General: Belize

"It all seems like yesterday not far away" or so Madonna sang anyway in 'La Isla Bonita'. For me it all seems like 3 weeks ago, and so I decided, to get busy writing up my experiences of my honeymoon in Belize.

The reason for the Madonna quote, if you were wondering, is that, just off Belize is the island which inspired Madonna's song, Ambergris Caye (home of San Pedro), and it is in places truly beautiful. But more about ...
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Just as a warning before I do begin, the way I've done this review is to write an account day by day of our experiences in Belize. Because this review would be 50 pages long if I went into real detail of each trip I have mentioned each place in summary, but will be writing specific accounts in separate reviews of all places mentioned. If you would rather wait and read those individual ones please feel ... more

"It all seems like yesterday not far away" or so Madonna sang anyway in 'La Isla Bonita'. For me it all seems like 3 weeks ago, and so I decided, to get busy writing up my experiences of my honeymoon in Belize.

The reason for the Madonna quote, if you were wondering, is that, just off Belize is the island which inspired Madonna's song, Ambergris Caye (home of San Pedro), and it is in places truly beautiful. But more about that later.

General Point on this review
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Just as a warning before I do begin, the way I've done this review is to write an account day by day of our experiences in Belize. Because this review would be 50 pages long if I went into real detail of each trip I have mentioned each place in summary, but will be writing specific accounts in separate reviews of all places mentioned. If you would rather wait and read those individual ones please feel free. But this is intended for use by those wanting to know how a 2 week trip to Belize could be best used, and what is possible in that time frame.

Belize 101
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For those who havent heard of Belize, and there seem to be many from my experience, "you're going where on honeymoon?" was one of the most common reactions I encountered, Belize is a very small country, roughly the size of Wales, located to the south of Mexico, west of Guatemala and north of Honduras.

It is the only English speaking country in Central America, due to the fact it was formerly part of the British Empire, although English is only one of the 3 main languages spoken there, the other two being Spanish, and Creole.

The population of Belize is very diverse. The main ethnic groups there are: Caribbean's, Mayans and Spanish, although due to the history of the country there are many mixed race people combining those three main groups. Since 1990 the country has also been settled by many Taiwanese, Chinese, Lebanese and Korean people.

There is a reason for all to visit Belize:

- If you love nature and wildlife then this is one of the only countries in the world where you can see Black Howler monkeys in their natural habitat, Jaguars and Iguanas and 52 species of snakes. The jungles of Belize contain plants which can cure many modern ailments; one such plant recently 'discovered' can cure prostate cancer, although the indigenous people knew that as they used it in many of their herbal cures.

- If you love water sports, like me, then this is paradise. The Belizean coast benefits from bordering the second longest barrier reef system in the world. It also houses 3 out of 4 of the only Atolls in the Western Hemisphere. The diving here is really second to none.
One of the major dive highlights for anyone would have to be The Great Blue Hole, a geological anomaly, in simple terms this was once a cave in ice age times, which during evolution sunk into the sea. At its deepest point it measures 412 foot deep and contains stalactites, something which is fascinating, as they only form in an air environment. When I dived it there were no less than 9 sharks within easy reach, all of which filled me with total awe.

- If you love archaeology then you will be in heaven, there are over 14,000 Mayan temples in the Belize City area alone. To mention but a few; Altun Ha, where they found the famous jade head weighing 10 pounds (see photo) and is worth today billions of pounds, Lamani, where the Mayans survived for centuries and outwitted their Spanish enemies, and Xunantunich, on the border with Guatemala which still houses some of the tallest structures in Belize today.

- And finally, as I could be here all day listing reasons to visit Belize, if you simply love good weather then how does 105 degree heat guaranteed for most of the year grab you? As they say in Belize, "seeing is Belizing".

You really should put Belize on your to do list!

Getting to Belize
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First let me start by saying it isn't currently that easy to get to Belize from the UK. No matter how you try it you have to first fly into America, and then get a connecting flight. You can connect at many US airports, we did Miami, but Houston, Dallas or Florida are all viable options.

