Ruth Snow
We've given up our jobs, home and the cats to sail the seven seas until there are no horizons left to sail and the rum is gone! Weiterlesen
    • Our final country! Mexico!

      30. Oktober 2015 in Mexiko ⋅ ⛅ 1 °C

      We got the 8am boat back to Belize City ($15). The boat looked full with about 20 people left on the dock but they managed to squeeze them in somehow until we were squished like sardines. Anna's regular iced coffee man had evidently overslept so she couldn't get her fix. She was caffeine-less until Chetumal but didn't turn into a monster for once.

      There’s little info online on buses to Mexico. We knew there was a night bus direct to Tulum but a lady on CC had told us there was one in the morning. When we got to the mainland they told us there wasn't one until 1pm which was $25 to Chetumal. Not wanting to wait around for 4 hours, we decided to save some money and look for a chicken bus. We got a taxi to the bus terminal (8B), where a chicken bus showed up almost instantly to Chetumal. We climbed aboard and it was pretty comfy and not too hot for the 4 hour journey (15B).

      The landscape was flat with grass, palm trees and sugar-cane plantations on single roads. At the Belizean border we all jumped off for a stamp. As tourists, we had to pay $18 departure tax. Only 3 of us got back on the bus (no idea where everybody else went!) and we drove a surprisingly long way to the Mexican side. There we got off, got our stamps and put our luggage through a scanner - I was questioned for dodgy looking items but he was satisfied with my Christmas presents explanation without having to unpack it all.

      Mexico is like a completely different place with it’s 3 lane roads and clean, Americanised shops at the side. Shortly after the border, we arrived in Chetumal. Despite it being in Mexico, all the lamp posts where we were dropped off had Belice (Belize) written on them. Must be some weird overlapping territory thing? Explains why the buses cross the border. It seems apt that our first and last border crosses have been done on chicken buses.

      The taxi driver even wanted Belizean dollars but we only had US as Anna had given our last 4 to the bus guy. The taxi took us to the nearby ADO terminal ($2) where we were able to pay in US dollars for our tickets to Tulum ($13). We'd gone forward an hour so we only had an hour and a bit to wait until our bus (which aren't quite as regular as we'd been told!). The terminal had free wifi to keep us entertained.

      We boarded the Mayab bus at 4:45pm, which wasn't quite as nice as we'd hoped - slight upgrade from a chicken bus with proper seats and aircon but certainly not modern and no toilets. It stopped a fair bit too and by the end of the 4 hour journey our bums were slightly numb! It was mainly a 2 lane highway with grass / bushes either side and not much to see.

      We walked to our AirBnB place and were shown around by Donaji who was lovely and gave us a map and told us where to visit etc. It's a small 2 bed apartment in the centre of town and at only $23, is a lot better value than any we found on Bookings.

      The hotel that we stayed at on our first visit to Mexico 3 yrs is apparently 5 minutes drive from here. We did look into going back for a night or two but it's really pricey. It'll be lovely to go back to the stretch of beach we got engaged on and see the area from a backpacker’s viewpoint.
      Weiterlesen

    • More chillin

      28. Oktober 2015 in Belize ⋅ ⛅ 32 °C

      We had another lazy morning, searching for our next accommodation which Anna (who is in now charge of planning, eek) has left to the last minute. Eventually we chose somewhere and then headed out for coffee and juice, bought our boat tickets for tomorrow and then had an ice cream.

      We chilled in the room and then chilled on the beach and then chilled on the dock and had a swim. Ah it's a hard life living in paradise.

      We collected some falafel for our lunch tomorrow and then some goods for the bakery for breakfast - if we are delayed this time, we'll be prepared!! We were going to buy baked goods from the huge man with a ridiculously high pitched voice who peddles his goods on a bike each night but they were 4B each! That's 4 cinnamon rolls!

      Fully stocked for tomorrow, we went to Enjoy for dinner again. Anna had the same; I had the creole veggie kebab which was lovely though not quite as amazing as the jerk version. Anna spent most of the night laughing at me for not being able to say snorkel in a Belizean accent - I sound Irish instead.

