Mary's Place is a phenomenal wall dive filled with black corals and fish built in between a vertical fault.
| Name Dive Site: | Mary's Place |
| Depth: | 19-98ft (6-30m) |
| Inserted/Added by: | subway_watersports |
| Rated: | Rated 3.4, 5 votes |
| Specifications: |    |
Send us your images for this dive site[Add Image][Add Movie]
Mary's Place is probably the most famous dive site on Roatan. The dive was created during prehistoric volcanic activity. This activity broke of a huge chunk in the elbow like formation of the reef. This section is itself divided by other fissures to make an exotic undersea maze decorated with spectacular marine life. To protect this unique dive site, Mary's Place has been under a management plan, since 1997, designed to sustain this natural resource. Access is limited to one dive per diver and vacation. Divers need to prove good buoyancy control. A mooring buoy is positioned over an area of 7 meter depth at the edge of the coral wall that falls vertically over 30 meter to a sandy slope and then fades into the dark abyss.
A wide variety of sponges compete for space on the steep walls, including iridescent azure vase sponges, sizeable orange elephant ear sponges and dangling rope sponges. Deep-water gorgonians and black coral extend into the main fissure where fairy basslets and bluehead wrasse dart about their branches. Schools of yellowtail snapper, silversides and horse-eye jacks hang near the entrances of the fissures. Nurse sharks can be seen sleeping under ledges while schools of spadefish pass by. The fissures are up to 4 meter wide and 30 m deep in places. Inside, light shimmers through fairy-tale formations and swim-throughs creating a dreamlike ambiance.
[Add Message]Messages from readers:
Name: native_sons
Mary's Place is Roatan's most famous site and it is stunning. There is a canyon formed when a peninsula of the wall cracked away from the main wall. You swim into the canyon at 90ft, passing beautiful fan corals, entrances to other canyons, and come out at 120ft where a sand chute drops away into the deep blue. Swimming back around the peninsula you will pass some of the best coral on Roatan and look out for seahorses. They are commonly found here. You can then swim over the canyon, at about 30ft and take a good look at all the fans of beautiful coral growing around the top.
[Add Divelog]Divelogs from members: