We're now back to being landlubbers after an adventurous 3 day sailing expedition from Caye Caulker to Placencia with Raggamuffin tours. Even though the trip was postponed a day for rain, we still didn't manage to dodge the drops (got rained on both nights...luckily our sleeping mats floated pretty well); but despite the rain we still managed to have an awesome time. Our fellow travelers included folks from Brazil, Argentina, Norway, Sweden, Canada, North and South Carolina, D.C., Philly, and Boston (and of course our native Belizean-Caribbean crew: Shane, Rasta, and Captain Patrick with dreds to prove it:)
Within the first hour at sea, Richard caught a good sized barracuda; then we had two men overboard (one swept in by the ropes, the other jumping in to avoid the boom but still managing to reel in his fish while in the water!) After that it was pretty much smooth sailing, with stops each day for snorkeling and spear fishing around the coral reefs; sailing alongside dolphins; ceviche appetizers and rum punch every evening; camping on a deserted island the first night (except for an awesome dude who wore his lifejacket 24-7 and helped us pitch our tents) and Tobacco Caye the second night (25 inhabitants including a group of Garifuna drummers who put on quite a show); an intense beach volleyball game, and lots of lounging about on the sailboat deck (only one hour of which I was seasick), gooping on the sunscreen and listening to plenty of reggae and anything else people had on their ipods. Our last afternoon was the icing on the cake: the sun came out and we finally all got the pink cheeks we had been hoping for;)
Alas, tonight is the "last supper" for the vacation...Placencia is an adorable, laid back beach town and our place is amazing (hot shower, real bed) plus we have found authentic and incredible gelato here...already tried 4 flavors (think we can afford a second mortgage??)
We'll be home soon and post some pictures (richard's already starting to miss the panty-rippers and belikans)
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Monday, February 15, 2010
Caye Caulker
Hey guys, I've got 3 minutes to summarize, so I'll be brief:
Caye Caulker is experiencing the cold front that the East coast survived, luckily that means only 65-75 degree weather, which still feels pretty dang warm enough to canoe without a shirt in from our Pacific Northwest thermostats. Our sailing trip is delayed one day, and we're going to try and stay with that meaning, we'll lose one day in Placencia and spend tomorrow on some other snorkel tour (likely, in the rain from the weather forecast, but you're supposed to get wet on those anyway.)
Out of internet cafe time, more to come from Placencia.
Caye Caulker is experiencing the cold front that the East coast survived, luckily that means only 65-75 degree weather, which still feels pretty dang warm enough to canoe without a shirt in from our Pacific Northwest thermostats. Our sailing trip is delayed one day, and we're going to try and stay with that meaning, we'll lose one day in Placencia and spend tomorrow on some other snorkel tour (likely, in the rain from the weather forecast, but you're supposed to get wet on those anyway.)
Out of internet cafe time, more to come from Placencia.
Saturday, February 13, 2010
San Ignacio
Wow, Richard handed the blog reins over to me...yikes I don't know if I can handle it. But as they say here, no worries: "Go slow, you're in Belize."
So we have spent the past 2.5 days exploring the jungle, mountain pine forest, mayan ruins and mennonite communities of the area. Highlights include:
--bumping and lurching our way along the crazy road to Mayan ruins Caracol in an old beater van driven by our guide "King Tut" with a real live Belizean military guard with AK47 in hand in the passenger seat to guard us from Guatemalan hijackers
--climbing the stone structures at said ruins (remarkable that something built that long ago still exists, and in not too bad shape!)
--swimming in a series of freshwater river pools (still guarded)
--eating authentic handmade Italian pasta, Burmese stew, and Sri Lankan curry (all fabulous)
--getting chummy with 4 actuaries from Philly (Ellie, need a job when you get there??) and a couple from Austria
--being driven through Mennonite farm country in a small Datsun pickup that forded creeks, honked at said Mennonites (in horse-drawn cart), and pilfered sun-ripened oranges to be eaten while riding in the back on a couch with life jackets for protection
--being paddled in a canoe 1.5 miles into a cave under a mountain that was used as a Mayan burial ground (awesome!!!)