In total we paid £768 per person to get to Belize. We used American Airlines, flying from London Heathrow to New York JFK, then from New York Newark to Miami, and Miami to Phillip Goldson Airport, Belize.

This involved a 7 hour flight to New York, a 3 hour flight to Miami, then a 2 hour flight on to Belize on the way out, on the way back we flew Belize, Miami then straight on to Heathrow, which proved slightly quicker. So just to warn you, you are looking at around 12 hours travelling time currently.

There is one other way, you can go into Mexico an then head down on a bus, but I hear that takes a long time, and the Lonely Planet book doesn't seem to recommend it much.

As the demand to visit Belize has increased dramatically over the last years, they are just in the process of moving Phillip Goldson airport in Belize, to a slightly different location, where they can expand it and offer direct flight to the UK. So if you want to visit now while UK travellers are relatively few, get in there.

Why Belize for me?
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Ok, so why did I want to go to Belize on my honeymoon? 5 years ago I did some units in Archaeology as part of my Linguistics degree, totally unrelated to my core degree, but you can do that at any of the University of London- unis. So I started going to UCL twice a week for my classes. One class was called Indigenous Archaeology, taught by a wonderful tutor Bill Sillar. This class was amazing. Each week we'd be taught about a different Indigenous people of the world, and their culture/archaeology. So Aborigines, Kogi Indians, Native Americans and Mayans were all on the syllabus, among others. The thing that brought the course alive for me was the fact that we'd frequently have guest speakers. We heard from, among many others, a very interesting man from Belize called Nazario Ku, who was, at the time the curator of Lamani, one of the biggest sites in Belize. I enjoyed his talk so much that I resolved at the time that I would one day visit the site and see what the Mayans had built.

Fast forward to our planning of the honeymoon and we looked at the options on offer, and neither of us is a real 'lie on the beach type', so we ruled out Barbados and Mauritius and the other 'typical' honeymooner places. No offence to anyone who honeymooned in these places Im sure they are amazing too. We wanted somewhere that would offer us a mixture of adventure and relaxation. My husband didn't feel as strongly about anywhere as I did, so I got to chose Belize, and Im so glad I did.

For the remainder of this review Im going to set out the things I think others may benefit from knowing about my Belizean experience, and things that just made me feel good or bad.

Our Journey
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We left the UK for Belize the day after our wedding so 17th September. We were both very excited as we departed Heathrow at 18.30 that day. After our 7 hour flight we arrived in New York JFK, and our bags were delayed for 2 hours. That was fun. We finally stumbled into a cab at 5am UK time, midnight in New York. As our flight was out of Newark the next day, we'd booked a hotel at the airport, and a taxi to take us there. We were very fortunate that the traffic was light at that time of night; the cabbie told us the journey often took up to an hour. We arrived at the Ramada Inn at 12.30am and checked into our room. As our flight to Miami in the morning left at 7.20 we were up again by 4.30 in time to catch a mini bus to the airport. After catching that flight we landed in Miami at 10.30 and had about an hour before we were off again. Finally we landed in Belize at 11.30 local time.

Day One - The Hotel
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My first impressions were, wow small airport. As we circled high above the air all I could see was the beautiful ocean with all its reefs visible from the air, then the announcement we were to land came over the tannoy. Literally 5 minutes later and we were coming down into what looked to me like an industrial trading estate. And the heat was immediately noticeable, it hits you like a wall as you step off the plane. I really thought I'd seen small airport after being to Sharm el Sheik a couple of times, but this one is even smaller. We walked through it to collect our bags and we were at the baggage reclaim 2 minutes later, 3 minutes after that we were standing outside as a taxi driver packed our bags into his car, and on our way to the hotel.
The thing about Belizean taxis is; first of all don't expect seat belts, second of all, expect a cracked windscreen. All of the cabs we travelled in are in this condition. The cars are, in the main, old American vehicles, which are functional, but ancient. Don't expect air con. There is a standard fare of 50 Belize dollars or 25 American dollars for the 11 mile ride into Belize City centre. You know this because it is painted in big white lettering along the taxi rank, so don't worry about being ripped off.
The driver was nice, keen to talk to us about Belize and ask us where we were from. His accent, which is typical of the locals all over this area, is pure Caribbean in my mind, or what I'd always associated with the Caribbean up to that point. English spoken with a lilt.

