Today was a really fun day. Got up a little early for breakfast, then to the beach! I hung out on the beach for a few hours, then went on a snorkeling tour of the reef. I guess I didn't realize, but the reef runs from Mexico all the way to Honduras. It is the second largest reef in the world, and the largest in the Western Hemisphere. After a 20 minute boat ride we arrived at the reef. It was amazing!! We snorkeled the reef for over an hour and saw so much wildlife! Today I saw a giant eel, probably 6 feet long, giant grouper and tuna, so many colorful fish, a puffer fish, and maybe 6 sea turtles. Oh, and a leg of an octopus. Our guide tried to coax it out of the coral, but I only saw one of the legs. The reef is amazing here. I was really kind of sad though. There was so much plastic and garbage in the ocean. Our guide said it was from cruise ships. I guess normally there isn't much garbage in the reef but the current was just right and the winds, that it all washed up on the reef. It was really sad to see. I picked up as much as I could fit in the pockets of my swim trunks, but it wasn't enough. Tomorrow it will all be washed out further into the ocean. Makes me mad that people treat our oceans as a garbage dump. After the hol chan reef, where we started, we went further up to a place called shark ray alley. The guide threw some chum in the water and all of a sudden HUGE rays and nurse sharks started swimming around us. It was intimidating, but really awesome at the same time. The guide got one of the rays in his arms. I bet it was 5 feet across and let me pet it. It was really smooth and a little slimy. But, I was so amazed that I got to pet a ray that I didn't care. It was a really cool day.
Tomorrow is my last day in Belize and I plan to just hang out at the beach and catch some more sun. Then the journey home begins. So sad it is coming to an end. But, back to reality I guess. The tv stations here are all American tv stations. So, I saw the weather channel and it said snow showers in WI on Friday. What a bummer to come home to. I'm going to get as much sun as I can tomorrow!