Tomorrow we will venture onward toward sea, sand, and lobsterland (hopefully it will only be the crustaceans and not us that end up all red and crabby). Not able to post pics but taking lots of them to show when we get home!
So we have spent the past 2.5 days exploring the jungle, mountain pine forest, mayan ruins and mennonite communities of the area. Highlights include:
--bumping and lurching our way along the crazy road to Mayan ruins Caracol in an old beater van driven by our guide "King Tut" with a real live Belizean military guard with AK47 in hand in the passenger seat to guard us from Guatemalan hijackers
--climbing the stone structures at said ruins (remarkable that something built that long ago still exists, and in not too bad shape!)
--swimming in a series of freshwater river pools (still guarded)
--eating authentic handmade Italian pasta, Burmese stew, and Sri Lankan curry (all fabulous)
--getting chummy with 4 actuaries from Philly (Ellie, need a job when you get there??) and a couple from Austria
--being driven through Mennonite farm country in a small Datsun pickup that forded creeks, honked at said Mennonites (in horse-drawn cart), and pilfered sun-ripened oranges to be eaten while riding in the back on a couch with life jackets for protection
--being paddled in a canoe 1.5 miles into a cave under a mountain that was used as a Mayan burial ground (awesome!!!)
Tomorrow we will venture onward toward sea, sand, and lobsterland (hopefully it will only be the crustaceans and not us that end up all red and crabby). Not able to post pics but taking lots of them to show when we get home!
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Day one
- Need an eight letter word, starts with a 'v', ends with 'ion'.
It's just a little after midnight and we're just 15 minutes into our highly anticipated trip to Belize. My day started at 3 AM, had to be to work by 4 in hopes to put out enough fires (or as my co-worker, Ryan, put it "to start enough fires to create a sufficient diversion) so I could sneak out of work for a measly 10 days.
Somehow, after 20 hours of frantic working, packing, last minute shopping at REI, and a shearing off of the winter beard, I still can't sleep on the plane. It doesn't help that my "personal TV" placed on the back of the seat ahead of me won't shut off (the flight attendant said he'd "write it up" with a tone that sounded way too much like the one I was using as I ran out of the office earlier today...) The promo stuck on repeat playing on the screen claims that for $6 swipe of the credit card I can stop the suffering, but Continental Airlines has underestimated the cheapskatedness of this tired traveller.
Eventually I manage to drift off into a sort of dazed conciousness, too sleepy to read or fill out a crossword puzzle, but too overwhelmed with visual sensory overload and the comfortable coach seating arrangements to doze off. Now if I could only stop thinking about all the things I forgot to do on my way out of work today...
- Hmm, five letter word for fried slice of pork
We just spent our Thursday morning scavenging the Houston / George Bush International Airport for breakfast at 6 AM (that's 4 AM Seattle time). After an hour of wandering through the great expanse that is IAH, we settled on Bubba's Seafood Grill, which really doesn't serve much seafood in the morning. We split a couple plates of eggs, hashbrowns, sausage, pancakes, and bacon and wash it all down with a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice while we watch the Snowpocalypse II unfold on CNN. Anna offhandedly mentions that our original plan was to take a trip back east to tour the capital but decided against it because she was afraid the weather could be unpleasant in February (solid call Anna!) In spite of our sleep deprived and overall traveller's state of airport grogginess (okay, Anna slept the whole flight, I'm the only one sleep deprived), vacation mode is starting to settle in - I mean, come on, bacon AND sausage in the same meal! With an MD in the house, these things don't happen everyday.
We head back to the terminal and try to fidget away the rest of our three hour layover, Anna's reading a book about French cooking (look out, I think she's taking notes and already planning our next vacation...) while I bumble my way through a crossword puzzle and actually manage a 15 minute nap before the flight boards...