We entered Belize city over a bridge crossing a wide river, and at this point we were told that there are two sorts of crocodile in Belize, the Morlet's crocodile and the American crocodile, both live in that river. I prayed the bridge was sturdy.

As we began entering the more built up parts of the area I really couldn't help but feel a little disappointed and concerned. Most of the houses, which are very old colonial style buildings, are very run down looking, there were stray dogs running in the road, and people hanging around outside shops looking shifty. Where were the beautiful brightly coloured houses I'd seen in the guide book? Frankly this place looked scruffy and a little on the dangerous side.

We drove on to our hotel, The Chateau Caribbean, which was right on the sea front in Belize City. The hotel had been described on its website as an old colonial building, and its picture had put me in mind of 'Tara' from Gone with the Wind. Beautiful big white building with a large garden surrounding it, and steps running up to it and wide open doors to the entrance.

In the flesh the hotel was exactly as it was in its picture, from the outside. The cabbie helped us out with our bags and then someone came down from the hotel to help us up the steps.

We entered the reception area and again my first thoughts were, magnificent old building, but in need of work. I felt disappointed that our honeymoon was to be spent in somewhere so scruffy looking. The communal areas of the hotel are all like that, the carpet on the stairs was a cheap looking brown colour, and the white walls were badly in need of painting bright white again. As we opened the door to our room I was dreading the worst. But I need not have worried at all. The room itself was pretty nice. We had the most amazing sea view I've ever had, I would say the hotel was only 20 metres from the sea if that, and the entire front of the room was windowed so we had a wonderful outlook. The room had a shower, air conditioning and a tall fan to help keep us cool, a TV with cable channels (not something I really cared about, but a nice luxury) a fridge and a queen sized bed and large built in wardrobe.

I should say at this point that I got the hotel from the Rough Guide, which recommended it, and continues to do so in even its latest edition. Although, the Lonely Planet Guide (which I bought, after we'd booked) says it's in need of renovation. The cost of the hotel was something like $100 US a night so around £50, this may sound cheap and you may be thinking, oh well you got what you paid for then, but this isn't cheap for the area. You can get nice rooms for around $40 US so I'd felt relatively confident paying this much.

Things that made that first afternoon bearable, were, my wonderful sister who was also one of my bridesmaids, had organised a bottle of champagne to be on ice in our room for our arrival, with a note from her to welcome us. It may sound funny, but after so much travelling and being very tired indeed, that almost reduced me to tears. I felt like she was there to welcome us. The hotel had also put a nice bunch of flowers in our room addressed to Mr and Mrs Shoka, so that was a nice touch.

We had realised upon landing that Mr had lost his camera and mobile phone at Miami airport; we now think they were more than likely stolen while we sat eating with the camera around the back of the seat, but I digress. So the first thing we did in our room was ring the UK and get his Mum to cancel the mobile contract, and apologise to his Dad for losing the camera, which was his and on loan.
That dealt with, we sat in two wicker chairs in our room, looking out onto the ocean and drank our champagne. We both admitted to each other at that point that we were feeling very unsure about Belize, it didn't seem what we'd expected, and I think we were both upset that the hotel wasn't as lovely as we'd hoped. But we said at the time we'd make the best of it whatever happened, and the beautiful sea view really helped calm us down. Frankly I think we were just so tired after the wedding and the flying that we were too exhausted to take it all in.
We ordered room service and then by about 3pm local time we were sound asleep!

