Inland Trip, Belize

          Instead of my usual spouting off at the mouth and only posting a few pics, I'm gonna try a new format:  I'll tell my story with mostly pics and keep the verbosity extra short.  They say pictures tell a thousand words, and although I do like to read myself type I have to agree I think most blogs could do with more show and less poe. We'll see how this goes.  Allow a little verbosity to set up the picture show.

          Ted's 30th was set to coincide with a car rental inland exploration of Belize that had been brewing for a couple of weeks.  We were gonna use Placencia as a jump off point, and had a long list of things to see. Belize isn't that big of a country, and we figured we could get our fill with a 3-4 day tour.   The Romo's had done something similar 2 weeks prior, and seemed to have really gotten a good dose of inland Belize.  I'd be lying if I said there was no drive (if only in my mind) to try and outdo them.  This would be no easy task, for the Romo's know road tripping, and Bryan found a second crystal skull, Indiana Jones style for god's sake.  So we took off, driving right by places we knew the Romo's had gone, and seeking out places they hadn't. 

I assume the car rental places expect you're gonna to do stuff like this with the car





          Dammit, already I need to interject.  (the silence didn't last long) Barton Creek was our first stop, way up near San Ignacio, and this place was amazing.  The owner of the property -Mike, was a friendly talkative guy, who had a bucket full of stories to tell about his 4000 acres of property.  Some true, maybe some not.  He is originally from Europe, has worked in Canada and the U.S., and moved down here 18 years ago to get away from it all.  He apparently has 3-4 waterfalls, a handful of different caves, and even a hidden mayan temple.  He is in a court battle with the Belize government for usurping 5 acres of his land so they can charge money to tourists who want to see this particular cave on his property.  For this reason, as well as the fact that "archaeologists are assholes" (his words) his mayan temple will stay hidden.  He and his young Belizean wife showed us nothing but hospitality for the two days we were there. 

Bub and Pen

Getting ready to canoe into the Mayan underworld

          The cave was pretty amazing.  Inside we saw ancient bones, pottery, stalactites, stalagmites, bats and these huge freshwater catfish.  When you get far enough in and shut off your lights it is pitch black in there, so devoid of light that no amount of time will allow your eyes to adjust and see.  All you can hear is the tinkling of water dripping from the roof above you.

what the fuck was that?



bridge joining the walls of the cave, where the virgins were sacrificed.  you can't really see it but there is still a skull off to the left



rope swing outside the cave

Mike let us "usurp" his outdoor kitchen for the night

for the first time in his life Bubby has more balls than Penny

an early morning walk revealed these beauties

          After cooking tomato egg and cheese sandwiches in Mike's kitchen he recommended a handful of places to see (all places the Romo's hadn't been to, of course), so we set off to sort through his directions.

Penny is spotting Ted on this vertical ascent

not sure why I'm bothering to keep my bathing suit dry

          Mike's first recomendation was Big Rock Falls, which was a little difficult to find.  After this sign you have to park the car and hike for a while.  An overcast sky and smoldering fires in the middle of nowhere (left over from a forest fire) made the hike a little eerie.  But the excitement steadily built as we got closer and closer and could begin to hear the sound of rushing water.

I realize that when you try to describe a hike as "very steep and rocky", but then show a picture of someone doing it barefoot in board shorts, it makes the statement lose credibility, but it was steep

forgive the water drops on the camera lense for the next few pics, it was unavoidable

Ted attempts to shoulder the full weight of the falls, Penny relates to this sense of wrecklessness, and soon swam up to follow him into the fury

          After being blown away by the beauty of Big Rock, we piled back in the car to head for the menonite settlement.  Mike recommended taking the hand-crank ferry across the river.  We were told the menonites had a grip on the best dairy, best meat, and closest thing to a super-walmart in Belize.  They also had a Golden Corral buffet, (no affiliation with the American restaurant thank god) that we intended to check out, if only because we knew it would really burn Bryan's ass to know that he missed it.  We found all these things, and the super walmart was more like a Tractor Supply, but we did go on a mini-shopping spree for Ted's B-day.  Ted's beard got him immediately accepted as a fellow menonite, which got us all kinds of discounts and special treatment. (not really)

hand crank ferry

Mongo takes a break from the hand crank

          After the shopping spree we headed to San Ignacio to find a place to stay.  This little town seemed very cool, lots of traveling backpackers, and is built right on the Belize River. I forget the name of the place we stayed, but they let the four of us and 3 dogs pile into one room to save money.  And the place had A/C to boot, which we hadn't experienced since we left in november.  That night we spent playing music, making rum drinks, and cranking the A/C till we passed out. 

the river was only about mid-shin deep in the middle, but had a bitch of current that swept Bubby and Gimpy downstream.  Meghan and I had to scramble after the midget-legged dogs while Penny just watched in evil delight

checking out the San Ig market

          The next day was Ted's big day.  Meg and I got up early to walk the dogs, and came back with cinnamon rolls, #30 candle, and OJ for breakfast, but the room was empty.  We should've known Ted wasn't gonna sleep in on his Birthday.  Shannon and Ted returned shortly thereafter and we jumped back in the rental to continue our tour. Next stop was 5 Blues Sink (which of course had not been Romo-ed), so named for the number of shades of color in the crystal clear water.  We had directions from a 10 year old guide book, and couldn't find the exact road, so Ted suggested we ask these two guys on a motorcycle with machetes.  I'll be damned if these guys didn't say that they were the caretakers of the 5 Blues Sink.  The one guy proceeded to tell us it had been closed down because it suffered a secondary sinking a couple of years ago, in which the bottom of the sinkhole fell out and all the water drained to a lower level.  Kind of a scary thought to be visiting the sink on that day.  But he said we could still go there, if we didn't mind that the trails were overgrown and that there wouldn't be another soul around.  UH, yeah, we didn't mind, so off we went, drinking beers and happily bouncing along the backroads, past cow farms, through dry creek beds, and wet creek beds, tree branches smacking the windshield, till we finally found the visitors center. 

visitors center

trail head

we made Penny walk point to spring any traps from crocodiles or guerillas (not GO-rillas, GERR-rillas)

           Once arriving at the sink, it appeared that it should now be called 5 Greens, and didn't look all that inviting to swim in,...definitely a little croc-y.  But we made Penny swim around for a while, and since she didn't attract any unwanted attention, we decided it was safe.  One bonus we found was a 20 foot diving platform, which I had absolutely no desire to jump off of.  But of course Ted did, so I had to go too, lest I find myself less of a man. 

Ted had a pretty good limbo stance, but then Gimpy tugged on her leash and threw him off balance

5 Blues wore everybody out

Hummingbird Highway, hardly another car on the road

Happy 30th buddy

       We had an awesome drive back to Placencia down the Hummingbird highway, which is very beautiful and this drive alone would have been worth the trip.  We stopped and got steaks and veggies on the way back and had a birthday dinner for Ted once we got back to the boats.  All in all a successful inland adventure.  (See, that wasn't too wordy)

C