Monday, the start of our vacation, was kind of crazy. I’ll leave out the crazy details and suffice to say that EVERYTHING from the journey changed the moment we stepped onto the dock of our resort. The resort staff met us at the dock, took our luggage, and had cocktails waiting for us. Those rum punches are delicious!!!! They took us to our room, which was gorgeous! We had an ocean view that we never wanted to leave! The room was very spacious, as it is actually a fully furnished condo. We ate on the patio that faces the ocean. The room is mostly cherry wood with Mayan decorations, but this was our view:
Tuesday, we set out to kayak to the reef, which is about half a mile to 3/4 of a mile swim from the resort shore. We got there only to find out there are only two paddles and we had just watched another couples take them out. So, we hung out and chatted with a local guy named Joe. He’s a coconut oil maker for the restaurants. He told us about what the island was like 20 years ago and how some of the hotels, sadly, are built directly over Mayan ruins. We chatted with him until a boat came delivering the resorts groceries. The nearest store is 8 miles south and can only be reached by sea. There are roads, but they all go through the jungle and are highly discouraged against. As the boat was unloading, some paddles came back in so we headed out to snorkel on the reef, which should have been a 20 minute paddle.
Well, we tried to “beat” the current by paddling in to it on the way out, so it would be easier on the way in. By doing this, we totally over shot the buoy and had to paddle much more than had we just taken the easy way. We finally reached the place to tie off the kayak to find my goggles are only pool proof, not ocean proof. Not gonna let that get us down, we took turns snorkeling with Dylan’s dive gear. It is beautiful! Definitely one of the worlds best snorkel and dive spots! After we had our fill, or Dylan saying he would snorkel til he didn’t have energy to paddle back, we realized our kayak had a hole in it. Yep. That happened. So we had to swim the 3/4 of a mile, against the current, to shore, without putting weight on the kayak and dragging it. Sounds fun, right? We made it, with time and a few breathers. Boats waived at us as they passed, probably thinking we were crazy. You could see people on the dock watching us, but no one came to help, probably thinking we wanted to swim. Ha!
Anyway, we made it! Later, I beat Dylan at life size chess on the beach, like wizards chess from Harry Potter.
We drank cocktails on the beach. One of my favorites is coffee, chocolate and banana! It’s good, just like a Banana smoothie. The bartender, Luigi, was nice enough to share his recipe with me, so I’m hoping to try it at home.
We ended the day with a walk on the beach and Dylan cracking coconuts for water. So resourceful! I think my man could survive just about anywhere!
Wednesday, we swam with sharks, sting rays, and sea turtles! My sister, Mallory, will be so jealous of the turtles!! It was really fun! When I first got in, though, having never really been snorkeling before, my mask came off, I took in a full breathe of salt water, and my fins came off. The guide told me to get them loser rather than tighter and there were no in between sizes. I had a little
holy crap moment, but got everything figured out after a fluster. The guide kept offering the life jacket to me, but I can swim just fine! Besides, in Salt water, you mostly just float! My fluster of salt water lungs and eyes with only one fin happened to be directly above two sharks! Fun! Dylan said he had a “good person, bad person” moment in his subconscious, watching me, about wether or not to tell me at the time. He decided to wait until later. :) Once settled in, we got to snorkel at
Hol Chan, which is a narrow channel in the reef there. Lots of beautiful fish and reef!
Then, we headed to shark and sting ray alley, which is where those particular fish learned to follow the fishing boats who would clean their catch there. Having already had my close encounter with the sharks, this wasn’t as scary as I thought it was going to be. We just jumped in! They were so close you could almost touch them, but its actually illegal to touch the fish here, so you just look. I didn’t have an underwater camera with me and I truly regret that. However, here is the shot I could take safely from the boat. The first is a shark, the second is Dylan in the water.
Then, we met some local fisherman who have fished there for decades. After that we headed to Caye Caulker to explore the island. Dylan got a shrimp burrito. The famous bar there, Lazy Lizard, had lost their liquor license the day before, so we couldn’t try their lizard juice. :(
Then, we headed to a tarpon fish nursery to see them and a seahorse sanctuary. We didn’t have any luck seeing the seahorses, though. Our guides headed us back towards our island, but stopped for one last snorkeling adventure before heading in to spear fish for lobster! The season closed on Sunday of our trip, so we made it just in time!
They caught some, which one of the couples on our tour made into ceviche with mango to share later that night! It was yummy! We made a stop at a floating bar that is famous for being able to float/ tube the ocean while they lower you buckets of beer.
Thursday, we went into San Pedro. The three streets are aptly named front street, middle street, and back street. We stopped for breakfast at Ramon’s, which is supposedly the very first resort ever built here on the island. We tried the fry jacks, a Belize breakfast staple. They were good and butter actually took away from their flavor. We choose Ramon’s because they also have a dive shop that we stopped at the day before to pick up fins before heading out to Hol Chan. I needed a mask, but they only had one for $150. I also wanted Dylan to see the pool there and the beautiful condos that look to be fully sustainable material. Dylan said he looked inside and it was concrete, but the outside was cool! We walked around town, bought some groceries, and stopped at a local bakery to pick up lunch and the next days breakfast.
That was just the first half of our trip! Part 2 is coming on Thursday!
(Please note that the adventure photos were taken with our decade old point and shoot, not our wedding photography gear.)
– Mylah Renae
[…] If you missed it, Part 1 of our trip to Belize was posted earlier this week here. […]