Day 2 - Belize City and Caye Caulker
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We awoke at 4am Belize time to a phone call from OHs parents saying they'd cancelled the phone so there was no need to worry. Thanks for that parents….in fairness we were pretty much awake anyway after the very long sleep.
We managed to wait in our room until we knew breakfast started, and then at 6.30 we decided to venture out. The breakfast room is a large airy space on the 2nd floor, with big glass windows again over looking the ocean. Although we were so early there was already some other people in the restaurant eating. We sat down at a table and waited. A couple of seconds later the waitress came over. We were handed menus, and we discovered all sorts of things we'd never come across before. The main ones were; fresh lime juice for breakfast, fry jack and Jonny Bread and the Mayan option of tortillas spread with re-fried beans. We decided to try the new things, and were very pleasantly surprised. Lime juice is lovely, they make it freshly squeezed, and then add sugar to sweeten it. And they serve it with ice. Really nice and refreshing. Fry Jack is like has browns, and Jonny Cake I'd almost describe as being like a type of doughnut.

The only thing that displeased me was, as an avid coffee lover, they only had long life milk, and I cant bear the stuff, so that put me off having coffee there again.

After breakfast we went back to the room for a while as we thought that there was no point going out too early as things would still be closed. About 9.30 we ventured out, with the idea of doing the walking tour of Belize City laid out in the Lonely Planet guide. It's described as being 2-3 miles long, and we thought it would be a nice way to orientate ourselves in the city.

As soon as we stepped out of the hotel there was a man there waiting by the wall, he wanted to know if we'd organised any day trips yet. We said that we hadn't and he proceeded to show us a laminated sheet with all the trips he could offer, I recognised the names of many of the places from the guide book. So we said we'd be interested the following day. He had his BTG which we knew was very important to look for in a guide, so we felt quite confident. BTG is Belize Travel Guide official status; it means that they have to pay $1000 a year to the travel institute to become listed guides registered at the institute and in the local guide book for tourists. It's very important to make sure that people have that, or you could just be going off with anyone. He said he'd come back the next day at 9am.

We left the hotel and had gone about 5 minutes up the road before we were asked to look at someone's stand by the road side. It was a man selling necklaces and carved goods. We briefly looked then told him we were on our way out for the day, he was pretty relaxed about it and just said to us to look later. We passed on a little further and then were stopped by 2 men who wanted to tell us all about the tours they offered, we were at the time a little wary, and as we'd already said we'd go with the other guide we felt a little harassed. One of them insisted on giving us his phone number and was a bit weird about it really.

We passed on into the main shopping area, and started our walking tour. We walked over the famous Swing Bridge, which was built in the 1800s by the British, and is one of the only ones of its kind still in operation today. The thing that makes it interesting is that it still operates twice a day to allow big boats access, it cranks at 5.30am and 6.30pm and that's it. As we walked over the bridge we noticed to our left the Caye Caulker water taxi association, which takes people to Caye Caulker and Ambergris Caye at several specified times a day. We carried on into what they class as their main business district, and walked around on this tour. Again I have to say I just felt that the place was dirty, run down and dangerous. Belize city has a big problem with homelessness and unemployment, and currently the most common means of animal control is using strychnine to poison the strays. I felt like, where am I supposed to be looking here, as none of the items the tour pointed out were very interesting or pretty. Again you see a lot of amazing old buildings, but they are peeling or filthy and its hard to not notice that before you notice the architecture. Its worth saying at this point that because the tourist season in Belize runs mainly from November to May, the fact that we, two white people, were walking around in the middle of September made us stick out like a sore thumb, it was obvious we were tourists. This made me uncomfortable, Im used to living in London and being ignored by the population on a daily basis.

We were approached several more times before we gave in and headed for a café. As we sat down eating our ice cream sundaes I just felt so glum. I felt responsible for the fact we were there, and just felt like I couldn't understand why there was such a marked difference between what I'd expected and what we'd come to.

As we looked through the guide book I noticed a bit I hadn't spotted before, advising against tourists venturing out after dark without a taxi to take you where you wanted to go. It also mentioned not to go into the south side of town at all, as this is mainly a ghetto. This didn't do much for my spirits.

