We spent the last week on the Grand Princess and one of our ports was Belize City, Belize. We spent the entire day with Don (Doanld) who own ZIP LINE BELIZE (www.ziplinebelize.bravehost.com). He met us at the dock and escorted us everywhere and we were amazed as we bypassed the long, long lines of our fellow ship passengers. The organized cruise excursions only had time for one adventure due to the long lines and time constraints of so many people on big buses....in fact, several times we overheard people grumbling and asking why we were getting to go past them....however, there were 6 of us in our own minivan and following a city tour we first went to the Belize Aerial Trek and ziplined thru the rainforest canopy with great guides, excellent equipment and it was fun, fun, fun! Next, we went around the corner to Jaguar Paw Resort and tubed thru 3 cave systems and saw amazing caverns with bats, stalactites, etc. Again, we had 2 guides (Don was one of our guides) that stayed with just the 6 of us whereas the cruise excursions had 35-40 people and only 2 guides....they couldn't seem to keep up with their people and looked completely disorganized. The cruise excursions had lunch under a shed while we were escorted inside the Jaguar Paw Resort restaurant for a terrific lunch and a tour of the resort including the resident howler monkey who looked in the window while we ate(he dropped down out of a tree about 4 inches from my nose when we walked outside and I wanted to touch him but Don said no....his bite could be ferocious), the butterfly farm, pool, cabanas and just amazing tropical rainforest flora and fauna!!!! Following lunch we went to the Belize Zoo for up close (I mean way, way up close)views of Belizean wildlife including howler and spider monkeys, jaguars, macaws and so much more. Then Don escorted us downtown for shopping at a Belizean grocery store (Don recommended several items) and a souvenir shop. They kept a constant watch on our time so that we wouldn't miss the boat and were so warm and friendly. Don pointed out many things and gave us the history of Belize as we drove thru both Belize City and the countryside. You could never find a better tourg uide anywhere! Thank you Don for a wonderful time and we hope to see you again!

We used their services too and they are the best. There is no way I can ever thank Donald and his team for such great time.

Donald, keep on what you do !!!!!!!!

May god bless you!!

Dedee

We did the combo with Donald too last week and found him to be an interesting person. He is easy going person and very flexible. We had a great time and we highly recommend their services.


Roberts Family

We used their services and it was great. Roberto was our tour guide and he was very nice to us. If I get the chance to do it again I will use their services.

Thanks for the blast!!!!!!!!!!!!

We just booked the cave tubing and zipline combo with this company. Hope w have as much fun a you did.

Belize, here comes the Wilson Family!!

Zibra

We just got back home ( England )after our western caribbean cruise. We did the zipline only with this company and we had a really great time.

Thanks David for giving us a tour.

Elton

We just got back home from our cruise. WE used the services of this company. Roberto was our tour guide. He told us all about Belize's history and culture.

I have to say that the zip line was a blast! Roberto put a lot of life in our tour. He is the best.

We highly recommend their services.

Martha Walker and family.

Just got back home from our Carnival Cruise. This was our second cruise to the Western Caribbean and it was the best. We did a combination of the cave tubing and zip line with Action Boys Belize dot com . There were 27 of us in our group. We had 3 tour guides that were with us. Donald was the lead guide. He is a warehouse of knowledge. After Donald spoke for half an hour I was thing that that were nothing else to say. David got the mike and started with Indian History and on he went. When we got to the site there was a long line. Donald stopped the group and told us that we will be passing the line, and just follow him and all will be just fine. We did as instructed. We walked to the front of the line . We were assisted with our gears and headed to the first platform. WE has two experts that were assigned to us ( Donald worked this out ). They were kind and very polite. The sipping was a blast!

After the zip line we started our hike through the rain forest. As we hiked Donald did presentation on Medicinal Plants, Indian Culture, and Cave Systems. When we got to the cave entrance Donald gave instructions on what to and not to do. They formed a chain with the kids and Donald towed them whilst David towed the adults. Edward was a back-up guide. The tubing lasted an hour or so. After the tubing we headed to the City. Donald told us that we can add the Zoo to the day's activities with no extra cost. All we need to do was pay our entrance fees. This was nothing to debate on, so we went for the tour of the zoo since we had a lot of time. The tour

of the zoo lasted 40 minutes. We then continued to the City. We had lunch at a local restaurant. Rice, bean, and chicken was our lunch and it was good too. We were then taken back to the terminal to board our tender.

We had a great time in Belize. Thanks to Donald Ramirez and his team. Just to pass this on, Action Boys Belize is made up of tour guides who came together to offer visitors to Belize their services at the lowest rates possible. They were all employed with the larger companies who do tours for the cruise lines. Their services are of high standard and doesn't cost mush.

