REGIONS OF BELIZE

There are four distinct geographic regions in Belize. These include the low-slung Maya Mountains in the south that dominate all except the narrow coastal plain; the lowlands of the north with its many rivers and streams; the swampy and flat coastal plain, and the hundreds and hundreds of cayes, islands, and lagoons that can be found around its Caribbean coastline and territorial waters.

More than half of the country is a tropical rain forest which is connected by a network of rivers, generally short in length. The Belize is the largest and most significant river and is traversable from the neighboring Guatemala border to the Caribbean Sea.

 Belize shares 174 miles of coastline with the Meso-American Reef, the longest such neighbor to the 620-mile long barrier reef. Travel 58 miles to the east of Belize City and you will find the Blue Hole, first explored in detail by Jacques Cousteau in 1972 aboard the research vessel Calypso. The Blue Hole is slightly more than 1,000 feet across and about 400 feet deep. Today, it is one of the world's most popular dive sites.