But me being me I wanted to make the best of things, I could see from the guide book that while Belize City may not be very nice, there were so many fantastic things to do that you could still have a fantastic time in Belize.

We decided to abandon the remainder of our walking tour and head back to the hotel for our swim wear, then come back out and take a water taxi to Caye Caulker. So at 2pm that day we went into the taxi station, bought a return ticket at 30$ Belize and waited for the boat to come in. I liked their water taxi system I must say; it beats the hell out of Ken Livingston's bendy buses!
There are a few crew members that shout out which stop you are going to, then they take the luggage from people, and then after that they load the people. The water taxi is an open topped boat with a wooden seat running around the entire inside and a few blocks set in the middle of the boat. It can take around 40 people maximum, and 40 is the norm that get on. Its so interesting looking at the locals, they don't care about being on the boat at all, they get on, with their kids and animals, and sit there sometimes falling asleep, as the boat speeds along. Its not a relaxing experience, as the boat really bangs down onto the waves and spray often whips the boat, plus the seats are built for practicality and not comfort, so by the end of the 45 minute trip to Caye Caulker or 1 hour 15 minute trip to San Pedro, your bum knows about it.

Going to Caye Caulker was the best thing we could possibly have done. As our boat pulled into the dock I could see where I'd got my idea of what Belize was. Beautiful white sand, colourful houses on stilts and beach hut style houses were all there on display, the water that lapped the sure line was brilliant blue and just out to sea you could see the water breaking on the reef. My spirits were truly lifted as we came ashore. The only roads on the island, which is around 4 miles long, are made of sand, and as we wandered along, we took our shoes off and just padded along. The island was really quiet and peaceful and we just took it all in. As we headed for the area known locally as 'The Split' we saw Rasta's lying in hammocks on the beach, shaded under the huge palm trees, we saw dogs flopped out along the road asleep in the sun. A few street sellers had BBQs going in empty steel drum type affairs and the smell of grilling chicken and prawns filled the air. It took us around 15 minutes to get to the Split, this an area where the island was torn apart by Hurricane Hattie back in the 1980s. It literally tore a split in the island which is now used as a local swimming point. The area has been described as looking 'post apocalyptic' because there is a long stretch of the original pier which just stretches out into nothing now, because of the split. People jump off it into the sea, but it does look almost like modern art.
There is a bar there right by the water which was busy with locals when we arrived. We set out our bags on the side by the water, where other people were sunbathing and swimming, and then we took our first Belize swim. Absolutely wonderful. The water was at least 25 degrees, if not more, and it was like slipping into a bath. We swam about and snorkelled for ages. The snorkelling is good even this close to the shore and within 10 minutes I'd seen Pipefish by the dozen, and beautiful azure coloured Blue Chromis.
We had a lovely time that afternoon and I was sad to have to return to the main land.
That was the main activities of Day 2.

Day 3 - Belize Zoo
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We headed out expecting to see our guide at 9am, but he didn't show up, so we went to where we'd seen the other two guides. Sure enough one of them was there, Wayne. He was delighted to see us, and took us through the tours he could offer. Again he showed us his BTG card and defensive driving certificates to assure us of his credentials. We had wanted to visit the Cockscomb Wildlife Basin which is supposed to be doable from Belize City, but Wayne said really you were better off doing an overnight trip to that area and starting early, if you wanted to get the best of that experience. So we decided that we'd start off with a trip to Belize Zoo instead. I'd heard a lot about the zoo as its one of the smallest in the world. It was founded in 1983 because of a documentary filmed in the area that resulted in 17 animals becoming so tame that they wouldn't have been safe back in the wild. I won't tell all in this review as it's a separate review in itself, but its very much worth a visit for the wonderful collection of animals and its unique approach to life.
After the zoo we were back in Belize City by 2pm and went to a really nice restaurant called the Smoky Mermaid, again Im going to review this fully elsewhere so I won't dwell, but I would totally recommend it. Its set in a hotel called The Great House, which is what our hotel should have been like in my opinion. Big old colonial building, really high, about 4 floors I think. The restaurant is set in the middle of the building in a wonderful shady courtyard with a fountain in the middle. After the heat on the road back from the zoo it was like an oasis literally. Great food and lovely staff. They even have two cats called Ginger and Mr Skiddy, which made me homesick for my own cat.

