Belize Day 3: First Snorkel

We headed out to snorkel at 9, having set it up with the front desk only 10 minutes prior. Our tour was through Searious Adventures. Jeff, our guide, picked us up from our dock. There were 5 other snorkelers on board: an older couple that liked to take pictures, two women from Denver (one was originally from Overland Park and went to Bishop Meige, which is only a few blocks away from our house), and a younger girl from San Diego that just graduated from med school. (The San Diego girl had just been in Guatemala, and said there was no noticeable unrest.)


Our first snorkel location was Hol Chan. 3 or 4 other boats were already at the site when we arrived. Once our boat was anchored, a nurse shark greeted us with a wagging tail. The fish are fed in these areas, so they are very friendly. Once in the water, we saw tons of crevalle jack, a moray eel, a huge eagle ray, 5 nurse shark, a couple big grouper, a baby barracuda, and ton of other smaller fish. The reef was teaming with life.


Shark Ray Alley was our second snorkel location. There were less fish here, but there were still a bunch. We saw a little nurse shark, lots of social jack fish, and huge schools of fish trying to blend in with the coral. Very vibrant colors (even if you are color blind).

Afterwards, we napped, laid out, and read. Ann declared that it would probably take 10 years for Wyatt to finish the book he was reading: she's probably right. We noticed that we are 10 buildings down from a barge unloading point. It is kind of annoying, but we get used to it. When the hunger bug struck, we hit Coconuts, next door. Wyatt had chowder with conch, snapper, and shrimp with rice (8.5/10). Ann had fried shrimp with fries (7/10). We then watched "Blades of Glory": two thumbs up for the flying scissor finale.


We went to Caramba's for dinner. We had Ceviche and chips to start (7/10). Wyatt had jerk snapper fillet, which was shockingly spicy (8.5/10). Ann had Caribbean snapper (8.5/10). While were walking home along the beach, we witnessed a small black man tell a plus-sized white women that he was only interested in monogamous relations (paraphrasing for the kids). Furthermore, she was going to have to "make a choice." Ahh...love in tropics!

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Belize Day 2: Chillin'

We woke up early - the sun rises around 5:30 am. 5:30 am! We enjoyed the free continental breakfast at our hotel and ate out on the beach. The spread was quite nice: cereal, eggs, cinnamon raisin bread, toast, fresh fruit, and coffee. Ann enjoyed the tropical fruit jam on her toast while Wyatt was a fan of the hardboiled eggs.


We ventured north on foot along the beach to get acquainted with San Pedro. The main part of town is a quick 15 minute walk from our hotel. Everyone is very friendly; although, there are far more vendors than we anticipated--most of them Mayan--who sell hand woven blankets and tapestries. They carry the baskets on their heads quite adeptly.


And of course there are tons of tour and dive shops. The barrier reef off the coast of the islands coupled with the conservation efforts of the Belizeans yields some of the best diving and snorkeling opportunities in the world. We stopped in at Amigos del Mar to investigate scuba certification for Ann, but she is not so sure she is ready for this. By this time, the sun is HOT. Time to return to the hotel and cool off!


After a nap, we hit the beach: Wyatt with the book he has been reading for the last 3 years and Ann with her book she borrowed from Lyn, and parked it under a palm tree. Rum punch for Wyatt and a Belikin for Ann! Although there is no pool, you can walk out to the end of Woody's Wharf and go for a swim off the edge of the dock.


Remembering one of Roy's suggestions from the day before, we headed up the beach to BC's for their Sunday Beachside BBQ with live music. We shared chicken nachos & grilled fish with coleslaw & beans (7.5/10). The same band from the night before was playing, with an additional guitar player. Apparently Drummer Dan enjoys more celebrity on the island than he did in Berlin. Even though it was a "jam" session, Ann didn't sing as she "did not feel the need to perform."

Our stomachs full of grilled fish and Belikin, we return to Corona del Mar for some serious Scrabble playing. Wyatt wins the first game; Ann wins the second game. After a full day of being beach bums, we called it an evening.

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Belize Day 1: Fly'n Like a Mayan

After our pilot turned left then right then left then right, we finally landed at Belize City International. Our American Airlines plane barely fit on runway. We would have more pictures of the airport except that Wyatt got in trouble, taking pictures in customs. He had to show a relatively laid back customs officer a picture of Ann in a snorkel mask to convince him that the offending pictures had been removed.



The airport was small; it had about 5 gates. We had a little less than an hour to make it to our plane bound for San Pedro. We had to wait through a couple customs lines, a bag check line, a fee collection line, and a security line. It's amazing how many lines they fit into this airport. Somehow we made it to our flight despite the fact we were still in the security line less than 5 minutes prior to our departure. Twelve passengers and one pilot. We've never seen a more laid back grounds crew. The crew member guiding us out seemed to nearly forget to do it.


The flight to San Pedro was smooth. We only had to go through a couple of clouds. The San Pedro runway was grass, dirt, and short. The landing could have been worse. The airport consisted of two weather beaten buildings, each housing one of the two competing airlines: Maya Island Air and Tropic Air. We flew Maya Island Air.


We picked up our bags from baggage claim. We've basically been on autopilot since we arrived in Belize City, just following directions. They called a taxi for us even though we thought we could walk to our hotel. (We could have, but it would have been hot and dusty.) Nearly all the cars on the island are small Toyota vans. Personal transport is done via golf cart, bike, and legs.


We were greeted by Frank at our hotel, Corona del Mar. (Later, we discover that Frank's favorite phrase is, "It's all good." You say, "Hi." He says, "It's all good." You smile at him. He says, "It's all good." We're pretty sure you could fart in his general direction, and he would say, "It's all good.")


Our room is exactly what we need, and almost nothing more. It's great! We grabbed some free rum punch and Belikins (the beer of Belize) and sat on our veranda. From there we looked out at the beautiful reef and the gulf beyond. We also watched the hotel crew play horse shoes. Wyatt rooted for the men. Ann rooted for the women. The women won, but that's probably because they cheat.


We checked out the view of the sun set from the our dock. Then we walked to Blue Water Grill for dinner. We tried all 4 kinds of Belikin: Regular, Stout, Lighthouse, and Premium. Regular is Ann's favorite. Stout is Wyatt's favorite, because it takes like regular, costs the same as Regular, and has more alcohol. Lighthouse is skunkier than Rolling Rock. Premium is only slightly different than Regular, so why pay a premium? Our appetizer was coconut shrimp sticks (9/10). Wyatt had snapper in a curry sauce (9.5/10). Ann had seafood angel hair pasta (9/10). The seafood is exceptionally fresh!


We stopped by Crazy Canucks on the way home. There we met Roy. He came to live on the island in February, and still hasn't found a steady job. He had lots of good advice about the island (of course Ann already knew most of it from her research). One other thing we learned is that Roy hates single barrel rum--and he damn well knows the difference. We also watched a decent band play a bunch of different kinds of music. The bass player was 13-year-old native of the island. The lead guitar was a semi-famous island musician. The female mediocre vocalist had a fake rack and a smoking habit that rivaled Juliet Lewis' character in "Old School" (i.e. "I said I was sorry."). But the real star was Drummer Dan who was formerly part of the band Berlin of "Take My Breath Away" & "On the Metro" fame.

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