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Published: February 8th 2011
Barton Creek Outpost Canoe
Our method of transportation for the day.Up with the sun again. It rained allllll night. I would wake up ocassionally & listen for awhile to decipher whether I was hearing rain or the river or both. It was a fun game that helped me fall right back asleep again. I also woke up to the smell of coffee brewing from below the loft. My favorite morning treat! Non travel days I enjoy multiple cups of coffee. Yumm!
It smells so good here in general. The plant life is so green & it smells fresh. Especially after the rain. Everything also looks greener & more vibrant after each rain. Smiling plants. They made us a yummers breakfast of banana pancakes & scrambled eggs. The dairy all comes from the Menonites & I could probably just eat the butter with a spoon. They also make homemade butter with honey from their honey bees. OMG! I didn't use syrup because the butter & pancake flavor was too good. Wow.
It's still kinda overcast, but at least its not raining currently! We've been reading on the couch after breakfast & I've been typing. It might be time for bug spray & a walk in the jungle now. It's so
The Cave Entrance
At Barton Creek Cave easy to just sit on the deck of the Outpost. We're surrounded by the river, rocky cliffs, green trees, flowers & birds singing on all sides. Peaceful paradise. It's a little chilly today. Especially after the heat from the sea level beaches, the jungle is definitely different. I'm currently wearing long johns, a tank top & a sweatshirt & no shoes. Oh & I'm wrapped in a wool blanket.
As usual I'm working on uploading pics too. (I feel like that is my job, also I've randomly found a bit of joy in folding our clothes. Maybe I miss domesticity a bit?). Thank god for wireless, no matter how slow it is. Otherwise we'd have to buy about 15 more memory cards. I've already filled 2 & am trying to upload all the pics so I can start fresh. Currently only 4 hours & 55 minutes left for 62 pics. Time to pry Geoff away from his book.
The bugs are starting to annoy me a bit. Last night I thought it was cute that the moths/flys/mosquitos would all land on the computer screen as I typed. Tonight I keep finding fleas jumping around, & considering the number
In the Cave
Peering into the darkness with a spotlight of bug bites I currently have, don't find them cute. I keep picturing the monkey that climbed into my lap today & worry that maybe I brought some fleas back here. Ooops! Apparently they don't dislike bug spray, our new perfume. I'm a little nervous about the jungles of our future & the bugs I will continue to get to know. The bigger the bugs, the less I like them. There was a huge cockroach in Geoff's sunglass case that I threw across the room when I opened it. There was a mini cockroach in my clothes today. He wasn't cute either. Plus people keep telling us all these stories about different bugs/flies that can lay eggs in your skin & live for who knows how long & then you have to apply raw meat to your skin to entice the wormy/bug like thing out of your skin. Barf. I wish I hadn't heard that story. It has not left my thoughts since I heard it.
We had a nice afternoon. We took the Barton Creek Outpost Canoe up the river for a short ride. Canoes are much easier to maneuver than kayaks, or we are just getting better
Stalagtites
Taken while laying down in the canoe. at working together. The navigation is definitely a team effort. We canoed to the entrance of the Barton Creek Cave. Hmmm I wonder if this isn't a river, but a creek that is next to us? It makes noise like a river so that's what I'm calling it. Geoff agrees, whew. The river is filled with tetras that look like our rummy nosed tetras in our tank at home. We talked with the guides who were exiting the cave as we entered & they said they'd give us a deal, but it didn't matter because we planned to see the cave anyway. Canoed back to the Outpost, retrieved money, waterproof camera, more bug spray, & canoed back.
Joe was our tour guide today. A self described Mestizo from a small village near here. The cave was magnificent, marvelous, & magical. 😉 (Thanks Rabs!). We canoed into the cave. We were the only people in the cave & at one point he had us turn off the light (which was a spotlight attached to a car battery for power) & we could not see the hand in front of our face. It was kinda creepy. I think we were both scared
Me & Mango
Pet spider monkey? a little bit. But we turned the light back on (whew) & continued on. There were points in the cave where the stalagtites were so low hanging that we all had to lie on our backs to pass under them. It was beautiful & had some of the most incredible stalagtite & mite structures I've ever seen. Apparently it's a cave that the Ancient Maya used as a sacrificial site for the God of Rain (whose name I can't remember). They believed the cave was an entrance point to the Underworld. The Ceiba tree is above the cave & they believed its roots went into the Underworld. It was like another world in the cave so it isn't hard to imagine why they believed that. We saw a ton of bats, which are gross & icky looking & they would randomly fly around & get really close to us. Eeewww!! At one point when we were on our backs under the stalagtites we came face to face with a few of them. They did not like my spotlight at all. The cave itself was very high in places, measuring 70ft. We made it all the way to the end of
Accomodations
for night two the cave where the stalagtites had fallen into the river & from there Joe said you could continue walking to the end of the cave another 4 kilome
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