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Published: June 15th 2010
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Ready to go
Group shot before tubing Coming from a country where your borders are pretty well defined by a couple hundred nautical miles of ocean, I've always found the idea of land borders a pretty strange concept - the fact that things can change so dramatically just by an arbitrary line someone drew on a map a couple of centuries ago is just weird to me.
And nowhere has this difference between neighbouring countries been so apparent than crossing the border from Guatemala into Belize. Let's compare and contrast:
- the national language of Belize is English (being a former British colony), making it much easier to communicate with everyone (though it took a day or two to change back from si and gracias) than in Guatemala and the rest of Central America, which predominantly speak Spanish.
- the population density of Belize is 15 people per square mile, compared to Guatemala's 120-odd, and Belize's GDP per capita is US$7,700 vs Guatemala's US$4,800. So Belize is much less crowded, with a less impoverished (though still not wealthy by any means) population.
- Guatemala is still recovering from the scars of 36 years of civil war that only ended in the late 1990s, while as far as
Into the caves
Tubing in San Ignacio i can tell, Belize hasn't had so much as a scuffle since the British pirates "subdued" the Mayans back in the 1600s or something.
- while Guatemala consists mainly of Mestizo (mixtures of Spanish and American-indian) and Mayans, Belize has a more diverse population, with Kriols (descendants of pirates and black slaves shipped from Africa to help harvest logwood and mahogony back in the day) and garifuna (some sort of African descendants too, but somehow differentiated) giving the place a much more Caribbean than Central American feel.
All these factors combined to make the change from one side of the border to the other very marked. After arriving at our hotel and finding some lunch, we headed to the tour office to plan our next day. Two of the options was river tubing (sitting in a tyre inner-tube and floating down the river) or caving at the Actun Tunichil Muknal (ATM) caves. Being the keen beans we were, six of us asked if it was possible to do both in one day, to which the guy replied that is was, and by doing so we'd get to the ATM caves later than the other tour groups, which meant there
was less waiting involved. This sounded ideal, so the next morning we set off bright and early to the river. After a quick hike through the jungle, we jumped into the water and (somewhat ungracefully) onto our tubes. From there we floated through a couple of caves, watching the cave entrance get smaller and smaller behind you, and floating further and further into darkness was a little unsettling, but really cool. Then in the second cave, as the light from the cave entrance faded, you could hear the roaring of an underground waterfall growing louder. As we got closer and closer to the waterfall, the sound started to echo from every direction and being a cave it was pitch black (we have headlamps, but we tried to keep them off as much as possible to make it more fun), so we couldn't tell where the waterfall was until we basically hit it (it wasn't very big). Being right at the end of the dry season, the water level was very low, with very little current, so trying to propel ourselves along the river was quite an arm workout, but the whole thing was really lovely and relaxing.
After that
we headed to the ATM caves. We got to the carpark at about 4pm, and headed into the jungle for a 45 hike to the cave entrance. Once there, we donned our caving helmets and headlamps, and headed in. This first 10 metres of the cave was so deep you had to swim, but from then on it was a matter of clambering over rocks, through squeezes and through water that varied from ankle to chest deep. I loved it.
But the fun of the caving itself isn't what ATM caves are famous for. Lost to the jungle until being rediscovered in 1989, the ATM caves were used by the ancient Mayans for rituals to various gods. So the point of heading deep into these caves it to see the remains of these rituals that are still lying in the exact places the mayans put them over 1000 years ago. Out of respect for the mayans (and to not damage the caves more than necessary), we had to take our shoes off once we got to the entrance of this chamber, so we crept in our socks around pots that had been used in rituals over ten centuries ago.
I was amazed at how close to these ancient artifacts they let us stupid tourists get - they weren't behind wire or rope (except for the last bit, which i'll get to), just a bit of orange tape on the ground to bring the artifacts to your attention. I could tell our guide had witnessed some truly shameful irresponsible tourism and was quick to tell us when we were getting too close to anything, which I appreciated. Being around fragile things like that always takes me back to when I was a kid and mum would lead us into fancy shops, stopping at the entrance to turn around and hiss at us "Don't touch ANYTHING!!" :-P
Having been suitably impressed by the vessels littered about the lower cave chamber, we went up a little further, where our guide told us to turn our headlamps off while we briefed us on more of the mayan history. At the end of this little speech he shone his torch on the ground in front of us where there lay a perfectly preserved human skull. It was an amazing sight. I felt like Indiana Jones!
Further on, after a couple more piles
Cavin
Me and freshwater... like peas and carrots again of bones, we reached the highest part of the cave where there was finally a wire fence to sheild the contents from tourists, and maybe vice versa. A complete human skeleton! A teenage girl that was sacrificed to the Mayan gods and placed at the specific spot so as to not wash away when the caves flood during the wet season. The sight took my breath away. It was amazing.
After that crescendo, we retraced our steps out of the cave, emerging into the fading light at about 6.15pm. The guide was anxious that we not muck around before starting the 45 minute hike out of the jungle - dusk is precisely when snakes are most active, and with the rest of the tour groups long gone, they wouldn't be considering the trails as much of a no-go zone as earlier in the day, when the crowds scare them deeper into the jungle. So there we were, in the depths of the Belizean jungle in the fading daylight (and in the tropics, the daylight fades FAST). I wasn't stopping to admire the fireflys, beautiful as they were. We did actually see a snake on the side of the trail,
Group shot 2
Inside the ATM caves but it only little and slithered away as we watched it. It was only once we were back in the safety of the car that the guide suggested that it was a baby fer-de-lance (venomous pitviper) and it's mother probably wasn't far away.
The following day we headed, via local Chicken bus and ferry, to Caye Caulker - an extremely laid-back island off Belize City. The pace of life here is such that if you walk at more than a slow stroll, the locals are likely to tell you to slow down, there's no rush! It's from here where you can dive the Blue Hole - supposed to be one of the top ten dives in the world. I did, it wasn't. But Caye Caulker was a fanstastic place to laze for a few days, sunbathing and drinking the local specialty - Panty-rippers (coconut rum and pineapple juice, Yum!), before heading back to Mexico for the last few days of our tour.
And that was the end of my Central American adventure. It was about size weeks ago now, this blog's pretty late. I've since spent a couple of weeks in Illinois, New York and London catching up
with friends and revisiting places I've missed (mostly yummy restuarants). It's been great seeing old friends rather than new sights, and having a chance to sit down and plan the rest of my trip. Tomorrow I head to Ukraine, where I will try and be more punctual with my blog posts!
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