Unbelizabe

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So I make it to San Pedro for a reggae festival my friend told me about. Traveling makes one loose track of days. I thought I had left Flores on Friday for the festie that weekend, well boy was I surprised when I was half way to Belize and I realized it was Thursday not Friday. So now I'm in San Pedro Belize 2 days before I'm to meet my friend Joe for the festie, what to do, what to do? First off I should tell you that Belize ( at least the coastal parts) is way different than Guatemala, way more of a Caribean vibe. Reggae and Punta drumming everywhere, tall dark dread locked Garifuna everywhere and a beautiful azul Caribbean Sea! A girl could definitely have some fun here!
*** As a side note Garifuna are the decedents of a shipwrecked slave ship. They settled in the coastal areas between Honduras and Belize. As their ship was wrecked, they were never sold into slavery! They are some of the few people of African decent who's ancestors were never slaves!
So I check into the hotel Joe said to meet him at and just my luck happy hour was just starting! Well the place is full of some crazy cats! Mostly 60+ year old British ex pats guys a couple other Britts about my age and one crazy Texan! Yeeehahh! Well after a few rum punches and a couple rounds of Yeager and some absinthe a group of hit the town to catch some music! We found some reggae music and started a dancin! I lost the boys I went out dancing with but ended up meeting a cute DJ who a danced with for a bit and then chatted with him for hours under the stars on the pier. Que romatico except the wind blew one of my flip flops off the pier and into the ocean ( I always wondered why I always saw just one lost flip flop on beaches!) so I had to walk home bare foot on the unpaved road. I spent the next day hanging out at the pool and there are no real beaches in San Pedro. I met another nice guy from the states who had moved to Belize and spent the day hanging out with him. Turns out he was one of the people helping to put on the reggae festival! Got back to hotel a bit late but the boys and Shirley a fabulous new arrival from Canada were ready to go out again, and you know I cant pass an opportunity to dance to live music under the island stars, so off I went! Well the next day was the big reggae festival, so I spent the morning at the pool and then headed out to the festie around noonish, to find nothing going on! The soccer field was blocked off and the stage was there but no people, so I walked around town and headed back to the hotel for some pool time. By this time Joe (Natalie's boyfriend, the guy who told me about the festie) got to town. We all chilled at the pool and heading back out a bit later to see if it had started, nada! Again back to the hotel went out around 8ish and still nothing so I decided to take a nap, went back out around 11ish and still nothing! So went to listen to music at the clubs with my friends from the hotel and ran into some friends ( a Dutch couple) that I had made in Guatemala that I told about the festival. Turns out there was a tour agency on Cay Caulker ( an island just south of San Pedro) who had brought boat loads of people over for this festival that was a total flop. My friends had come over on this boat. Glad I got to see them one last time.
Well the festie was supposed to happen on Sunday as well but after Saturday's flop they didn't bother. So it was another day at the pool. That Sunday also happened to be Super Bowl Sunday ! I intended to watch the game but ended up outside the hotel bar, by the pool, talking and drinking margaritas with Joe, Sarah, Jaime ( the wet willie king!) and Shirely and randomly walking in to check the score. After the game was over one of the guys who works at the hotel suggested we take a golf cart ride, so 8 of us pile into one cart and Tyronne rode his bike ahead of the cart. We went a searching for crocodiles! We saw the eyes of some big crocs and saw a baby one up close! Tons of fun!
So the next day it was time to leave the island, so Joe, Sarah, Shirley and I headed off to Cay Caulker, the island just south of San Pedro. We found a cheap hotel and headed out to the split! The split is the only part of the island where you can really swim. The island used to be bigger, but a hurricane split the island in two. The space ( or the split) between the the two parts is a great place for swimming. It felt so nice to swim in the sea, after looking it for so many days on San Pedro. That evening when we went out to dinner, I tried barracuda for the first time and boy was it yummy! We went out looking for music but there wasn't much going on as it was only Monday.
The next day Joe and Sarah took off for a 3 day sailing trip to Placencia and Shirley and I took a long walk around the whole island and then spent the rest of the day at the split. As it was Shirley's birthday we went out to dinner to celebrate but she was too tired to go out that night so I hit the town solo. One of the bars was having lady's night and since in Antigua that meant free drinks, I thought why not! Well this lady's night was a bit different. When ever a lady bought a drink she got a raffle ticket. They drew tickets every hour for prizes. Bu8t what prizes! Underwear, vibrators, and dildos! I won the first raffle and got a pair of underwear( the toys were few the last 2 drawings of the night). At the bar, I ran into a Finish couple that I had met in Guatemala! So we ended up kicking it all night. We got invited to an after party which lasted till 8 the next morning! Fun but tiring! I went back to the hotel where I got to say good bye to Shirley before she took off to Guatemala to hike El Mirador. Then it was nap time followed by more swimming at the split and an early night in.
The next morning I took off to meet up with the mysterious Marjorie in Placencia! I say mysterious because I had no idea who she was. I had received an email from my friend Lisa in California saying she had a friend in Placencia....then I received an email from Lisa's friend Marjorie telling me she would be in Placencia until the end of March and if I would like I could stay with her for a couple of days. Would I? Uh yah, of course! So we had been emailing back and forth for a week or so and now I was on my way but I knew nothing of this lady other than that she had been my friends neighbor. So I get to Palcencia and give her a call from a restaurant, and she walks down to meet me. Marjorie is so cool! A retired pharmacist from Santa Barbara, she spends her retirement in 3 months intervals in different countries! My first couple days in Planencia were very nice. Walking on the beach, listening to music, dancing with a hot Chilean dude, and chilling. THen it started raining. Not just a light rain but a cold windy rain! Arrg!
Saturday and Sunday were an annual art festival in Placencia. Marjorie was volunteering at the school helping the kids make art to sell to raise money for a new printer for the school. After walking around the art festival a bit Saturday morning I ended up helping out with the kids as well. Tons of fun, I actually ended up staying an extra day so I could help on Sunday as well. The kids did great, raising enough for the printer and then some!
Well it was time to leave Belize and head back to Guatemala for a few days and check out the Garifuna/ Caribbean side in Livingston. Not much to see or do there as it was raining the first 3 1/2 days. Thurday afternoon when the rain had cleared I walked around town for a while, caught up on emails and the such. Well sometime between the internet cafe and getting back to the hostel my wallet got stolen with my debit card inside! I discovered this that night when I went out to dinner and couldn't find my wallet. The owner was nice enough to give me ride back to my hostel as the restaurant was a bit of walk, to see if it was in my room. It was not. Went online and saw that they had used my card! So spent a bit of time dealing with that and getting new cards sent to mom's. Thank goodness I had another card linked to a different account!
I decided I might as well wait till Saturday to leave so I could check out more Punta music before I left. I figured now that the rain had stopped, and it was Friday night something must be going on but no such luck, so the next day I left for Honduras to meet up with my friend Saloua.

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