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Spring Break Belize • March 11-March 17, 2023

Final Hello from Belize

March 17, 2023

Hello one last time from Belize!

 

After an amazing week together, everyone in our Belize Spring Break family is in the air and headed back home with full hearts and so many incredible memories to share.

 

The second half of our adventure started with another beautiful day of Scuba Diving—this time at ­­­Pompion Canyon. After a calm morning boat ride, we all dove right back into the water with half of our group fine-tuning some skills and the other diving down to 60 feet along the Pompion Wall. Erin, again showing off her swimming prowess, was a leader in the water as we explored the reef while Holtie captured some unreal GoPro footage of everyone swimming right alongside a family of nurse sharks!

Later in the afternoon we made our way back to our home base at the hostel and all enjoyed some much-deserved down time. Jake, Jackson, Holtie, and Owen got creative and put together a floating Spikeball game in the water to keep themselves entertained while the girls relaxed in the pool and Addy kept the vibes high by leading conversations and helping queue the music!

 

We then geared up for our exciting evening activity—Mini Golf at Inky’s! But first when we got there, we took a dip in their pool and Marlo led a few games of Pass the Ace before we all enjoyed dinner on the patio at sunset. On the course, Mak showed off her athleticism by dominating the competition and Nola and Holtie had hole-in-ones! To cap off our exciting night out, everyone enjoyed some gelato!

 

Back at the hostel, Jake and Nola led a thoughtful poolside Moonup before we all turned in early before our 5 am wakeup call and final day of scuba diving!

 

To kickoff Day 5, Splash served us a yummy moonlight breakfast before we got on board the Princess Taia for the final time and headed for Salt Water Key. The ride out featured a beautiful sunrise, a cool breeze, and lots of naps on the deck! We are so proud that Addy, Marlo, and Sari all completed their certification after utilizing their wrist navigational devices to navigate a dive underwater. We even had a pair of nurse sharks along for the dive who stayed close hoping we would feed them some lionfish. We saw some stingrays, eels, and a turtle! Back on the boat, Zoe led our previously certified divers in a game of “Name that Tune” and Nola blew everyone out of the water with her music knowledge. After our 2 dives, we headed to the island where we got to enjoy lunch and explore.

 

After saying our thank yous and goodbyes to our instructors at Splash, we headed to our cooking class in Seine Bight! Kim and Bobby welcomed us with open arms as we learned about Belizean culture and traditional cuisine. Sari was in her element leading the charge in every aspect of the meal prep—from shaving coconuts to dicing the vegetables! Then in the final stage, we all learned, “no beat, no eat” when it comes to preparing our side dish of plantains. This time, it was Jackson who led by example jumped at the opportunity to take on the bulk of the workload.

 

After enjoying our Garifuna dishes, Jake and Marlo led a thrilling game of tag with our chef’s kids before we headed back to the hostel for our LODs, Jackson and Addy’s, Moonup! It was a reflective Moonup where we talked about how we had grown from our choices, and how we will continue to grow.

 

On our last full day in Placencia, everyone got some much-enjoyed extra sleep before we hopped in Mark and Sheila’s cars and drove down to the pier for our final activity: sailing! We met our crew for the day—Mike, Alex, and Captain Jimmy—and immediately knew we were in for a treat. Everyone relaxed on the catamaran as we sailed out to Moho island to enjoy our final day together. Not even a few light rain showers could slow down this group from having an absolute blast! Mike constantly reminded us that we were “on vacation” as we grilled out and enjoyed every soda and juice under the afternoon sun. We swam, lounged, played games of Death Sack, listened to music, solved some riddles, and soaked up every last minute together. It was truly the perfect way our trip!

 

Yesterday evening we went back into town to celebrate our trip with some souvenir shopping followed by dinner and karaoke at the Tipsy Tuna! Virgin strawberry daquiris and tacos fueled us for our big performances of Sweet Caroline and Love Story—and our spontaneous dance party captivated the entire restaurant! We are pretty sure they’ve never heard karaoke like ours! Our kids were out of their comfort zones and loving it!

 

To close out our final night, we surprised the kids with the first annual “Belize Spring Break Paper Plate Awards/Superlatives” and then shared lots of laughs and memories during our final Moonup that was led by Holtie and Marlo. Moonup was full of reflection on this trip and our takeaways from our time together. Every person was so insightful in how they will carry a small part of this trip and group how with them.

 

We’ve have had one unforgettable week here in Belize! We’ve laughed harder, smiled bigger, and soaked up more sun than we could have ever imagined or hoped for. A hearty thank you to everyone who made this trip possible! We adore these kids, and we were so lucky to get to know and love them this week. They are thoughtful, silly, and simply a blast to hang out and adventure with. We hope they loved having us as much as we have loved having them. Belize Spring Break was certainly one for the books. We can’t wait to stay in touch with this group and who knows- reunion Spring Break Maui 2024??

