Caye Caulker Day #3

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Today I woke up feeling 85% back to normal. Popped an Immodium, ibuprofen & guzzled water & felt ready for the day. We've been buying a 5 gallon bottle of water everywhere we go that we know we'll be staying for a few days. It's much cheaper. $5 for the current one we have.

Feeling ok enough to leave the safety of the room we went & had breakfast at Marin's. We had our first Fry Jack, which is basically a flour tortilla super quick fried & served cut in quarters. Of course, it was really good. We had some eggs & toast as well. The bread here is all from the local bakery & is excellent. Thick, airy wheat bread with a hint of cinnamon.

We strolled around town for a bit & checked the place out. Of course we ended up talking with this guy who told us all about how he got shot in Belize city one day while minding his own business in the pawn shop. We talked about the weather in Seattle. Get a story, give a story. He had the cutest little boy. Edwin Jr. He called him EJ.
The dogs around here are like tour guides too. One will decide to walk with you awhile & show you around. They're all well fed & taken care of but apparently there's no such thing as keeping your dog in your yard or any sort of leash law. It seems kinda nice. The dogs get to roam free & behave like dogs. I decided Eddie would love it but probably wouldn't leave our yard, just alienate himself from the rest of the dogs by growling all the time at them & everyone else walking by. Oh well, we still love & miss him... 😉 There's even the fancy shitzu dogs just wandering around the streets doing whatever. Last night Ryan & Erin had a pit bull that they named Bruce spend the evening with them & then hang out with us on the beach. He was sleeping at Ryan's feet on the beach. I already saw Bruce this morning & he greeted me with a huge tail wag & an excited pant.

We took it easy & I worked on downloading pics for awhile. Why is internet, wireless, so slow everywhere? Oh well. Can't complain really, it's free.

We went on a snorkel tour with Tsumani Tours with the Nanaimo's for the afternoon. Geoff went ahead because I was lagging & needed to buy more food, always hungry. So as I'm walking down the sandy road to the tour shop I'm kinda walking at a bit of a quick pace. I had at least two people tell me to "go slow, make easy" or "why the hurry sistah?". Seriously RAD!! Our guide was Frenchie & he was super. He spoke at least 5 languages, that we heard anyway & had been all over the world, but loved Caye Caulker the best & spent his days fishing & taking tourists out on snorkel trips. Not a bad life. His boat had a "glass bottom". It was cool, it was a fishing boat that had the bottom cut out & some sort of glass seriously epoxyed into place. It was so fun to see the bottom go by as we went along. Inside the reef is soooo shallow & the water is so crystal clear. We snorkeled in one place for awhile & saw lot's of fish & a beautiful turtle, the hawksbill turtle.

The second place we went was the best. It's called Shark-Ray Alley & it's just that. The boat gets close & there are sting rays everywhere! You can see them through the glass, all around the boat. Then the Nurse sharks show up. Then Frenchie says, grab your snorkel but not your fins, so you don't stir up the sand, & get in. We all sat there & looked at him & said, Really? And then got in! It was the coolest thing I've ever experienced. He would throw them some rice & food & they would just swim around us all in circles. You could touch them & feel their fins or wings. At one point I was standing there & a shark came by & made a turn & his tail just used my leg as an aid in the turn. It was ridiculous! The rays felt soft & mushy. The sharks had soft sandpaper skin. They all looked at you with their eyes & you could just see their intelligence. The water was only about chest deep & it was just incredible. We stayed there for a good 45 mins-1hr & just were all in awe of the amazing sharks & rays. There was a 3-4ft barracuda that just sat there the entire time & watched us all. He was creepy. Every time you would look at him he would open his mouth to show you all of his teeth. Creeper! We were the only boat out there other than a guy in his boat with his two little boys who were loving watching all the activity in the water. So we climbed back in the boat & headed for another snorkel area after that.

The next place we snorkeled was beautiful also, of course. We saw a big green moray eel that Geoff messed with for awhile & some big trunkfish & the usual fishies.

We headed back into town & got cleaned up & went to Syd's for dinner with our pals. Our entire walk back to our hotel, which is at the other end of Caye Caulker we talked about chaffing. It becomes a serious issue being wet from the ocean all the time...

At Syd's we had a plate of fried conch, the first we'd all ever tried. It's pretty good. Like a cross between calamari & lobster. Pretty good. We ate well of course, fried chicken, beans & rice & fried fish. Yummy!

Our friend Mandingo came by on his bike & talked with us for a bit. In the few minutes he talked with us he mentioned love, friendship, drums, the beauty of the day. Love it!
Then off to bed since we have 3 dives tomorrow. Yikes

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Photos

Snorkeling Caye Caulker
Snorkeling near Caye Caulker

Shark Ray Alley
Touching a Ray

Shark-Ray Alley
Shark-Ray Alley

Shark Ray Alley
Sharks & Rays

Geoff
Reading in the Sun.

View
From Tropical Paradise Hotel.