      We're very sad to be leaving Belize… it's been one of our favourite places with such a lovely vibe - if you can avoid the drunken men and the crazy swerving cyclists!
      Weiterlesen

    • Chillin in da Caribbean

      27. Oktober 2015 in Belize ⋅ ⛅ 31 °C

      We had a lazy morning, munched some granola and sat outside reading. We headed out to get Anna her iced coffee, me a not great coconut and a fruit smoothie to share (4,5,5B). It was absolutely roasting and we were hot and sweaty when we returned so jumped off the dock into the sea.

      After hiding in the aircon for a bit we headed to the bakery for a cinnamon roll and a ‘cookie’ which was sort of shortbread with sprinkles and jam. Then we settled at Sip N Dip, a colourful dock with seating and ladders so you can pop in and out of the water to cool off. Anna tried 2 more beers whilst I had 2 ice creams - one was chocolate fudge brownie which was absolutely amazing. Once the sun had gone, we went home to change and then came out for the sunset at the Split which wasn't great and the sand flies were out in force as there was no wind.

      We went to Aladdin’s for dinner and had lamb and falafel wraps, iced tea and sour sop (a nice local fruit smoothie) for 41B. It was probably the best falafel wrap I've had on all our travels so far...absolutely perfect! The poor lady then told us how her ex boyfriend was trying to destroy her business / life and she had to go to court soon - Latino men don't seem to make great partners from what we've heard. As we were having dinner we saw a bright red, huge, full moon rise out of the sea! It slowly turned to orange and then normal moon colour as it rose higher. An amazing sight I don't think I've seen before.

      Quote of the day from a rasta man: Slow down or you'll get a speeding ticket! Hannah will attest to the fact that we walk pretty slowly these days. We don't seem to be able to walk down the main strip without everyone wanting to talk to us. It already feels like we know half the people here and has such a lovely vibe. Definitely my favourite place so far.
      Weiterlesen

    • More sharks and rays

      26. Oktober 2015 in Belize ⋅ ⛅ 31 °C

      We moved rooms this morning as ours was booked and we wanted to extend our stay. Our new hut is 4 back from the beach but bigger and with a stronger shower. Plus seems to have a functional, non-leaking toilet!

      We went to the bakery and bought 4 cinnamon rolls for 1B each. Not quite as good as Utila’s but very close and a bit bigger. Then, just after 10am we went back to the snorkel tour shop and had to wait while Anna had her caffeine fix before heading out. Today we were doing the reef straight off Caye Caulker, a 5 min boat ride away so it was cheaper (70B). The water is extremely shallow, about 5ft deep, so it's the most beautiful clear turquoise colour I've ever seen.

      Our first site was Ray & Shark Alley (diff to yesterday). There were tons of stingrays, which was slightly frightening since the water was so shallow and you couldn't get out their way easily. At first we only saw a few sharks at once, but then a small boat came and about 20 of them flocked after it so we managed to follow them for quite a while. We also saw a barracuda and some big pufferfish.

      Then we drove a minute to our next site: CC southern channel. Alex guided us and we saw barracuda, flamingo tongued sea slugs, parrot fish, angel fish, tons of coral and a huge lobster. Again the water was beautifully clear and the coral looked lovely.

      Our last site was a further minute away: Coral Garden. We went in alone and saw millions of tiny fish at the surface, 2 sharks hiding under the coral and more barracuda. We munched on some oranges and headed back to shore. Another fabulous day of snorkelling! We saw a couple of small boats rammed full of tourists. Apparently they are from the cruise ships and all have to wear life jackets. We were very grateful for our private tour today!

      We were back by 1:30pm - the heat of the day - so stayed inside for an hour or so. We went for ice creams and Anna tried her first Belizean beer. I laid in the sun whilst Anna hid inside. Then we went to wander around and check out the sunset. We looked at numerous places for dinner until settling on Enjoy, which was cheaper than most on the main strip and offered proper, local veggie food! Plus it had swings instead of seats at the bar! Anna had jerk snapper and I had a jerk veggie kebab. Both came with coconut rice, garlic bread and mine with tons of sautéed veggies. It was the most lovely, delicious spicy food I've had in ages. I couldn't manage it all which seemed a travesty. The price also included some fruit for dessert and a rum punch each (41B). We saw Lou and Spanky, kiwis that we met in Utila, who've followed a similar route to us.
      Weiterlesen

    • Dolphins, turtles, rays, sharks...wow!

