2012_12_04 Blancaneaux then Turtle Inn

Up at 6:00 to post some stuff on the blog.  Walked around taking a few images of Blancaneaux Lodge before we head off this afternoon to Turtle Inn.

Swimming pool - early morning fog

Our cabin was to the left of the one in the back - Can't see ours much from the office/restaurant

Here's our cabin

Main office, bar and one restaurant.

Swimming pool with the sun out.

Airstrip right next to the road into Blancaneaux

Access to Blancaneaux

Near the entrance to Blancaneaux.  Jars - inside joke!

Starting our bike ride to the falls.  Harvey and Steve at the top of the driveway.  Thanks, Kasey!

Blancaneaux has free rental bikes so we decided to take a short ride to a local waterfall.  There is a hiking path but it would have taken 45 minutes each way.  Time was short so we followed pretty simple instructions down the road to Big Rock Falls.  Parked bikes in a small pasture and headed down to falls.

Heading down

Mind the rocks.

Big Rock Falls - worth the effort!

Kasey and Steve by the river

The road right at Blancaneaux.  That's the end of the small runway to the right.  The bike trip was really easy heading to the falls but pretty steep almost all the way back to here.  Worked up a sweat!

Connie had finished her 1 hour Thai massage and I found her with some water outside sunning by the restaurant.  Back to the room to finish packing and then off to the beach!

On the road to Turtle Inn - The Sleeping Man Mountain

Stopped at The Orange Shop for some handicrafts and lunch - with our new driver James.  3 hour drive to the Caribbean.  Arrived at The Turtle Inn and checked into this:

Cabin 8 at Turtle Inn - Massive room

Not bad.....

Connie relaxing before dinner

Attached, but outdoor shower!  Totally private.  Can't wait!!!

Going for dinner at Rumfish  (5 minutes away) allegedly a "beach dive" with fish tacos.  FINALLY!
I LOVE FISH TACOS!!!!!

Steve and Kasey ate there almost every night the last time they were here.

A bit later.....

Back from dinner - some fish tacos, some pork tacos, lobster flatbread appetizer and gelato for dessert.  Not too shabby!

Going fishing tomorrow with Mr. Eloy- local fisherman who guided for Jaques Cousteau back in the day.  Steve went bone fishing with Mr. Eloy 2 years ago and couldn't wait to go again.  I guess we're bone fishing, trolling for barracuda and snorkeling way out by the reef.

2012_12_02 Actun Tunichil Muknal Cave

Up at 6:30 with tea delivered to our cabin.  Continental breakfast @ 7:00 and then Jeronimo picked us up (again) for transport to Actun Tunichil Muknal.

Stopped along the way in San Elena to pick up Luis (our guide for the cave tour). There are only a few authorized guides for the cave tours and each guide is limited to 8 persons into the cave.

Luis the guide and Steve in the van.  He spoke Creole - mix of English, Spanish and Caribbean words.

Heading from Blancaneaux Lodge to A T M

Took about 2 hours to get to the cave - the last eight miles on a road that was described by Luis as "8 miles of bad road - 3 miles of bad road and 5 miles of good bad road".  He was telling the truth!  More later……

We had our lunches in backpacks that Jeronimo brought with in the van. We placed our orders for lunch last night at dinner.  Because some knuckle heads had walked on a broken some of the artifacts in the cave all cameras have been banned so I had to leave the camera behind.  I really would have liked to have it but that's the way it goes.  

In the parking lot.  Our van is over on the right.

Arrived at A T M and walked for about 45 minutes on some pretty slick muddy paths to the cave entrance.  We crossed through the same river 3 times on the way, the water was never more than knee high - but pretty cold.  Had to pay attention not to step on the bigger rocks as they were quite slippery.  The nice thing was the river was really clear so it was real easy to see where you were walking.

Once we got to the cave mouth we got our helmets with lights on them for inside the cave.  Luis gave some instruction about how to behave inside the cave.  Right away you had to swim (only about 35 feet) to enter the cave.

Swimming into the cave

Looking back to the entrance of the cave from inside.

The first little bit was up some pretty steep rocks to get to where the river leveled off.  This part of the cave had collapsed at some point so we were basically climbing over boulders and rocks that had fall from the top of the cave.  You could still see light coming thru from above.  There is no way they would allow this in the U.S.  WAY too dangerous for most folks.

Lifted this from the internet - Back when cameras were allowed!

Once into the flatter section we walked upstream thru the river - at this point the ceiling of the cave was really high and loaded with stalagtites and stalagmites.  The river went from just above knee hight to almost up to my chin at some points.  Mostly nearer to knee hight.  