Day 4 - Turneffe Atoll
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Thursday was our first day of diving. We hadn't been thrilled to learn that diving in Belize means a 5am start. So we'd set an alarm call and then woken up bright and early. We were very fortunate because the dive company we used for this dive - Hugh Parkey's Belize dive connection, were based at the Fort George marina 2 minutes walk from the hotel. We turned up on the jetty to meet the staff and check out the boats. We learned at this point that we were the only two from Belize City and that the next point of call would be the enormous cruise liner sitting 2 miles out of Belize, where we'd pick up the passengers who wanted to go diving. This was new to us so we went along with it all. We boarded the dive boat, which was a nice large boat with lots of room to kit up on the deck, room for at least 20 people, and a sun deck up top. We met our Dive Master for the trip - Enrique, and he briefed us on where we were going, and asked us to fill in the standard dive waiver form, basically saying you won't sue them if you die! Then we headed out to sea. As we approached the massive cruiser I was quite impressed I must say, it looked like the Titanic, (in a good way!) as we drew up along side they opened the cargo doors and people started piling on to the boat. Once they were all on I noticed that all of them were American, apparently the cruiser was on a weeks trip out of Fort Lauderdale in Florida. There were about 20 people on the boat by this point. Everyone was milling about downstairs, and we sat upstairs and took it all in.
The next stop was a place called Spanish Lookout Caye, which is about 10 miles off shore I think. It's the dive companies' private island, and they are planning to open for business in the immediate future. It's gorgeous. Little brightly coloured huts and they have a dolphin enclosure in their lagoon. They are at present a Manatee observation point, so they also plan to offer Manatee spotting trips around the mangrove islands, which I would love to do. That was one of my big regrets about the honeymoon that we didn't get to see one.
Anyway, they lead you ashore into their dive shop where everyone gets their kit for the day, if you need to hire it. Once everyone is kitted up then they head back out to sea. Our destination that day was Turneffe Atoll, one of the four only atolls in the western hemisphere, as I mentioned before. There are many dives on the Atoll which is enormous, but we did just 2 of them on this trip.
The format of the rest of the day was, dive one - into the water by 10am, then they served us wonderful post dive nibbles, beautiful spice bread, freshly chopped melon and pineapple, and tortillas and salsa. Plus you get as much fizzy as you want. Dive 2 was around 12pm and then you head off back to the cruiser as they are on a tight schedule for the cruise people. The sea life was quite plentiful and the coral very nice on Turneffe atoll, although I wasn't raving about it at that stage, that came later in the holiday.
After we'd dropped the cruise people back then they took us back to Spanish Lookout Caye and served us lunch. It was lovely sitting there by the water, dangling our feet. I think it will be a very nice place to visit in the next year once its all finished.
Total cost for that dive was £180 or $360 US, which is more expensive than I've paid before, but then I've never dived in the Caribbean before so I cant benchmark it. I would say its worth the money though as you really do get an excellent service. They take a roll call before everyone goes into the water, and each time they exit the water, which should reassure those people who've seen 'Open Water' all your food is included in the price and drink, plus all dives are guided. When we dived in Australia you had to pay extra for a guided dive, which they didn't tell us till we were on the boat. This company employs very good staff, so you are in good hands.