      25. Oktober 2015 in Belize ⋅ ⛅ 31 °C

      We had pancakes and fruit for breakfast with a sea view at Brisas del Mar (28B). We then talked to a guy from Reef Friendly Tours about a snorkelling tour. It wasn’t as cheap (130B) as some but advertised itself as eco-friendly and doesn't feed or touch the animals. We were very happy with this as we'd spoken to a big, sunburnt American customer yesterday at another place who thought the tour was amazing ‘cos they held the rays up for photos!’. We arranged to go tomorrow but then some other people turned up and he asked if we could go in half an hour. We grabbed our stuff and climbed aboard the small boat with another couple who were a little odd and seemed to love PDAs.

      We drove through the Split, a narrow gap caused by a hurricane, which separates the island from it's northern half. After getting some fuel, we headed towards Ambergris Caye (where the rich people go), which is pronounced similar to hamburger in their Jamaican-esque accents which made me chuckle.

      On our way I spotted a pod of dolphins and we stopped and watched them for a few minutes. After half an hour, we reached our first snorkelling spot: Hol Chan Marine Reserve where our guide, Alex, paid the ranger who was bobbing about in his boat. Alex led us and pointed out lots of things. There were tons of big jacks hanging around the boat, we saw 3 turtles, stingrays, an eagle ray, a swimming green moray eel, barracuda, a baby lionfish, plus tons of other fish and coral. Alex showed us a cool swim-through which was quite deep so nobody apart from me went through - it was fun and full of fish. Despite it being a guided tour, Alex didn't bother getting in the water at the next 3 stops! We didn't mind though, I prefer to explore on my own.

      Next, we went to Shark & Ray Alley. As soon as the boat pulled up a ton of brown nurse sharks surrounded the boat in a frenzy. Many of the boats feed them so they are now ‘trained’ to seek out boats. We jumped in and Alex drove the boat around us which kept them close to us. It was the most amazing experience being surrounded by 30 plus sharks, some up to 4m long. They are bottom feeders so completely harmless and we never felt afraid. Alex then moored up so they spread out more but it was pretty easy to find a huge bunch of them - the water was only about 5m deep. We also saw some Southern stingrays and a turtle.

      We had some watermelon and then went to a cargo wreck that has been sunk in really shallow water. It didn't seem to have a front to the boat and looked almost more like a platform, but did have layers and ladders. There was some coral but not many fish and the visibility wasn't great so we didn't stay too long.

      Our last stop was at Coral Garden. The visibility was rubbish due to too much rain water recently and the coral was dead in parts. A disappointing end but frankly we'd seen so much we couldn't care less. We got out, munched on some pineapple and headed home.

      We went out for an early dinner as we were starving. We wandered along the back streets and came to a cute little shack called Meldy’s. We had happy hour caipirinhas and Anna had conch in a coconut sauce and I had a veggie burrito the size of my arm!!

      Shattered, we dragged ourselves back to our room. Our cold water suddenly stopped and the toilet wouldn't refill. We couldn't find anyone about to help us and the other loos by the beach were locked so we had to fill the tank with hot water manually.
      Weiterlesen

    • Belize: Caye Caulker

      24. Oktober 2015 in Belize ⋅ ⛅ 32 °C

      3B = £1. English is the first language.

      Feeling fully refreshed after a good sleep, we got up at 7am for our 7:30am shuttle to Belize. It arrived empty half an hour late, we picked up 2 other couples and off we went for the border. We ate our packed breakfast which the hotel had kindly given us again - cheese and ham sandwich plus an apple juice, which is better than their sit-down breakfast.

      We travelled for a couple of hours, crossed the border quickly and then travelled a further couple of hours to Belize City, which seemed a very lovely place, all colourful and no high rises. We waited an hour for the next boat and both had our favourite foods - Indian curry for Anna and ice cream for me. The boat took about 45 minutes and we were on the island by 2pm. Shuttle and boat cost 180Q total.