After about 900 feet of river we started to climb up again.  Here we started to see the artifacts - pieces of pottery and plates from Mayan rituals.  The pieces were always broken as the Mayans thought you should never offer anything too perfect to the Gods.  Basically, they believed that caves were the entrance to the underworld and they were making offerings to the Gods to try to stop droughts or whatever else bad was happening.  This was pretty amazing!  At one point there was a naturally occurring rock out cropping that had a stalagtite hanging above it.  Archeologists have been able to determine that the Mayans chipped away at the bottom of the stalagtite to make it look move like jaguar teeth. When you cast a light the shadow of the "top teeth" and the naturally occurring outcropping by moving the light up and down it looked like the profile of a jaguar opening and closing it's mouth!  The Mayan shamans took pine sap torches into the cave and it must have seen auspicious to find this.  Pretty sweet!  I wish I could have photographed that!

We then climbed up some more to another regroup of chambers where there were MANY artifacts.  Luis explained them to us - at one point I thought if I saw one more piece of pottery…. I should mention that before we entered these chambers we had to remove our shoes.  The artifacts are not protected at all and at some point tourists have stepped on and broken some artifacts so we had to pay the price.  Our tender American feet were not ready for walking on the uneven rocky floors!  After more artifacts and two skulls (probably sacrificed by decapitation) with bones we reached a ladder.  Climbed up the ladder into yet another chamber where a mostly intact skeleton of another Mayan was lying.  This is the only intact skeleton ever found in a Mayan cave.  It's ben there for almost 1,000 years!  Almost worth the effort - kidding it was worth it.

Here is the skeleton

Reversing our steps we climbed back down the ladder and then the rocks after recovering our shoes.  The way back was a bit faster - now going downstream and less talking about stuff.  Got back and swam out of the cave.  It had rained quite a bit when we were in the cave so the walk back was even muddier.  45 minutes later we got back to our van and changed into dry clothes.

Headed back and right away Jeronimo tied to sneak around a water filled hole and skidded off the road.  Tried to gun backwards and really got stuck!  Luckily, there was one more driver back at the cave parking lot and he had a chain as well.  Geronimo walked back and got him and we were pulled out.  Rushed back to the hotel and Steve and Kasey made it exactly on time for a couples massage.

Dinner and now sitting in the lobby of the hotel updating this blog as the WIFI seems to be working - it didn't work in the room.

Connie has a massage scheduled for tomorrow morning and the other 3 are going to ride bikes to a local waterfall.  Then at 11:00 we will be transferred for 3.5 hours to our next stop - Turtle Inn.  Can't wait.

2012_12_02 Caracol Mayan ruins

I got up this morning (overslept 15 minutes) and went bird watching with our driver from yesterday and a guy named Ben from London.  No idea how I didn't hear my alarm - slept fitfully last night somehow and then missed the alarm.  anyway I caught up with them right outside the main part of the hotel.  Saw quite a few birds and tried for some images but it's really hard - no good ones.  Was able to see closeup through his scope though.  Amazing colors!

This was the best I could do with my lens - a taninger from far away

Organic vegetable gardens

After breakfast, outside our cabin

Back for breakfast and then transfer with our guide for the day Jeronimo who was really a great guy.  Spoke perfect English, college graduate is a naturalist to boot.  Knew quite a bit of history about Belize and the Mayans as well.  He is of Mayan and Spanish descent.  Interestingly I asked him a some point "What do you think happened to the Mayans"?  His answer - "Nothing - I am right here"!  Pretty good...

Drove for about and hour and a half the opposite direction we came from yesterday on a mix of dirt and paved roads until we arrived at the Caracol Mayan ruins:

Caracol, a Classic Period complex, covers 30-square miles of thick, high-canopy jungle, and includes five plazas, an astronomic observatory and over 35,000 buildings which have been identified.

The loftiest among them, a massive pyramid (Caana) which is capped by three temples and rises over 140 feet above the jungle floor. Caracol's central core today, as seen by visitors, consists of three plaza groups surrounding a central acropolis and two ball courts, along with a number of smaller structures.

