Day 23 - San Ignacio

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My first full day in Belize and I must admit I really do like it. The vibe of the country is quite strange; it has a Latin American feel to it, but with a British/Caribbean mix. I was a little disappointed that I could no longer practise trying to speak some Spanish as Belize's official language is English, the only country in Central America. The people of Belize do speak Spanish though, but obviously with me being English it was easier to communicate with my native language.

I learnt that Belize was originally part of the British Empire and from 1862 to 1973, its name was British Honduras. It became an independent Commonwealth realm in 1981, retaining the British Queen Elizabeth II as head of state. It was weird having Belize currency too with a younger vision of Queen Elizabeth II on their banknotes.

Our accommodation was two nights on this farm/ranch place and the owners were very friendly. The wife of the owner was from Britain. This was a good thing as the other Brits in the group and myself got to have tea after having our meals. Back home I drink tea every day and I hadn't had a cup in about 3 weeks and I really appreciated this massively.

There were several excursion options to do for the day in San Ignacio, all to do with going into caves and seeing Mayan artefacts. I can get a bit claustrophobic so decided to do Cave Tubing, as it didn't seem to challenging as you are lazing in a rubber ring going in and out of caves on a lazy river.

It took as an hour to reach our location to go Cave Tubing from San Ignacio. Cave Tubing is good fun, we all got a big rubber ring and had to wear safety helmet with a torch. We then had to do a 20 minute or so walk before jumping into the river and sitting in our rubber ring, then it was a case of just relaxing and slowly going down the river in and out of caves. We did do an adventure inside one of the caves and found some Mayan artefacts. It was a great experience. I wished I had taken some rubber water type shoes to wear as when exploring the caves the ground was rough on my feet.

In the evening we chilled at the farm/ranch type accommodation and there was a large selection of beer, vodka and gin to drink. The highlight of the evening for me though was watching loads of fireflies in the fields, was pretty awesome seeing all these little lights keep flashing in the field.

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Photos

Me before Cave Tubing
Me before Cave Tubing

Cave Tubing
Cave Tubing

Sleeping Accommodaton
Sleeping Accommodaton