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Published: January 17th 2007
Back to: Three Days in the Jungle Monday, January 8th (cont.)
First Day on the Island Arrive San Pedro, Ambergris Caye about 12pm.
Took a cab to Changes in Latitudes Bed and Breakfast, run by a couple of women, Renita and Cindy. We were early, so we left our bags and went to find lunch.
Found the Blue Water Grill on the beach and had very good shrimp and calamari salad and coconut shrimp and conch ceviche.
After lunch we spent some time on the beach. I swam near shore with some local kids who were very cute, then eventually asked me for some ‘shillings’. Scott snorkeled out from the shore and saw an electric ray.
There were also a ton of fish hiding out under the dock at "Ramon's". Pretty much all the same common fish, but the quantity was pretty cool. Dinner Time Tried to go to a new hot place called Wild Mango. We couldn’t get a table, so we put our name in and went walking. When we came back, they still didn’t have a table for us, but had seated other people. Scott got angry, but we sat at the bar and had
a drink. After about 20 minutes of that, he complained to the bar tender who said, ‘what do you want me to do about it?’ Scott said, ‘you can buy us these drinks.’ He said, ‘sure and there is another place down the beach that has very good food.’ The whole scene was pretty embarrassing. We ended up eating at a jerk place, where they didn’t know what a Mojito was.
I still think even on vacation (maybe even especially on vacation) I should be treated well. The place didn't seem to care whether I ever got seated or if I enjoyed it. Why should I give them my business?
Tuesday, January 9th
Snorkel Adventure 1 Breakfast: Phenomenal fresh fruit and blueberry waffles with granola and
whipped cream
Went snorkeling on a small speed boat ‘L’il Alphonse’ with Alphonse and Tony and about 15 other people. Too many people. We went to Hol Chan natural reserve, which is a break in the second largest barrier reef in the world. We saw an extraordinary amount of fish and coral and a hint of an octopus (I hurt myself by scraping on the boat rope trying to
wait for it to come out). Then, we went to Shark Ray Alley and swam with and held nurse sharks and rays. There, there was a school of gorgeous blue tangs, grunts and other stuff too. Too pretty to describe. Scott claimed it was as good as much of the scuba he has done elsewhere.
There were some pretty nice large coral formations just a few feet down, but the cut ran all the way to the floor at 30'. Here, there wasn't much need to be diving. At Shark Ray Alley I spent a bit of time trying to follow a Spotted Eagle Ray around. Never thought I'd see one of them up close! Time Share Adventure 1 When we got back, we rented a golf cart for the afternoon so that we could explore out a little farther (recall, I wasn’t walking so well). We jumped in the cart and headed straight up north to see what was there. We had to cross a toll bridge, which is apparently new. After this bridge, the ‘road’ we were on became even less a road and more like a flooded moon surface. We persisted in driving along
it, meeting others whose golf carts had broken down along the way.
We stopped for lunch at the only thing we found on the north, which was mostly residential, called Beach’n Kitchen (said ‘bitchin kitchen’).
Upon continuing on, we found a newly built resort called Captain Morgan’s and thought we’d stop for a walk on the beach or a drink. Upon entering the resort, we were accosted by a representative who told us that he would take our cart back to our hotel and put us on a boat, if we would just listen to a 90 min time share presentation. In short, we did it. They are expensive. In addition to the ride home without the use of the cart on the ‘road’, we had free drinks, $100 cash and a $25 gift certificate out of the deal.
After the boat ride back, we jumped back in our cart (which was, miraculously, back at our hotel) and explored San Pedro. We were concerned about the gasoline situation (we had said we would return it full). There is only one gas station and when we tried to go to it, we found it closed at 6pm. No
one told us this.
We had dinner at the tiniest restaurant in the world, called Waraguma (African of some sort for the North Star). It had two tables and was made of an awning leaning against the wall of another building. There was a lady outside making papusas, a stuffed, fried bread from Honduras that was delicious (when we finally got some). There was a long wait for a table, but once we got in, the food was fantastic. We had fish burritos and shrimp in coconut sauce. We had ordered papusas before walking away, but they didn’t save us any. We were visibly disappointed, I guess, as they did find us two after we had finished eating. They were worth it.
While we were waiting, we went into a wood working gallery, Graniel’s Dreamland, that had unreal things. We bought a cutting board there, using our $25 gift certificate. We had gotten a similarly styled bowl at Altun Ha, probably for too much money.
After dinner it started raining. We drove past the golf cart rental office, which is at the supermarket, and asked about the gasoline. We had to pay for it, of course. The
guy there drove us back to the hotel and took the cart.