The gods are good, I wake up to a apple cinnamon muffin from the flight attendant and an announcement that we are 30 minutes outside of Belize, I managed to finally sleep during some of this "red-eye" trip! We fill out a set of custom forms that look disturbingly similar to the itinerary form our mothers' required for us to fill out prior to leaving the country in the first place (where will you be staying, don't do/transport illegal drugs, ...) The pilot makes an announcement that it is 77 degrees and a little cloudy in Belize City, which will be a far cry from the 45 degrees and rainy we left behind in Seattle. From Belize City, we hope to hop a van to San Ignacio and spend the next three days exploring the ruins, caves, and jungle that is inland Belize.
The pilot makes another announcement that we are on final approach, and a group of older ladies in front that have held down their bloody Mary's long enough break into a raspy, smoker's laughter. The sound is both terrifying, and disturbingly contagious. We're dropping through the clouds into what tropical jungle that looks ...
- Four letter word for "not cold", starts with ... 'w'
It's just a little after midnight and we're just 15 minutes into our highly anticipated trip to Belize. My day started at 3 AM, had to be to work by 4 in hopes to put out enough fires (or as my co-worker, Ryan, put it "to start enough fires to create a sufficient diversion) so I could sneak out of work for a measly 10 days.
Somehow, after 20 hours of frantic working, packing, last minute shopping at REI, and a shearing off of the winter beard, I still can't sleep on the plane. It doesn't help that my "personal TV" placed on the back of the seat ahead of me won't shut off (the flight attendant said he'd "write it up" with a tone that sounded way too much like the one I was using as I ran out of the office earlier today...) The promo stuck on repeat playing on the screen claims that for $6 swipe of the credit card I can stop the suffering, but Continental Airlines has underestimated the cheapskatedness of this tired traveller.
Eventually I manage to drift off into a sort of dazed conciousness, too sleepy to read or fill out a crossword puzzle, but too overwhelmed with visual sensory overload and the comfortable coach seating arrangements to doze off. Now if I could only stop thinking about all the things I forgot to do on my way out of work today...
- Hmm, five letter word for fried slice of pork
We just spent our Thursday morning scavenging the Houston / George Bush International Airport for breakfast at 6 AM (that's 4 AM Seattle time). After an hour of wandering through the great expanse that is IAH, we settled on Bubba's Seafood Grill, which really doesn't serve much seafood in the morning. We split a couple plates of eggs, hashbrowns, sausage, pancakes, and bacon and wash it all down with a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice while we watch the Snowpocalypse II unfold on CNN. Anna offhandedly mentions that our original plan was to take a trip back east to tour the capital but decided against it because she was afraid the weather could be unpleasant in February (solid call Anna!) In spite of our sleep deprived and overall traveller's state of airport grogginess (okay, Anna slept the whole flight, I'm the only one sleep deprived), vacation mode is starting to settle in - I mean, come on, bacon AND sausage in the same meal! With an MD in the house, these things don't happen everyday.
We head back to the terminal and try to fidget away the rest of our three hour layover, Anna's reading a book about French cooking (look out, I think she's taking notes and already planning our next vacation...) while I bumble my way through a crossword puzzle and actually manage a 15 minute nap before the flight boards...
The gods are good, I wake up to a apple cinnamon muffin from the flight attendant and an announcement that we are 30 minutes outside of Belize, I managed to finally sleep during some of this "red-eye" trip! We fill out a set of custom forms that look disturbingly similar to the itinerary form our mothers' required for us to fill out prior to leaving the country in the first place (where will you be staying, don't do/transport illegal drugs, ...) The pilot makes an announcement that it is 77 degrees and a little cloudy in Belize City, which will be a far cry from the 45 degrees and rainy we left behind in Seattle. From Belize City, we hope to hop a van to San Ignacio and spend the next three days exploring the ruins, caves, and jungle that is inland Belize.
The pilot makes another announcement that we are on final approach, and a group of older ladies in front that have held down their bloody Mary's long enough break into a raspy, smoker's laughter. The sound is both terrifying, and disturbingly contagious. We're dropping through the clouds into what tropical jungle that looks ...
- Four letter word for "not cold", starts with ... 'w'
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