9 - 17 June 2014
We made it to Belize! And we love it here. Its Caribbean coast is exactly as we´d hoped. With its palm trees and coconuts; jive talkin` rastas; tropical fruits and juices; street side grills; obnoxiously loud reggae music; colourful barrier reef (second largest in the world, right after ours of course, which we enjoyed reminding people of): and "go slow" life philosophy, we had hit Caribbean paradise jackpot.
What I didn´t know about Belize was how redundant my Spanish would be. Everyone speaks English, or at least a dialect of it, and Queen Lizzy features on all their notes and coins. (We have the Brits and their defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1790 to thank for that).
We spent three days in Placencia doing absolutely nothing. It was great. Then followed that up with five fun filled days in Caye Caulker.
And we got about the country on an interesting array of transport, includnig old recycled American school buses (riddled with rust and holes in the floor, squished full of sweaty people, with incredibly uncomfortable seats, and let´s not foreget the standard blaring reggae music at all hours of the day or night (after a 14 hour trip I eventually resorted to ear plugs); rough water taxis; bombed out rusting cabs; ferrys, which were comparably quite luxurious; and golf buggies. Never have my ears and butt hurt so much as they did in Belize (ears from the blaring tunes, butt from long bumpy rides).
But, as they´d rightly say here in the Caribbean "no worries, go slow, peace and love, respect, god bless, just enjoy brother...."
The highlights
Placencia
- There was nothing to do in Placencia. And there was no one around to play with. The peninsula was deserted. Which turned out to be perfect cause we used the time to catch up on some admin (yes, traveling requires "work") and laze about the place, guilt free. Our daily routine looked something like this: coffee in bed, bircher on the balcony, reading and swimming at the deserted beach, tuna salad sangas in the air con, work out at the park (which inevitably ended in Damo having a chin up challenge with the local kids), wander up and back along the single footpath, sundowners at one of the two beach bars, head home to cook up a healthy dinner and drink rum filled with fresh coconuts a-la-Damo. Chocolate. Bed. Repeat.
- The biggest highlight was probably the epic thunderstorm that ambushed us one morning. It was the biggest I have ever seen! It set off car alarms and nearly made me cry out of sheer terror. Ture story.
Caye Caulker
- I´m in love with Caye Caulker. I loved everything about it. Everything.
- Its sunny days, cool breezes and rainy nights
- Its sandy streets lined with dive shops, grocery stores, tasty restaurants, street grills, markets and surprisingly, without pesky sunglass hawkers
- "The Split", the now norther most part of the island after hurricane Mitch had his way with it and sliced the island in two. The Split is super pretty and hosts the infamous Lizard Bar and constantly has people swimming and sunbaking on the mangled concrete jetty. It´s pure bliss.
- Its abundance of rum. Coconut rum. Rum punch. Rum and anything. Our fave was the ´panty ripper´, coconut rum with pinapple juice. Oh as well as Damo´s home made coconut water with rum. Potent, and healthy!
- Caye Caulker has everything you could ever want on your island paradise. But if I had to choose just a handful of highlights, they would be...
- Riding our push bikes all over town. By day, by night (under a full moon of course), holding hands, with NO hands at all. Our bikes were the best.
- The grand opening of "Lobster Season"! The locals were finally able to hunt, kill and serve lobster. Lobster fever took the town by storm, much to Damo´s delight.
- Reading and drinking coconuts in hammocks on our private jetty. Standard.
- Watching the World Cup at Lizard Bar. We were the only Aussies and were relentlessly harassed by a loud Chilean dude and his crass Skippy impersonations. It was partly insulting, but mostly hilarious.
- Trying our hand at windsurfnig was a big highlight. Our bleary eyed French instructor taught us all the tricks of the trade, which naturally we were awesome at.
- And finally, diving. Woah. We enjoyed a private trip to Esmerelda, which was out past the reef break. Navigating our tinny boat through smashing six foot waves was both exhilarating and pant-peeingly terrifying. And as if being above sea level wasn´t scary enough, as Damo and I decended - on our own - through the hectic surf, we found ourselves surrounded by more than 5 sharks! I immediately used half a tank of air. The marine life in Belize are unlike any we´ve experienced so far. They´re stalkers. Instead of being scared by us, they relentlessly followed, and even harassed us. That said, it was incredible to swim side by side with two-metre long sharks and to see the colourful friendly fish and coral below the surf. So worth the initial horror!
The Summary
Weather: Hot as usual, but chilled by the onshore winds and the nighly rain. Loved it.
Diving: Amazing. Roatan still takes the cake, but seeing so many sharks, having the private tour and diving in a surf break were pretty gnarly. So was windsurfing.
Food: We ate SUPER healthy in Placencia. Then lived it up with Belizian style chicken dishes with rice and salad, grilled lobsters, the quaintest Italian meal and lots of social street side grills in Caye Caulker.