      We checked into the Tropical Paradise Hotel. At 90B it’s a bit more than we'd usually pay but there weren't any budget options we fancied. Turns out it’s a lovely place and well worth the money. We have a spacious, modern cabin a stone's throw from the sea with aircon, hot water and even a bath!

      I promptly planted myself on one of the nearby sunbeds on the ‘beach’ which is more concrete as there is no real sand on the island. For once it was the perfect sunbaking conditions with a strong breeze making the temperature ideal. Anna went off in search of her caffeine fix and then joined me. Some locals set up camp next to us with a large bottle of rum and a cooler full of ice. They invited us to watch them play in their band that evening.

      The sun disappeared behind the houses just after 4pm so we went for a wander around the small island. It's a beautiful place full of coloured, shabby wooden houses with a lovely vibe. We caught some of the sunset, spoke to some tour people and finally found an ATM (Caxton succeeded again). A random man offered to let us go watch him catch lobster and do some fishing for a tiny contribution of $100 each!! Both of our jaws dropped and we made our excuses. He later found us in the restaurant and invited us to dinner (well Anna mainly; I think I'd alienated myself when I told him I preferred to see fishes in the sea rather than murder them!). The men here are certainly friendly and stoking our egos. An old man tried to grind up dancing next to me and nearly got smacked by Anna!

      We had feared Belize was going to be uber expensive, especially in view of hotel prices, however there is a lot of cheap food options and the snorkelling tours are pretty reasonable. We had dinner at La Cubana and had mains, 3 rum punches and chocolate cake for 15B each (£5!). Anna had fish and I had salad, with coconut rice, beans and garlic bread.

      There was a big, lively political parade whilst we were dining and then they all congregated in the outdoor basketball court waiting for the party to begin. The band wasn't playing so we went back to the room for a while. We went out later and they still weren't playing so perhaps they got too drunk. We did however find our drunken fisherman friend, even more drunk and regaling us with the slowest story ever. Anna, buoyed on by her rums and 2 of mine seemed to enjoy encouraging his storytelling. He repeated his invite to dinner but we suspect he won't remember a thing tomorrow.
      Weiterlesen

    • Tikal

      23. Oktober 2015 in Guatemala ⋅ ☀️ 31 °C

      We got up begrudgingly for our 3am shuttle for the hour-long ride to Tikal (85Q). The 250Q entrance fee is 100Q extra for early entry (though our guide purchased them and we never saw the ticket so I'm not convinced he didn't pocket the difference). The shuttle & tour cost us 85Q - an American guy paid 120Q for the same thing, which he'd talked down from 150; pays to be a grubby backpacker!

      Our group of 8 (apparently grows to 50 in high season) walked a fair way in the dark through the jungle following our guide's torchlight, stumbling over tree roots and rocks. Passing through the main plaza, we saw temples 1 and 2 eerily poking out of the dark. Then we climbed the 186 wooden steps up the side of temple 4 and waited in silence with about 30 other gringos for the sunrise. Sadly the jungle mist occluded any views, which is apparently very common. However, right on cue, the dawn chorus burst into life and we listened to some of the 400 species of birds chatter away, mixed with the panting noises of spider monkeys. The dominant sound, however, was the howler monkeys which make the most almighty roaring monster noises to mark their territory upon waking.

      Our guide then took us on a brief tour before leaving us to take some of our group back to the start for their bus to Belize. We thought we were getting a 4 hour tour so Anna was a bit disappointed, however, I was relieved as he wasn't very interesting. We were then free to explore at our leisure. The place was deserted and we barely saw anyone the whole time until we started to leave and saw a few small tour groups arriving.

      One of the most important Mayan sites, it is a huge site of which only 20% has been excavated, the rest is just mounds buried under vegetation. It seems far bigger than Chichen Itza but has less variety and detail. There are about 5 huge, solid temples, a few smaller ones and some other residential places that have been cleaned up. The fact that you can climb up and explore most of it makes it a lot of fun and it's jungle setting is magnificent. We saw monkey cats, guinea pigs on stilts, howler and spider monkeys (our first spiders) and lots of birds including toucans. The site is 16km2 and we haven't slept properly for 3 nights so by 10am we were flagging and headed back for a drink and got the 11am shuttle back.