 

With full hearts,

 

Owen, Zoe, and Sandra


Diving Right In!

March 14, 2023

Greetings from Belize!

We have had the best few days here in Placencia full of laughter, sunshine, incredible views, and great diving!

Our adventure began in the Belize airport where our first 6 students arrived! While Addy, Marlo, and Jackson experienced some unavoidable travel delays, we were anxiously awaiting their arrival on Day 2.

We welcomed everyone to Belize and began the journey to Placencia. We jammed out to some of our groups favorite songs while learning some new fun facts about our home for the next week!

Our lovely hosts Mark and Shelia greeted us with homemade pizza and chocolate cake and ice cream. We then took the opportunity to cool off in the pool before our first Moonup!

At our first Moonup we talked about why we were all here and what we hoped to get out of the experience, as well as our B+ superpowers. At the end we were excited have our Alumni Holtie and Sari named as our Leaders of the Day (LODs) for our big first day of diving.

We woke up bright and early to enjoy a yummy breakfast where we got to enjoy some local fruits and a great quote from Sari to kick off the day. Then we headed out to Splash to begin our scuba diving adventure.

At Splash we broke into dive groups for our first briefing and then headed to the boat. We boated to the beautiful Long Boat Key where we began to practice skills in the shallow water.

Erin and Holtie were like fish in the water with their dive instructor saying that they could be certified in just one day at the speed they were learning! They jumped right in and were already at 30 feet deep by the afternoon!

Everyone was quick to learn skills like mask removal, CESA, and equalizing! In the afternoon we headed out for our first open water dives. Mak and Nola even saw a nurse shark on their very first descent!

As we turned back home, we were building so much excitement at the fact that the rest of our Moondance family was waiting for us at the hostel!

After a thrilling first day, we were welcomed with cheers and celebration as Addy, Jackson, and Marlo had made it to Belize! We celebrated by taking everyone into the town of Placencia for a tasty local dinner on the beach complete with strawberry smoothies to cheers our group being together!

After dinner we headed to Tutti Frutti, a famous local gelato shop, to cool down with some ice cream. Jake, in his classic positive demeanor, absolutely loved his watermelon cone.

Finally, we headed back to the hostel to finish our day with a meaningful Moonup together with our whole group for the first time. Holtie and Sari prompted us to talk about some of our happiest memories and even lead us in some funky dance moves. They named Erin and Mak as our next LODs!

On the morning of day 3 we were ready and eager for a full day of scuba and fun!

Jackson, as our certified diver extraordinaire, dove right back in scubaing and kept everyone entertained with his incredible storytelling!

Addy and Marlo caught right up with the group in their scuba skills, ending the day with a 30-foot dive. We are particularly proud of them for pushing through the skills quickly and working through their initial hesitation. They are absolute rockstars!

Half of the group completed their Open Water PADI certification early with the rest of the group not far behind!

We then headed back to our hostel where we enjoyed great conversations, card games, and darts before chowing down on some Belizean burritos.

After dinner, we jumped into the pool for a lively game of Marco Polo! Shortly after, Sari became our head chef as she led the charge for baking a lemon and funfetti cake for dessert, which everyone enjoyed after their swim.

Mak and Erin lead a meaningful Moonup where we chatted about the most influential people in our lives (and I am sure many of you reading this were mentioned!) They named Jake and Nola as our next LODs as we head into our next day of diving.

We are so incredibly grateful for this awesome group of kids! They are thoughtful, silly, encouraging, and kind. We have loved getting to know them these first few days and can’t wait for the next few! They make our jobs so easy, and we want to say thanks for letting them be a part of Moondance history with us this week!

With full hearts,

Zoe, Owen, and Sandra


Excited for Scuba Diving

March 12, 2023

Hello Belize families!

We heard from our leaders this afternoon that the group gave a warm welcome to our late arrivals, and everyone is thrilled to have the whole group together! Everyone is in high spirits and excited to start scuba diving. Stay tuned for trip updates from leaders Zoe, Sandra and Owen about everyone’s adventure!

 

Spring Break Belize is underway!

Cheers,

Moondance HQ


Greetings from Belize!

March 11, 2023

Greetings Belize Spring Break families!

We are so excited to begin our adventure but our trip will not be complete without a few of our friends who experienced some travel delays. We are meeting them tomorrow and then our Belize Spring Break Moondance family will be complete!

Cheers,

Moondance HQ


Students

  • Addy
  • Erin
  • Holtie
  • Jackson
  • Jake
  • Madison
  • Marlo
  • Nola
  • Sari

Staff