Highly recommended
Beris Flo and group

I am the leader of a group of 12 who will be docking in Belize City in January 2009. I am interested in the zip line/tubing combo, but am concerned about how athletic you need to be to safely do these activities. We are all in our 50's-60's. Any real danger of getting hurt?
Thanks

All age can do the zip line. It is a safe trip.On most tours there will be two tour guides with you. Action Boys Belize has the record for the oldest at age 84 doing the cave tubing and zip line tour. I am sure you will do just fine.

Go for it.

My husband and I just got back from our cruise on the Carnival Glory. We wanted to do both the zip line and the cave tubing in Belize. I couldn't find an excursion that offered both with Carnival so after reading/researching the posts on this discussion board, I booked an excursion with actionboysbelize. (You can Google them.) I asked the Glory's excursion desk about getting off the ship as early as possible. Carnival wants to get their excursions off first before they open the tenders (20 minute boat ride to the port) to people without excursions. They told us to go to a location on the ship to wait in the morning and they got us off on one of the first few tenders.
We asked where to find gate #1 where Donald Ramirez told us to meet him. We found Melanie and Donald outside with a sign with our name. We were partnered with another couple so there were only 4 of us which provided us individualized attention. (My husband and I like smaller groups so we are not herded like sheep on an excursion.) Melanie provided great historical and cultural information on the 45 minute van ride to the zip line. Melanie was very knowledgeable and had a great sense of humor so the time passed quickly. We arrived at the zip line before any other groups which was great! I was a bit concerned about doing the zip line since I have a slight fear of heights. However, the 2 guys that were assigned to the 4 of us were helpful and kind. They reassured us, put on our gear, and told us exactly what to do. (The hardest part was the hike up to the first platform but we were told to take our time.) Make sure to put on bug spray before you arrive since the mosquitoes are hungry! Our bug spray worked great but we would have been miserable if we hadn't put it on. Anyway, the zip line was so much fun and we are so glad we did it! They do take photos of you that you can buy at the end of the zip line tour if you want.
Melanie met us at the bottom and took us to bathrooms where we could change clothes for the cave tubing. We left our other change of clothes and valuables in the van and felt very safe since someone stayed with the van. Melanie walked us through the rain forest (about a 30 minute easy, flat hike in the shade) pointing out interesting plants. We got in our tubes and linked together by our feet. The water is refreshingly cool and clear! Melanie did a great job of leading us through the caves and around the other large groups. I appreciated being in a small group of 4 since she could keep up with us and tell us where to go. The cave tubing was a relaxing, wonderful experience.
Afterwards, we changed into dry clothes and got into the van for the ride back. We had the opportunity to ask more questions about the country and culture. Donald and Melanie took us to a local air conditioned restaurant where we had chicken, rice and beans. The restaurant was clean and the food tasted so good after an active day in the rain forest! I appreciated the excellent service from Donald and Melanie. The zip line and cave tubing was an experience we will never forget and I'd highly recommend it.

J. Gallen

Don, thanks for giving us a great time. We will highly recommend you and your team.

May God bles you more


Roberta

It was a great tour. The kids can't stop talking about it. I think every one in my Town will use your services. The kids are telling every one about Mel and Tiny. I can never thank you enough Donald.

Donald, that was a big surprise. Thank you very much for the birthday cake. We will be back for the spring break coming.

See you and yout team then.

Blesings to you

great tour, Donald Thank you for every thing.

Babba

Tendering:
First I just want to say a little about how we arranged to get off with the early carnival tours for Belize. As we were a group of 22 Carnival now provides a group coordinator. Anyway I worked it out with the coordinator to allow our group plus the few people we met with cruise critic to all get off the Valor with one of the Carnival tours. This worked out very well and had us on shore asap!

For everyone else you can try the pursers desk and many times they will let you go with the carnival tenders if you can show them a confirmation and the time needed to do the tours. If that doesn’t work you can actually just go with the carnival tours – you would be amazed how few people got checked. IF you don’t feel comfortable doing this just get up early and get the #1 stickers! The 1st tender of “regular” non carnival booked cruisers still gets to shore pretty early.

I do want that because of all the rain in Belize prior to us arriving many of the carnival tours were canceled. I think this helped us get on the early tender!! The group coordinator did not finalize any of the details for me till the night before. It was a scramble to get out all of the information to our crowd. Sadly I wasn’t able to get in touch with everyone…..but more on that later.

Combination tour – Cave Tubing canceled?

When I heard that carnival canceled their cave tubing tours I e-mailed Donald ( http://www.ziplinebelize.bravehost.com )to find out if ours was canceled too. He was very quick to get back to me! He confirmed that Cave tubing would be canceled for us as well AND that the bridge to get to Jaguar Paw resort had been washed out. He Said that the resort could carry us across but it might be a little rough and that for anyone who didn’t want to try this we could figure out options for them on the pier.

