churches in Granada that show the European influence along with large shady plazas and children playing football in the street. 

On our second day in Granada we encountered a large parade in the central square, with many colourful costumes that seemed to illustrate a story mocking old colonials. Later, we took a kayak tour around some of the Isletas, many small islands in the enormous 'Lago de Nicaragua' lake. We were soon wondering why all the other tourists had opted for a motor boat tour however our hard paddling paid off with a very serene cruise through picturesque wetlands with loads of birdlife and an insight into some of the expensive holiday homes of the rich and famous on these islands.

Nicaraguan cuisine gets a thumbs up from Ali after sampling Quesillo, a creamy cheese treat in a fried wrap. We also had some great meals at vegetarian(ish) restaurants, El Kapuyo and the Garden Cafe and it seems that at least in Granada the country has embraced budget travellers and tourists but managed to maintain a sophisticated but rustic charm. And the dollar does seem to go a bit further here than in Costa Rica or Panama.

Our next stop was Leon, the other famous colonial city, and although it is not quite as impressive, we were here for another reason. More volcanoes. The ridge of volcanoes running through Central America seems to be particularly active in Nicaragua and we took a couple of exciting trips near to Leon with Quetraltrekkers, an organisation run by volunteers that guide hikes to fund projects helping street children.

Cerro Negro is a relatively new volcano that was formed only in the last couple hundred years, and still warm and steaming, there is little plant growth yet and its terrain is entirely dark black rocky gravel. One face of the volcano is a nice even slope and makes a great place send backpackers shooting down on wooden sledges. It takes an hour to walk up and less than a minute to ride down but this was such fun that we walked up again for another go. Despite a jumpsuit and goggles, the black grit sprays everywhere filling hair, ears and mouth, and there was little time left in the day after washing it all out before we were packing for our next trip.

Volcan Telica is the most active volcano in the region and erupts every few years, with a constant pume of smoke to be seen from its cone and were excited that lava could be seen at the crater. A two day hike didn't register as too challenging until we arrived in the morning and were each handed 8 litres of water to carry along with food and camping gear. We realised we were spoiled on our camping in Madagascar where porters carried all this for us! Still, the promise of lava spurred us on and we ascended the 11km in just five hours in some stifling heat enjoying some magnificent views of the volcano range and some bubbling mud pools. Arriving covered in dirt from the dry dusty track we set up camp in a unexpectedly green grassy area a short distance down from the crater. The imposing smoking cone was impressive and the sulphurous gases became noxious as we walked up the final leg, scratching our throats and making everyone cough. Peering into the crater was exciting as you can see and hear the volcano roar and hiss as jets of gases escape. The lava, well, it was more like a big barbecue but it was pretty awesome when we returned later after sunset.

Just two weeks left in Central America and three countries to see so pretty sharpish we take a bus north to Honduras and return to the Caribbean once again...

Back on dry land: exploring Costa Rica

Having had to sadly sail past the Osa Penisnsular which has been described as 'the most biologically intense place on earth' we instead visited the also good Manual Antonio national park on our first day of freedom/ off the boat. Our previous crew mate Jenny joined us at the park which incorporates jungle and beautiful beaches and runs along the Pacific coast. The initial tracks were teeming with tourists but still delivered numerous monkeys and at least one sloth. Further into the park the paths were less busy and we saw some rather mischevous monkeys, one jumping on Ali's backpack, snakes, raccoons and hundreds of bright orange crabs amongst the tree trunks. The trails all end at the Pacific Ocean with some beautiful beaches perfect to cool down after climbing in the jungle.

As it was Leila's birthday we wondered into Quepos town looking for a nice place for dinner and accidentally stumbled into a 5* resort. By the time the owner had picked us up in his golf buggy with the lead vocalist from the restaurant's band and delivered us into the head waiter's capable hands we could hardly refuse and enjoyed a lovely meal and even splashed out on one of the most unpleasant bottles of wine ever tasted!

Again making up for opportunities missed we next headed to the popular surf beach of Mal Pais, Santa Teresa, a peninsular on the south coast of Costa Rica. Arriving into town late at night we discovered thousands of the large bright orange crabs everywhere. We were fortunate to see such a sight as they were out in force due to the arrival of the first rain of the wet season. Sadly many hundreds of the crabs were less fortunate as their journey sadly came to an abrupt end with them squashed on the main road. Leila braved the tough wave conditions for an exhausting and intense private lesson whilst Ali headed out alone. The water was wonderfully warm but the waves were enormous and relentless leaving Ali with an injury resembling a bullet wound on his ribcage. His desire to stop at all the surf spots along the cost to Mexico has since somewhat subsided.

Our next stop was the Monteverde Cloud Forest up in the mountains. Whilst only 4 hours away by a very slow bus it was refreshingly cool if a little drizzly thanks to the higher altitude. Monteverde town was established by the Quaker settlers who moved there from Vermont and setup a cheese cooperative, the name 'Monteverde' is even a direct translation of 'Vermont'. Today the area is full of nature reserves specalising in all kinds of local insects and animals. Our first visit was to the Cloud Forest Reserve. A cloud forest differs from a rain forest in that the plants obtain much of their moisture from a cloud-like mist rather than mainly from rain. We took a guided tour around the reserve and were lucky enough to see the Resplendent Quetzel, a plain brown bird which appears a vivid blue colour thanks to its iridescent feathers.  We also enjoyed observing the many hummingbirds feeding, as well as beautiful butterflies, insects and frogs. On our second evening we arranged a night tour into the forest but unfortunately were heavily rained on, sending most of the animals into the trees or underground. However we did see a sleeping toucanette, a salamanda, several frogs, plenty of fireflies and countless large orange-kneed tarantulas. Our guide was pleased to spot an armadillo but unluckily for him we had seen our first ever armadillo the night before whilst walking back to our hotel from the restaurant.

From Monteverde we headed slightly further North to visit the Arenal Volcano. With no thanks to our out-of-date Footprint guidebook, we discovered that the volcano is actually no longer active and the regular lava flows are a thing of the past - since well prior to the book's publication. As Ali had splashed out for Leila's birthday on a hotel in a prime viewing spot for the volcano, this was a little disappointing however fortunately the volcano's hot springs were still flowing and this hotel featured not only a swimming pool but also multiple thermal baths of ranging temperatures with water heated naturally by the hot springs. The hotel also had several insane water slides, extensive tropical gardens and even a small crocodile lake. Though it was bit cloudy we didn't manage to get a perfect view of the volcano but still enjoyed a couple of days chilling out in the hotel. 

The plan from Arenal was to head towards the Nicaragua. Due to bus complications we ended up having to go via San Jose. The Costa Rican capital felt pretty grim and a little intimidating with all doors and windows locked up behind thick grills so we checked in to the closest hostel we could find to the bus station, just 30 metres down the street. This turned out to be run by a slightly hostile Costa Rican Elvis lookalike and the walls were covered from top to bottom with images of either Elvis or Maralyn Monroe. After laying down the various laws of his hostel we settled into our somewhat overpriced room for a short night before waking early to take the bus and get the hell out of there.

After the night in San Jose the long bus journey to Nicaragua was almost enjoyable with air conditioning, good legroom, stops for breakfast and lunch and a friendly member of staff organising our forms to make for a swift pass through immigration control. 11 hours later we arrived in Granada, Nicaragua and were pleased to find immediately that it could not be more different from San Jose.