View from atop Caana

Discovered in 1938 by loggers, excavations did not begin until 1950, with most of the work having taken place since 1985. Caracol can truly be described in superlatives: Largest archeological site in Belize - One of the largest in the Maya world - Tallest man-made structure in Belize (Caana) - Most structures, largest area, largest population, most hieroglyphics etc ... Enlarge Many hieroglyphic texts have been found on stelae, alters, ball-court-markers, capstones and wall facades. The discovery of an elaborately carved ball-court-marker dating back to the end of the early Classic Period has been interpreted as Caracol claiming a military victory over Tikal, located more then 60 miles away in Guatemala. Caracol was linked together by more than 20 miles of roadways that radiated outward from its epicenter like the spokes of a wheel and it is estimated that 200,000 or more Maya lived in the area when this important City-State reached it's peak around 700 A.D. Evidence of Post-Classic occupation is lacking, thus presenting a similar situation to that found at other Classic sites in the region. Enlarge I lifted the above from a web site.  I tried to load some images from today but the connection is too slow. We were able to walk on all of the structures - still allowed here.  Another nice thing - no vendors bugging you to buy stuff here!  Plus, almost nobody was there t all - maybe 20 to 30 people tops.  So, interesting Mayan structures with none of the hustle and bustle of other Mayan sites we ave visited in the past. A nice surprise - a bunch of toucans were up in the tree tops feeding right at our level at the top of Caana.  We got some pretty good images - I am sure Kasey has some great ones as she has an amazing Canon lens - big one!  Can't wait to see her images! At the entrance to Caracol with Jeronimo Old tree in the rain forest at Caracol. Howler monkey near one of the temples Kasey's image of the howler Jeronimo Connie, Kasey and Steve scrambling up Caana. Close up of one of the toucans Photo op Steve and Kasey Connie and I looking out from the top of Caana.   This temple has the masks shown below Two masks were on either side of the temple across from Caana.  The bottom is the first of a jaguar - the one above was a newer image of the rain God.  They Mayans buried the jaguar after a certain amount of time and built the rain God to appeal for help. In front of Caana. One of the temples Left side Right side A stele that has been moved to under a canopy  Another stele that has been split in two pieces 700 year old Cieba tree - Oldest tree in the area. Had a nice boxed lunch and drove back to the hotel.  We went to the pool for a little while (cold water) and then walked down to swim in the river below our cottages.  First we went to a small beach and later Steve, Kasey and Connie got in the river (even colder)!  I stayed out because there didn't seem to be n easy way out.  Slippery rocks, so I helped to pull them out of the river.  They really need some sort of little ladder! Our cabin from down by the river.  You can almost see it. Down by the river River from the bridge Hot tub Another fine dinner and back to the room to post this. Tomorrow we have an all day excursion to visit and underground cave.  Sounds pretty neat - we'll see.  So far, so good - not injured and that'a a good thing!!!!!

2012_12_01 Get to Belize

Stayed overnight at a Marriott place in Houston Texas on Friday.  Got up, had some breakfast and headed for the airport for a flight to Belize City, Belize.

Flight was totally uneventful and 2 hours later we arrived in Belize.  We stuck around the airport for 3 hours waiting for the Muellers to arrive ion a later flight.  Pretty interesting.......  Met up with reps from the company that was going to transfer us to the Blancaneaux Lodge after we cleared customs.  They took our luggage and stored in in an office so we could walk around without lugging it.  We asked about lunch and Lil and her brother told us we could either eat in a restaurant in the airport itself, or walk over to where the locals ate.  Local tent here we come.  Delicious lunch of grilled fish, rice, beans, cole slaw and a melon juice for $10BZ ($5US).  Tasty and a lot of food, which we shared.  We ate up on a picnic table in what they called the "waving deck".  This is where people can see out to where the planes arrive or get ready to depart.

Preparing our lunch

There it is - fish head and all!

On the "waving deck".

A large group (actually two) of Mennonites were there to greet someone who was coming in on a flight.  Lil told us when this happens, the whole "family" comes to greet.  I guess there are a LOT of Mennonites in Belize and the only thing they don't like is people taking pictures of them.  I found this out after I was taking a bunch!

Belize City airport

Kasey and Steve have arrived!

Leaving the airport.

Once Kasey and Steve arrived we got into a van with our driver Ernesto for a 3 hour drive up into the Belize Mountains to Blancaneaux Lodge.  Pretty amazing place.  We only had a short time before it was dark but we walked around a bit after we were shown our cabin.  Dinner and off to bed.  Long day - but they had a longer one.  Woke at 3:30 in the morning and had a 4 hour layover in Miami!  Not fun.  Anyway, we're here and let the fun begin!

Here's our room - Before we started to trash it!

Thatched roof from our bed

Connie in our hammock on the front porch at Blancaneaux Lodge

 Posting this Sunday night - trying to catch up.