Belize City, Beliz
Teri
We took the cave/river
tubing tour offered through Xtreme Tours in Belize and had a wonderful
time! Our guides, Richard and Manuel, were very informative the entire
trip and helpful with any questions we had. My boyfriend and I booked this
tour after reading several good reviews of Xtreme through this website. We
were in an air-conditioned van for the ride to and from the river, which
was nice in the Belizean heat. Once at the river, you get your tube to
carry, and the jungle hike took about 30-40 minutes I guess, and wasn't
too difficult at all if you're in mediocre to great shape. The guides
point out several local floral and fauna and tell you about them.
Once at the cave entrance,
you can either walk down to the water and get into your tube easily, or
you can jump about 10 feet off a rocky cliff into the river and they throw
your tube down to you. I chose to jump - it was a blast! Plus, the water
is chilly and just jumping in is an easy way to get used to the temp. Once
your group is in the water, on their tubes and has their headlights on
their heads, you start floating through several caves, looking at
formations and bats pointed out by the guides, maneuvering through some
small rapids (not bad at all, though), and just paddling backwards
leisurely and enjoying the float.
I'd say about 75% of the
trip is inside the caves, and the rest (at the end) is in the sun, which
is nice because you get a little chilly after awhile in the caves! Then,
you can eat a delicious Belizean lunch there for $5 which was wonderful.
Afterwards, your guides drive you back to the port, where you have time to
shop a bit before returning to your ship by a tender boat. I would
recommend this tour to anyone and I know we had more fun using Xtreme than
the ship's tour because we had less people in our group and got to see an
extra cave!