Welcome to Belize!

First impressions: super expensive (compared to Guatemala and especially compared to India) and super lazy! They are so lazy they don’t even bother walking to the bus terminal and just wait for the bus to make a turn around the square in front of their house!!! Okay, it is incredibly hot here so it could be understandable!

We got to Punta Gorda (yesterday) and got our passports stamped at immigration. Here they speak mostly English with a carib accent but they speak Spanish and Garifuna as well. We got a bus from Punta Gorda on the same day. When we said it is expensive it really is: the exchange rate is 1$ US = 2$ bn and the prices are around the same as back home (at least for the food and transportation)…and the worst is that you don’t really get quality for the money! But oh well…we didn’t plan to come to Belize and now we are gonna enjoy it to the max :)

The bus ride was interesting – it was 6 ½ hours -- the longest time we spent on a “chicken bus” (the same as Guatemala) and for the price we could have gotten a deluxe in Guatemala (okay, I’m gonna stop complaining about the price hehe!) We did about half of the country on that bus so we got to see a lot of the countryside and a lot of bana plantations (they cover the bananas with blue plastic bags to protect them from the insects so its like a cloud of blue among the fileds. Their expressway is only one lane either way and straight as the eye can see and with no sidewalks so the bus has to honk its horn every time it’s about to pass so as not to run over the people. The countryside is very pretty, down south it’s more flat and it starts getting more mountainous towards the north. We stopped constantly to pick up people along the way but the main stops were Placencia, Dangriga and Belize City.

Oh, I forgot to mention, here they is great diversity of ethnicity (Chinese, Indian, Garifuna, Mayan and Ladinos) and there is more mixing in between them than in Guatemala) so the bus was filled with just about everything and since the bus was a basic one people brought their own stereos so I crooned a bit to Celine Dion (they seem to like her here!) and of course R&B :)
We had to switch seats at one point because two fat Garifunas were unhappy with their seats (we had assigned seats but you didnt see us complaining for not getting them!) and at one point the bus picked up a family and the woman was pregnant so being the gentlemen that he is Jo let her sit with us except that meant we were crammed for about an hour of the journey (until another seat cleared)! The bus also had to dogdge a family of pigs at one point (it was the mum with all her little piglets --too cute!)

We got to Belize City (not the capital -- that is Belmopan) at 9pm and had to get a taxi to the hotel. I have to say it was the first time we had to use a credit card -- like I said --- expensive!!! And we didnt even get a tv or air conditioning with it, just a ventilator! But anyways...we had a quick hot dog on the street and then headed straight to bed as yesterday we got up at 4am, took two boats (each 1 hour long) and a chicken bus ride to get here, talk about travelling! :)

This morning we got our bearings and went off to find the tourism agency to get information for planes out of Belize to Honduras (as we unfortunately saw too late in the guide that the next boat out to Honduras was on friday and we didnt want to stay here that long). After walking in the blistering heat with our bags we found that the of the 2 tourist agencies in town one had moved out to the highway (5km away) and the other was closed and for rent! So we walked back and got a water taxi to Cayer Calker instead where we were told we could swim with sharks!!!

After another hour on yet another boat we find ourselves in something close to paradise (if it wasnt for the heat and the prices hehehe). The Cayer Calker is an island off the coast of Belize known for its diving and snorkeling and everywhere you walk you see tour agencies guaranteeing the best sights underwater ever --yes, we have already bought a waterproof camera but those pictures we wont be able to put up on the blog :(

We got a nice cabana hotel in front of the sea and have decided to stay here for two days (so we will be leaving for Honduras on friday afterall). We headed out to the Split after eating (thats the north end of the island and it is acutally called that due to the island having split after it was hit byt the last hurricane!) There the party goes on all day with music, beer and a cement pier filled with tourists where you look out and dive into the beautiful turquoise sea. The water was amazing! Jo yet again saw an opportunity to use his incredible bag again (this time with all the equipment inside) --- it really does work and it floats too hehehe So we took a couple of photos while in the water...I sneaked my Rolleiflex into his bag as well :)

The day was amazing however it could have been better if Jo hadnt cut his foot on a sharp shell or gotten stung by algae while with his camera in the water -- by the way, the best solution for algae sting is vinegar (so we found out)!!! So we headed home before the sunset (which I was really looking forward too) to treat his foot -- good thing we had a pharmacy with us :) and also to wash our clothes seeing as we will be resting here for 2 days...gives them plenty of time to dry :)

Tomorrow we are heading out with an all day tour to the reefs where we will be swimming with sharks (they have 5 different kinds here -- I hope they wont smell Jo's cut foot hehehe) and manatees and rays and turtles and of course the coral reef and lots of colourful fish -- we cant wait!

So we will catch up with you after that -- take care, hope everyone is doing well wherever they are in the world and lots of kisses!

Love,
Jo and Fil

P.S. We put up more photos on the blog and also some in the earlier entries so dont forget to skim down the blog to take a look at them :)