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!