      For lunch, we went to a cute place overlooking the lake and I had some tiny, rubbish falafel compensated by tasty fries. Anna's mushroom burger was much better as were some refreshing watermelon, ginger and lemon smoothies (158Q).

      We then chilled out in our hot room for most of the afternoon, trying to avoid the invading ants. We only moved to get huge ice creams and then to our terrace to check out the most stunning sunset - a perfectly flat lake reflecting a rainbow, then golden sky.

      In our hot and tired states we were both craving junk food and aircon so lazily got a tuktuk (10Q) for the 10 min walk across the bridge to Burger King. Anna went for some retail therapy (excuse to buy a beer) and I went to bed early.
      Weiterlesen

    • Flores

      22. Oktober 2015 in Guatemala ⋅ ⛅ 31 °C

      Anna woke up at 9am and found out that breakfast was soon stopping so woke me up. I got up and stepped out the door to be greeted by the most beautiful view of the lake right across the road from the back of the hotel (hadn't noticed last night). We had breakfast of bread, beans and banana (plus the standard egg neither of us can eat). A different receptionist was on and happily gave us the key to the room with a terrace and lake view, a much brighter, airier room. Easily the best room in the place.

      After a rest for Anna to ‘wake up’ we went for an explore. Still hungry from our lack of food yesterday, I got a lovely coconut ice cream (9Q) and then we walked around Flores which is a small island connected to the mainland by a 500m causeway. It's a really beautiful little place, one we weren't expecting. Anna was searching for an iced coffee (despite already having 2 cups with breakfast) so we ended up in Cool Beans cafe and shared some nachos.

      We had to walk back across the bridge to the mainland to find an ATM that worked. My Caxton card finally worked for the first time in over a month - yey! Then we booked our tour tomorrow and journey to Belize the following day.

      We got a small boat (40Q return for both) to a tiny island about 500m in front of our hotel which has a museum (20Q) and a few houses on it. The museum is just a tiny room full of lots of Mayan artifacts and some old radio equipment. I lost interest after 10 minutes and played with the cat ‘curator’. We were the only ones there and had an amazing, cold, humongous coconut for 5Q each. Since they were so cheap and good I had another one. Our young boat man picked us up and took us back and there was a loud procession of vehicles promoting candidates for the upcoming election. Interestingly they were mostly full of young people.

      We checked out a few restaurants but they were quite pricey and nothing special. A guy groped Anna's bum in one and we promptly left (after she yelled at him) to avoid smacking him in the face. The guys here are a bit odd - very stary; the coffee tour guy apparently warned Anna about them. We ended up getting some street food to share - drinks, soft & hard rolled tacos, plus some open tacos with unknown toppings (one apparently was ceviche, which I liked). Nothing amazing but filling and all for 25Q with a view of the sun setting over the lake.

      We fetched Anna a beer from the supermarket to add to her collection of lids and then tried to get an early night in preparation for our early start tomorrow.
      Weiterlesen

    • A traumatic trip North

      21. Oktober 2015 in Guatemala ⋅ ⛅ 31 °C

      We were picked up at 9am in a shuttle and taken to GC. It didn't take long to reach the outskirts but took another hour to drop people off at the airport and then the bus stop. We got to see quite a bit of GC - there were some lovely statues and colourful houses but mostly it just looks like a huge, sprawling mess with tons of traffic.

      We then got the 11am Linea Dorada bus to Flores ($45 for shuttle and bus) - unexpectedly spacious and comfy though no TVs to entertain us. The roads were single lane and windy at times, with green mountains either side. We were supposed to arrive about 7pm. At around half 5, just as the sun was setting we came to a halt behind a queue of traffic...and there we stayed! We've no idea if it was an accident or landslide or something else. We were fully expecting to be stuck all night and with a young boy running around and playing his pan pipes in our ears really loudly, I expected I might have to murder someone.

