"You Better BELIZE It"

Our Caye Caulker TOP 10

1. Business hours of stores/restaurants depend on how the owners are feeling at a particular time. "Yeah I'll open later....probably."

2. Conveniently there are only 3 main (sand) roads on CC - Front St, Middle St, and Back Street.

3. Still unsure how the taxis (or old golf carts if we're getting specific here) stay in business when you can walk from one end of the island to the other in about 5 minutes.

4. "Definites" don't exist anywhere on the island - "We MIGHT be going snorkeling tomorrow", "The hairdresser MIGHT be here later", "the restaurant MIGHT open tonight." etc etc.

5. The entire local population (shop/restaurant owners, taxi and boat personnel, and most random locals in the street) ALL knew us by name, knew about my medical trauma and asked how I was doing everyday. (Emmanuel - the security guard at the boat dock who was very sad when we finally said good-bye)

6. All (often dangerous) adventure tours include bottomless rum punch - for participants AND the staff.

7. Walking the streets at night in any other place one might watch out for cars....Here, you watch out for giant blue crabs crossing your path.
(Alyece...scaring the poor little one)

8. The Chinese population exist only in the supermarkets - never to be seen outside of their markets - and EVERY single supermarket is Chinese. (This is true for all of Belize that we saw)

9. It took us an entire 3 week period to figure out that Kriol (in English "Creole") - the native language is actually a form of broken English. This explains why we could never really figure out what people were saying to us or if it was English or not (or if they were talking to us at all).

10. The general pace for the island, in EVERY respect is "Go Slow" - noted on street signs and by every local.

Alyece Says:

As noted in our last blog entry, Erin and I headed back to the lovely little island of Caye Caulker for some serious R&R after the hospital situation. We could not have picked a better spot to take it easy; after all, the island’s slogan and philosophy is “go slow.” During the week that Erin took her oral meds, we laid low, spent some time on the beach, and took a few day trips to other islands.

We went to San Pedro, the infamous island where Madonna’s classic hit “La Isla Bonita” is set, which they are still milking to this day. Every street sign and map boasts the catch phrase and you end up with Madonna’s voice replaying in your head as you wander the streets.
(not loving San Pedro, we opted to just chill out and catch some sun)
(not impressed about being photographed in her bikini)
We didn’t like San Pedro; it was too fast-paced, expensive, overly-touristy, and ruined with massive resort hotels for us. After spending so much time in Caye Caulker, the fact that you needed shoes in town sent us back on the early boat.

Because Erin and I had a bit of free time on our hands during the week, we were able to get some costumes together for Halloween… We found some leopard-print cat dresses, which we altered and added tails to. We were definitely going for most original. In our defense, however, we had limited resources!

Friday was also the day Erin finished her antibiotics so it was also a celebration of freedom. There were two huge Halloween parties on the island and all the creatures were out in full force.




(we weren't sure about this girl..who just sat on that motorbike in front of the bar?)

We spent the first half of the night at restaurant/bar literally on the water where we danced with some hilarious characters. Our personal favourite was this 50-year-old man wearing a pink sparkly dress with saggy boobs, a fanny pack, red tights, and a plastic alien crest on his head.
And he had the moves to match! There were some extraordinarily freaky costumes; we were pretty impressed with the spirit of the island. This place was more of the local crowd because it was a fund raiser for the kids of the island for education. (With our friend and snorkel guide, Ian)
(Met this adorable little girl in the lineup for the bar??)

The other party we went to was at the island’s only nightclub, Oceanside, which was more of a traveler/tourist crowd. We met some other cats (Clearly Erin hasn't perfected the 'be scary BUT still pretty' face)

and saw some interesting costumes (basically a bunch of backpackers getting creative with whatever materials were available). We confirmed the fact that we had a good night when we woke up in the morning with sand and rope in our bed and Erin only had one shoe :S Finally on Sunday were able to do what we originally set out to do about three weeks ago… SNORKELING! Of course, we had a pretty solid excuse to put it off for so long, some say it’s difficult to see the sea life from the hospital bed.

So with Erin back to health, we signed up with some fun local tour operators for an awesome adventure. The guy who owned the boat (the captain/cook) was a hysterical local Rasta man named Steve who made us feel very confident in choosing his tour when he showed up on his bike drinking a beer at 9:30 in the morning…Anyway, it was a gorgeous day and we boated out to the coral reef reserve to the relaxing sounds of the seawater and reggae music...and the smell of marijuana wafting from the boat crew at the back.... This was the first time snorkeling for both of us and at the first stop (Coral Gardens)
we got used to using the snorkel, and I got the hang of the underwater camera.
Next we went to the 'Shark and Sting-Ray Alley' where we dropped anchor and immediately our boat was surrounded with colorful fish, huge sting-rays and nurse sharks. Our snorkel guide, Ian, told us just to jump in
and had all the sea life swarming around us; he was like the sting-ray whisperer or something...or maybe it was the bait in his hands.
I was able to get up close and personal with one ray and pet its' back and belly.

Ian was an awesome guide and he showed us tons of wicked sea life. This included green moray eels, bright tropical fish, and other things I don't remember the names of.
(Accidental Fish Footage)

                                                                           (DORI!!!)

At the final stop of the day which was part of the National Marine Reserve called 'Ho-Chan Alley', we encountered more rays and sharks

and our personal favorites, Sea Turtles!! The turtles were a little more timid, but I managed to break away from the group and chase one down to swim with it.

After snorkeling we very slowly sailed back to the island,

(The completely hilarious 'Big Steve')

drinking bottomless rum punch...

and eating delicious fresh conch Ceviche. It was an amazing experience - and well worth the wait.

That night we accompanied our guides to the Reggae bar on the island for some drinks.

Here they talked us into staying one more day to do another snorkeling trip at a very discounted price.... (I think they had taken a liking to us) ...and we couldn't say no.

So we set out yet again, the next day with 'Big Steve', but this time with another snorkel guide (other Steve) who made the experience that much better by wearing speedo-briefs that left nothing to the imagination. We took a different route and went a bit deeper on the second trip so Erin and I got to see even more. We got up close with a barracuda (and back away when we saw how sharp its' teeth were), some huge fish, and an eight foot long moray eel. I ditched the camera on this snorkel so we can't freak you out with photographic evidence.

After another awesome day we finally left Caye Caulker the next morning and bussed down the coast of Belize to Punta Gorda where we spent the night. This was on the 4th of November and buzz of the election was crazy in every city we stopped in. American travelers and non-Americans, everyone was rooting for Obama. We were astounded at how huge the election was for people across these Latin American countries. Obama t-shirts everywhere and we even passed a restaurant serving Obama burgers and McCain fries! We caught some CNN action over dinner and breakfast and jumped on a boat for Honduras the next morning. We spent the day bussing through norther Honduras from one city to the next to reach La Ceiba (a coastal city where you can access the Bay Islands), which brings us up to the present....we're currently on one of the Bay Islands called Utila and we'll spend the next day or two exploring around here.