The Hummingbird Highway between Belmopan and St Herman's is paved and very well maintained. We had no trouble driving on it or on any other highway in our rental car. You can only go a short way into the cave without a guide. I believe there is also a non-cave trail that leads from St Herman's to Blue Hole, but we opted to drive from one to the other due to the heat. Both St Herman's and Blue Hole are right on the highway, about a couple miles apart from one another. It took us a 2 hours to do a self-guided tour of the cave and a leisurely swim at Blue Hole. If you opt to hike from one to the other and back, it would be more like a half day tour I think. Be aware that there is an underground river running through the cave system, and weather will impact your experience if you decide to hire a guide to tube through. If it's been dry, you'll have to paddle a lot. If it's rained too much, the cave may be flooded and closed.

we did not use a guide and just went ourselves, but I think there is another park in the area that provides guides to area caves. Not sure if St Herman's is included.

Dark. :) The self-guided trail goes in a couple hundred meters. There is a little water in that section (not on trail) and a few formations, but it is definitely and “intro” cave. There is a guided tour that goes in a different section, but we didn’t do—so can’t comment on it.

Hi! We considere St. Hermans to be a wet/dry cave , because the is still a small stream passing through the lower side of the cave and dry cave , because we can actually walk inside in a dry path to experience this marvelous creation of numerous cave feature this cave offers us.

The cave itself is fairly warm compared to other caves you may have experienced. The air temp in the cave is typically in the 70’s in December. The water is typically in the high 70’s as well. You can wear shorts/swimsuit and a quick dry a t-shirt or long sleeves if you prefer but no need for wetsuit or anything similar. You will also be wearing a life vest and helmet which adds to the warmth.

We went with a tour from Coconut Row Guest House in Hopkins. You can book a tour through them even if you're not staying there, but depending on where you're coming from it may be easier just to go yourself. Depends on if you have access to a car or not. If I remember correctly ,the tour itself took about 2 1/2 hrs. so yes, you would be able to get in and out or back to a cruise ship. The place itself is easy enough to find. It is right outside of Belmopan.

we payed around $6 or $7 per person for entrance to the blue hole and the cave and we paid another $3 to rent a flashlight we didn't get a tour so don't know how much that would be

The Blue Hole National Park where I did my cave tubing closes at 4.15pm and you have to be in the cave before it closes by about 2.30 to 3.00pm at the latest, so it would probably be a real push to get there in time, especially if there are any flight delays. If you need to get to San Pedro on the same day, you probably wouldn't have time to do the cave tubing as well. I just turned up at St Herman's Cave in the Blue Hole National Park and asked if any cave tubing tours were going and I was lucky, there was one leaving in about 10 minutes. I was there in the morning and joined some other passengers who had booked in advance, there were only 2 of them, so there was space for me on the tour and it wasn't a large group. I had made enquiries about booking an afternoon tour, but these did not seem to go every day which is why I just turned up on the off-chance in the morning. All of the tour companies seem to charge the same, $50US per person for cave tubing tours in St Herman's Cave. This includes your Blue Hole National Park entrance fee. You have to carry the tubes from the car park along the hiking trail for about 20 minutes and then carry them along the path in the cave until you get to the section of the underground river where you can float along. You have to carry your tube back out and to the car park along the hiking trail at the end of the tour.