      Thankfully, after 3 hours we slowly got going. The rest of the journey was painfully slow as we crawled along behind the other vehicles but we slept most of the way. Finally we got to Santa Elena sometime after midnight. We collected our bags and found that they were dripping wet :(

      An aggressive taxi driver tried to charge us 100Q for the 2km ride to Flores. We couldn't see another taxi so asked the bus driver and he said it should be 40Q and the taxi driver begrudgingly agreed, then drove like a bat out of hell to our hotel within about 1 minute!

      Strangely there were still a fair few people sat in plastic chairs in the middle of the street, not doing much. We rang the doorbell of Green World Hotel (183Q) and thankfully a sleepy lady in her pajamas let us in. She didn't have a record of our reservation but showed us to a murky room with a cockroach munching on the soap on the bed. Once she’d gone we realised it didn't have the terrace and lake view I'd booked but we didn't want to disturb her again and were just happy to have a roof over our head.

      After a hot shower and spreading out all our wet stuff, we finally got to sleep at about 2am.
      Weiterlesen

    • Sunshine and coffee

      20. Oktober 2015 in Guatemala ⋅ ⛅ 23 °C

      We awoke to the strange sound of no rain! Yey!! I sent Anna off on the 9am coffee tour of Finca Filadelfia (145Q). They run a free pickup from town and she was the only person there so got a private tour! She came back buzzing - in more ways than one, having seen the plantation and the drying, sorting and roasting process. Plus a few free samples.

      I meanwhile went for a wander to see the sights of Antigua sans rain. The puddles had virtually disappeared, people were out everywhere, the coloured houses looked vibrant and the crumbly old magnificent structures looked, well, still crumbly. Plus you could clearly see the three volcanoes: Agua, Pacaya and Fuego. Fuego (fire) was smoking away - apparently lava is visible at night but so far we've been thwarted by clouds :(

      Once Anna was back, I took her to the chocolate museum which I had visited earlier and we had a yummy truffle each.Then we walked up the hill to a lookout which gave a great view of the town with Agua as the backdrop. We then booked a bus for tomorrow, had some mango and pineapple and sat in the main square people watching (it was a public holiday so very busy).

      Anna wanted a hot chocolate so we went to the chocolate museum where they were doing 2 for 15Q which is a good deal, however when we got the drinks they were disgusting! Turns out it was cacao rather than chocolate but it tastes like dishwater. The nice waiter brought us more cacao to give it more flavour but this and a ton of sugar couldn't disguise the burnt yucky taste! We didn't drink them, but at least the brownie was good. We went back to Cafe Condesa for 2 more hot chocs, which weren't quite as amazing as the one I had on Sunday but were still pretty great. We sat in the pretty courtyard reading / writing for a couple of hours.

      Continuing our falafel tour of Antigua we went to Zoola for dinner (98Q) which has typical sit-on-the-floor-on-cushions type seating. The falafel was in wraps rather than pitas and whilst not presented as nicely as last night's, it had a lovely tangy sauce so it's a close call as to which is the best falafel joint in town (there are also a few others we didn't try so it's my kind of place). My mint tea was infinitely better at Zoola and it was cheaper too.

      We paid our hotel bill - the friendly hotel owner had given us a big discount on our last three nights (which we hadn't booked) which saved us about $30 which was very lovely of him. He also gave us a free beer each - well two for Anna, one of which was a local dark beer so she was very happy!

      Tomorrow we head north to the top of the country to Flores for the Tikal ruins. The tour agencies tried to convince us to get a night bus but we never end up sleeping that well and didn't fancy passing through GC at night. Plus we prefer to see the country as we pass through it. Our original plan was to first go to Lake Atitlan, a couple of hours from here, but the road is possibly blocked by landslides and it won't be much fun if the forecasted rain occurs. We were then going to go to Semuc Champney, some beautiful rivers, in the middle of the country. Again the road is supposedly blocked and the foreign office is reporting increased robberies due to this. Plus if it rains, they won't look so beautiful. So best be safe and hightail it to the top of the country!
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