Day 5 - Ambergris Caye (San Pedro)
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As we'd enjoyed Caye Caulker so much, and the guide book rhapsodized about Ambergris we decided to spend our Friday on San Pedro. You will notice I change back and forth in terms of what I call it. The locals mainly call it San Pedro, which is simply the biggest town on the 26 mile long island. However its official name is Ambergris. So there you go.
To get to Ambergris from Belize City, you take a water taxi in the same way you do for the other Caye. On our journey out that day we stopped at a private caye, Caye Chapel, to let a couple of people off, it looked amazing, but very upmarket, not like the cute beach front resorts at all.
It takes 1 hour 15 to get out to San Pedro. When we arrived we realised that this wasn't like Caulker at all, this is almost to my way of thinking, like Belize City should look. Its very developed, but still has the white sands and beautiful beach front resorts. The island doesn't have any roads the same as Caulker but it has the feel of a building site at the moment as there is so much construction going on. I have neglected to tell you, but both Caulker and San Pedro have their own airstrips so you can fly there from Phillip Goldson instead of going to B.C and taking a water taxi.
We had intended to head to Ceilas Deli for breakfast, as recommended in the L.P guide but it was closed for seasonal renovations. So we chose the 2nd choice option of a place which was meant to be called Sandbucks, but had changed to Tapu now. Anyway if you are using the guide book too, I wouldn't recommend it, the waitress was unfriendly and even left the restaurant unattended at one point so that when our food came out it sat waiting on the counter for 5 minutes.
The highlight of our day was definitely spending the morning at Ramones, which is a private beach area that allows the public during 10am-1pm and has a beautiful beach and swimming area. We both got burnt though even with factor 20 on!

In the afternoon we found an excellent bar called Fidos Courtyard and holed up there for an hour or so while there was a bit of tropical rain. I'd recommend it to anyone. It's a massive thatched structure with its end open to the beach. It's a shady place, with reggae music and very nice chilled out bar staff. Good place to enjoy a Belikin beer or two.

Day 6 - Altun Ha & The Community Baboon Sanctuary
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We went out with Wayne again, this time taking in two destinations. The first was Altun Ha, the site I mentioned in my introduction. As Im going to review it separately Im just mentioning it here. The cost of Wayne taking us there was around £60 or $120 US dollars. It was around 37 miles there, and then back again so it was worth the money. All Im going to say here is it's a fantastic place to visit, and if you are going there, it's very easy to combine it with another trip that day, as compared to Lamani which really you do need one whole day to do, if you are going from Belize City, its accessible.
The second place we visited that day was The Community Baboon Sanctuary, at Bermudian Landing; this is about 20 miles away from Altun Ha.
I can't recommend this place highly enough, and as they are totally privately funded they really do rely on people visiting them to bring in the money. Im going to review that separately too, or this review would be massive.

Day 7 - Gallows Point
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On Sunday, we dived with another dive operation based in Belize City called Sea Sports Belize. They are a totally different set up to Hugh Parkey. They are a husband and wife team, John and Linda Seale, he is from Belize and she's an American. They run a small boat, with room for around 10 people max, and leave from outside their shop in Belize City, which is just down from where the Water Taxi is. I really liked them both, they really care about the service they give you, and both the dives I did they let you stay down for as long as you had air for so a different experience to the tightly scheduled dives of the other company. They are both very knowledgeable about the local reef and Linda is conducting a survey of local turtles.
They took us diving at a place called Gallows Point, which isn't far from Spanish Lookout Caye, so around 10 miles off the shore I'd say. As it was a small boat we entered the water via rolling backwards, and then descended together. The life at this particular dive site was amazing. Within 2 minutes of entering the water I'd seen a turtle which is always very cool. The reef was just teeming with life, and it really reminded me of the Red Sea, if you've dived there you'll know what I mean. The storms of goldfish etc, well here they aren't gold fish but Blue Chromis, but the effect is the same.
The total cost of 2 boat dives with Sea Sports Belize was £140 for the pair of us, so significantly cheaper than Hugh Parkey, but if you prefer your diving to be on a big boat, where you've got room for a giant stride entrance, and room to lounge about between dives, then this isn't for you. This dive company also take you to an island for lunch, which was very nice, just a little tiny island that a fisherman friend of theirs lets them use so Im not sure of names.
I recommend John and Linda for another reason too, they went out of their way to help find us a guide that would take us Cave Tubing, and when they put us in touch with Vitalino Reyes they found us a perfect guide. So I thank them for that too.