Wednesday, January 10th
Time Share Adventure 2 Breakfast: Belizean eggs- not my favorite
It was rainy, but we decided to walk South on the beach where we hadn’t been yet. We walked as far as a resort called Xanadu, then turned up to see what was on the road inland. On our way, we were stopped by two guys in a golf cart, one of whom was Scottish (like Shrek) and the other English. They wanted to give us a ride to their property, Banyan Bay, then back home, after a time share sales pitch, of course. On the first day there, we had met a kid on the beach who asked us to draw prizes from a bag. I won ‘first prize’, which I needed to redeem at the resort. On the face of it, it was pretty great- 7 days in the Caribbean for 4 people. In reality, it is a scam, where I would have to pay $149 per person to ‘activate the certificate’, then they would maybe give me a room somewhere and sometime, only in vague relation to what
I might request.
It didn't help that after the first timeshare presentation, I had absolutely no interest in wasting time at this one. Please, no more! The time share selling woman was a frightening, tiny, Jewish, NYer. ‘nuff said.
We got a ride from the resort to a restaurant in town, Caliente, where we had mediocre Mexican food. Scott’s mole was pretty good.
Evening Fun Before dinner, we went into town to experience a world famous event called the Chicken drop. We tried to buy a number to gamble on it, but the line was too long. We did get to see the event, however, which involves a live chicken wandering around on a grid of numbers. His droppings indicate the winner. That is good poetic fun. We didn’t stay long, as we had dinner plans.
Dinner that night was an event. We went to a high-end restaurant, Casa Picasso. We had very good Mojitos and tapas chosen by the chef. It was all excellent. We ended with flan that I thought was burnt, but Scott liked a lot.
It was burnt. I did like it.
Thursday, January 11th
Relaxing While Waiting Out the Rain
Breakfast: Fruit and breakfast grenacha (like a tostada)
RAIN. Hung around the B and B. They have hammocks there- so I attempted some Xtreme lounging. I came out unscathed! I was reading a book that was very appropriate to the trip- a book about endangered species written by Douglas Adams (Hitchhiker’s guide guy) who went traveling with a nature guy and wrote hilarious comments about the whole experience. Much like my own musings…..
Later, we walked south to Banyan Bay, where we thought there was good snorkeling. It turned out that really, it is just shallow with little turtle grass. Scott wanted deeper water, so we ended up back at the yacht club, which is right next to our hotel. He went snorkeling and saw lots of stuff. I, left on my own, sat on the pier and took pictures of my feet and other things…..(see pics at bottom)
We had lunch at Blue Water Grill again and were disappointed this time by the sandwiches we ordered.
Snorkel Adventure 2 Despite the fact that it continued to rain, we went snorkeling at Mexico Rocks, as the only guests on the
boat this time. The weather was scary, but there were intermittent breaks and a gorgeous rainbow. It was worth it to see what we saw when we got there. There was 10 times more life there than at the other two sites. We saw schools of damsels, angels, brittle stars, sponges, sea fans, hints of octopi tentacles, flounder, sea urchin, conch…… We forewent the second stop on that trip, as the weather got worse. The speed boat home was very unpleasant.
Highlights for me were a Scrawled Filefish, some Queen Angels and what I believe was a type of Porcupine Puffer -- sadly no one else saw that one. The most interesting sea life we saw was not, however, on a snorkel trip. Walking along the beach on Wednesday, a local girl stopped us to show us a fish she had spotted. It was bizarre. It looked like a frog with a short snoot and had fins bent under like feet. Later investigation proved this fish to be a batfish, which are very rarely seen. This one was hanging right next to the path! We didn’t have a camera, of course.
Last Night on the Island Dinner for our last night was at Elvi’s restaurant. She is a staple on the island, we are told. She can’t come down to the restaurant, but still tastes everything before it goes out. The restaurant has grown over the years and has been built to encompass a tree planted on the property by her father when she was a child (which is not alive any more, but makes a very nice part of the décor, which includes sand floors). We had excellent Maya fish and key lime pie.
Friday, January 12th
Time to Go Breakfast: Fruit and Oatmeal pancakes. We asked for the recipe.
Travel.
9am, got on the world’s smallest plane, Tropic Air, and flew to Caye
Caulker then Belize airport. It took about 20 minutes. As a result, we had hours to kill in the airport. Then we flew to Houston and sat for 4 more hours (after clearing customs and rechecking our bags). Finally at 10:30pm, we got back to Cleveland.
All in all, a fantastic vacation that I would do again, only next time I hope to be more competent at walking!!
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