Once we got to the pier We all met up with Donald – he was holding a sigh with our groups name on it. The group got separated and was on 2 tenders due to the way the line worked out. Anyway we all got on the bus, as people were climbing on I talked to Donald. It turned out that the bridge was almost repaired and that it would only be a short walk in water about to our ankles to get to the other side. Our gang was cool with this so we all confirmed the Canopy tour. At this point Donald also let me know that we would be able to do an abbreviated version of the Cave Tubing. The group was VERY excited about this news. It turns out that jaguar Paw resort has a spring fed cave system that we would be able to safely explore.

Canopy Tour (zip lines)

We got to the “washed out” bridge and were happily surprised that a back hoe has just about completed the work needed for our bus to cross. Due to the time restrictions we all had to walk over anyway so that we didn’t loose precious minutes! It was an easy walk and there wasn’t even enough water to get to our ankles. On the other side of the washout the resorts vans picked us up and continued the drive to the resort. Now for those who haven’t been to Belize it is not a long drive out of the city to do the cave tubing and Jaguar Paw resorts canopy tour. Roughly 50 miles in which about a third is a rough dirt road. Our bus was pretty decent, a little better than a school bus and had air-conditioning and a great driver. However if you get uncomfortable easily on a rough ride this tour isn’t for you.

Anyway once we got to the resort it was a quick walk to the start of the canopy tour. Then we were geared up by a few very nice gentlemen and over to the first briefing. Here we were told the safety precautions etc. also they double & triple check our gear. Then it was a short hike up some steps to the first platform.

The first platform is really just a test run to make sure you know what you are doing. It is only about 10-15fft from the ground and pretty short. We were all instructed on what to do and we were off. Being the fearless leader, and an adrenaline junky I was first to go. No sweat! I zipped along, figured out how to break and happily yelled “Trogdor comes in the Niiiiiiiiiight” to get the gang going (for those who are not familiar with Trogdor it is a cartoon on homestarrunner.com)

Our whole gang got going then, we were roughly divided up into groups of 5 so that as one group was on the next platform the next group was heading to the same platform. Mostly to keep from having a traffic jam. A few of our gang did manage to get stuck in the middle of some of the longer zipline stretches. SO if they tell you not to break DON’T BREAK! - mostly if you are nervous you put more pressure on the above line behind the device you slide on – this slows you down. Trust me you don’t want to get stuck in the middle of one of these! Because it is more work to hand over hand pull your self to the next platform then it Jis to swing along

I am sorry I don't have space to share every thing. It really was a blast!

Donald Ramirez, thank you very much for arranging the zip line tour for my family. We had a great time. The kids loved it a lot too.




Doug

Just booked my group for the zip line and cave tubing adventure with this company. Hope to have a great time too.

Alma

Donald and Carlos, thank you both for a great tour of the zip line and tubing. Donald, my son ( Steve ) told every one about the plant you used to stop the itch on his arm. You had a really positive impact on my kids. Myself and my wife ( Anne ) are happy that we booked this excursion through you guys. Thanks for the tour of the zoo too. I have never seen a eagle so huge.

Note to Donald:
Donald, I hope that you will share your knowledge of Medicinal Plants with young kids. That will be very good for you and your business. When you stopped the itch on Steve's arm my wife was thrilled. Steve had that itching before went on the cruise, and you stopped it in less that 5 minutes. You really are a great asset to your country and your people. We love you and hope to see you some time in the very near future.

You guys are great!
Mike

Donald We will arriving in November of this year. We hope to have fun again. We all want to do the same thing again.

See you very soon

Great tour services. It was a lot of fun and we hope to do it again.

Liz

Our cruise ship docked in Belize at 8:00 am and we rushed off to the mainland on a tender. David, our tour guide had a sign that read " Action Boys Belize ." We got into the van and off we went. The tubing and zip line was very relaxing. We stopped at a local bar for a few beers and were dropped off at the dock again. It was a great experience.

Thank you Action Boys

Marv

We used their services and had a great experience. David did a great job as our guide and driver.


Thanks for a great time, Action Boys


Devon

Great tour! We had a great time too.

Thank you, Action Boys

Wooooooooooooooow! These guys are the best. Wayne was a great tour guide. He worked out everty thing for. WE also had time to stop for a few beers.

We love you, Action Boys Belize

We had fun. Love the rice very much. Donald, thank you for arranging every thing for our group

Thank you guys for a great tour. I pleased my review on other sites too.

Love you guys

Jeanette and family
Greece

Belize Shore Excursions - We used this company for the third time when porting in Belize. This time we did zip line and Belize Zoo. It was fantastic.

Love you guys

Pat and family