Beverages: Rum! With fresh watermelon in Placencia and pineapple in Caye Caulker. And Belikin beers, the nations pride and joy.
People: We met so many awesome people in Caye Caulker thanks to the communal dining establishments. A hilarious couple from Denmark, some nice newly weds from California, as well as a variety of other friendly souls in between, including a guy that Damo went to highschool with! What are the chances?
Accommodation: Both places were awesome. Air con (always air con), kitchenettes, good locations, great.
Budget: We overspent in Caye Caulker with all our fun activites, but it was totally worth it.
Overall: We love Belize. Granted we didn´t see much of the inland parts, but we loved what we did experience on the Caribbean side. The people are friendly and chilled, English was spoken everywhere, we never felt unsafe and we totally soaked up the Caribbean life on Caye Caulker. Definitely a highlight of the trip so far.
That´s it for now folks! Damo and I are now in Mexico (eek!!) and about to seek out some much anticipated guacamole. We did an amazing sailing trip in Belize before we left, but we´ll write about that another day.
Big shout out to Anna, Alisha, Zarz and Justin who are about to have their birthdays over the next week - big birthday love to you guys!
Bye for now,
Kath (and Damo)
Caye Caulker
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| Yep. This happened. Beers down at this split. |
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| Sunbaking and paddling off the jetty (or what's left of it post hurricane mitch) |
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| Happy Damo after floating in the Caribbean with our new Californian friends. |
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| Have we mentioned that we love bikes? Especially retro ones with baskets, like my friend Neon here. We rode bikes everywhere on Caye Caulker. We rode them along the main street. |
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| We took them out with us to eat cake. |
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| They waited patiently for us when we did grocery shopping. |
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| We rode them with no legs! |
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| And sometimes with no hands. |
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| Our bikes loved to come with us to breakfast. Mostly because they got to hang out with their other friends out front. |
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| Our bikes endured plently of reckless night riding. Especially by me after a couple of rum punhes. Poor Neon nose dived a few fences. Sorry Neon. |
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| We also took our bikes to the festivities for the start of lobster season! They liked that. |
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| And they came with us through the cemetery. |
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| We met this guy. He'd been shot EIGHT times when he was part of a gang in Belize city. True story. - he showed us the scars. He was a nice guy though, he was hoping to turn the city around. |
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| Now he's raising funds to educate the youth of today. This is his story. If you can read Creole. |
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| We watched the chile vs aussie game at the lizard bar. They served bar snacks of mango with habanero sauce and lime! Mind blown. |
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| Capturing coconuts outside our room. |
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| Slicing them open with a machete. No worries. |
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| Lobster season starts! |
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| There was a lobster frenzy about town. |
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| Every one was getting their lobster on. |
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| Almost everyone. |
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| We had many a fresh juice and sliced fruit from this nice lady! |
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| And lots of street food to boot. Bbq chicken with rice and slaw. Standard. |
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| Purchased some art. |
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| Not sure why. But he's here. |
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| One of our best moments ever. Beers. Beach. Breeze. Bikes. The anticipation of lunch. Best. |
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| Books. Cocktails. Hammocks. Yes. |
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| Oh and sliced fresh mango. |
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| Roaming rastas. |
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| I wasn´t lying about the full moon. |
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| And lots of sharks. |
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| My arch nemesis. The shark sucker who insisted on nibbling my flippers and staring me down through my mask. |
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| These photos do not do the situation justice. Damo diving in cresting waves. |
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| Our dive master and captain. |
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| Riding the surf back in to safer waters. |
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| Our humble abode. |
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| Finding our accommodation. |
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| We got windsurfing lessons. |
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| We totally nailed it! |
Placencia
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| One of our fave sundowner venues, Tipsy Tuna. A wise place. |
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| Where we spent our days reading and swimming. |
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| Jumping for coconuts! |
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| Reading time. |
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| Sundowner time. Belikins and rum. Not together. Gross. |
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| So many cute clapboard houses and pretty gardens. |
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| Why thank you. |
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| Colourful houses. And the sole footpath I mentioned. |
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| Restaurants. |
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| Jive talking. |
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| There was a drumming show! Garifuna styles. |
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| My hero. Fresh coconuts with local rum and a procured straw?! Yes please. |
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| We got our healthy green juicing on. |
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| Tasty home cooked meals. A rare treat these days. |
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| Belize has conch shells EVERYWHERE. They eat the slug inside. Not for me. I bought a pair of conch earrings instead. |
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| Bircher accompanied by said terrifying thunder and lightening storm. |
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| Oh this is from Puerto Cortes, Honduras, this is the beach there. Gah. |
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| It´s me bus! Ri(t)chies. |
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| Probably spent about 26 hours doing this in Belize. |