Day 8 - Cave Tubing
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Vitalino came to pick us up at 12pm and we headed out of Belize City in his car. There is a place called Caves Branch Archaeological Reserve which is around 2 hours drive out of Belize City along the Western Highway

We were so lucky to meet Vitalino as he has been doing the cave tubing for many years and is a total expert. For something like £60 in total he picked us up from our hotel, took us to lunch at a lovely out of town restaurant that served amazing chilli rice and chicken, took us on a 1 hour jungle trek where we got to hold a tarantula and see many animals and specimens, and then took us on 3.5 hours of cave tubing through the extended 5 cave route (most tourists only do 3 caves) and drove us home again. Pretty good value.
Again Im going to review the Cave Tubing separately so bear with me.

Day 9 - The Great Blue Hole
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If you havent heard of the Great Blue Hole then let me explain. It is an amazing natural phenomenon, a cave that literally sank into the sea over time, and provides a fabulous and unique dive for divers. Located 60 miles off the coast of Belize the Blue Hole is at deepest 400 ft. The limits for recreational diving are 120 ft (40m) but within that depth there is a real other world to see. Along the wall of the blue hole are stalactites which hang eerily over head, and reef sharks slowly swim by out in the blue. Many other species of sea life live there, and all of those that we encountered seemed larger than usual. Massive groupers came out of the depths and into view.
The Blue Hole was 'discovered' by Jacques Cousteau back in the 1970s on his famous research ship the Calypso. We discovered it that day on a dive boat with 10 other divers, and had it all to ourselves, bar the nine sharks and other wildlife.
Hugh Parkey's dive connection were the dive company we went with. When we reached the hole we were given a dive briefing, and explained to in no uncertain terms that the maximumn time we'd have to spend at 40m would be 8 minutes, after which we would have to begin our accent. This is due to the strict limits set on recreational diving. Any more than this and it would begin to involve decompression time.
Everyone that went on the dive agreed that this was one of the best they had ever done, and most people in the group were a lot more experienced than me, so I figure this really is one to recommend to other divers out there, in the unlikely chance that they havent already heard of it!
This isn't a cheap dive. We paid £250 in total, which included 2 tank dives for both of us, food, soft drinks, a dive guide, and cost of entry into the national park that the Great Blue Hole resides in. However you would probably be able to get it a lot cheaper if you were coming in from Ambergris Caye and not Belize City, due to the proximity.

Day 10 - Lamani
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Lamani, meaning 'submerged crocodile' in Mayan, is one of the most important ruins in Northern Belize. It is also unusual in that it was continuously occupied from circa 2,000 BC until at least 1,650 AD and survived numerous attempts attacks by the Spanish. It is a fantastic place to spend at least half a day and I would say that no trip to the Belize City area is complete without experiencing it.

We were fortunate enough to be able to hire the services of Vitalino Reyes again, who picked us up from the hotel at 7.30am and drove us to Orange Walk Town, where we were to start our river journey to Lamani. I belive for the whole day we each paid £40 which included: pick up and drop off in Belize City (around a 50 mile journey each way) lunch at the Lamani site, a 90 minute river trip both ways, including nature spotting and local guide pointing out all the most interesting points, entry to the site, and a guided tour.

You can get to Lamani by road, but its far nicer to sit back on a launch and have the beautiful New River scenery flash by you. We spotted several rare birds while on route, tiny fruit bats, but sadly no crocodiles, which are supposed to be common in that area.

Im going to review Lamani separately so that anyone who is really interested can read a full account.

Summary
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If you've made it this far then in summary I'd just add that I think Belize has a lot to offer, the majority of the Belizeans are lovely and friendly, it can be a cheap place to visit, but diving is not cheap there, and I would definitely return, possibly either staying further south in either Hopkins or Placenia (both places you can read about in the LP guide) or I may turn porch monkey and head for a hammock in the cayes!

Thank you for reading and I hope this helps you plan your Belize City trip.

Shona x 

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