Thursday, August 16, 2012

Belize + Best Mom Ever = Epic

I deduced something mildly life changing last week. I have the coolest Mom ever. Now not everyone can say that, so you should know that I feel pretty damn lucky. I have always known my Mom was awesome, but after spending an epic week with her in Belize I feel like I got to know a totally different side of her.  A jungle adventure having, tequila shot taking, island evacuating side. I apologize in advance if I over use the word 'epic' in this post, but it is the most efficient word to describe every part of the week, from human sacrifice to sharks and hurricanes, we did it all. 
Sharks at Shark-Ray Ally of course!

We arrived on a Saturday. We were staying on the island of Ambergris Caye, in the town of San Pedro. We flew in a small Cessna from the airport in Belize City to San Pedro. After a quick mishap with Mom trying to meet me at airport, only to have me looking for her at the hotel we quickly settled in to our hotel, the Blue Tang Inn. (Totally recommend staying there if you ever find yourself in San Pedro!) We followed my friend, Clement's advice and had a fantastic dinner at the Blue Water Grill. When we got up on Sunday we started hearing rumblings that Tropical Storm Ernesto was headed our way. So we decided to try and get as much done as possible before bad weather overtook our time. We scheduled a snorkeling trip to  Hol Chan and Shark Ray Ally. It was really beautiful. We saw all sorts of marine life like nurse sharks, a spotted eagle ray and turtles. Not to mention tons of fish, sea cumbers and conch shells. It was Mom's first time snorkeling and I cannot imagine a better place to be. When we got back to land, we headed to dinner at a local restaurant that served pupusas. Me, being practically Salvadorian these days, needed to try these pupusas out to compare them to the real deal. I was pleasantly surprised when they tasted just like the ones in El Salvador. That is probably because they were made by a woman from Chalatinago, a department in El Salvador.   

Lunch at Elvi's
Monday I did two local scuba dives in the morning. I had heard about how beautiful the dives would be, but it paled in comparison to the real thing. Tons of fish, a few more sharks, and some sting rays later, we were back at the dive shop. One of the most fascinating things I learned during this trip was about the lion fish that have decided to make the reefs off the coast of Belize it's home. Since these lion fish are not native to Belize, and they are eating all of the reef's cleaning organisms, they have been declared an invasive organism. The coastal citizens are trying to eradicate them by killing them off. So a few of the more experienced divers on the trip brought down spears and killed any lion fish they came across. The fish were then cut up and left to be eaten by something else. I did not expect to actually see any lion fish, but the group found about 4 or 5 and they were taken care of. By 1 I was back in the room and Mom and I decided to eat at the much acclaimed Elvi's Kitchen.

Getting ready for Ernesto...
It was at this point that people on the island were getting serious about TS Ernesto. Allen, who worked at the front desk at Blue Tang, told us that if the TS was upgraded to a hurricane we would be evacuated to the main land. As it looked like the hurricane was definitely going to be upgraded we decided to go ahead to make the plans to evacuate the next morning. As the next day was my Mom's birthday and we did not know what the day held for us, we decided to have her birthday dinner at a much recommended restaurant on the island, Wild Mango's. The food did not disappoint. The atmosphere was perfect for a restaurant wide rendition of happy birthday. After which Mom declared she was now old and a woman at the next table informed her that 50 is the new 30. Duh. I then worked some magic and daughter pressured her into a tequila shot. Epic.
Evacuation day!

Re-usable boarding passes, what a concept
Getting felt up by an iguana
Tuesday morning we got up and were evacuated to the inland town of San Ignacio. We stayed at a sister hotel to the Blue Tang Inn (or the Blue Tang Clan as my Dad called it... Get it Wu Tang Clan? Common now!)  Since it was Mom's birthday and we were in Belize, we decide we could not just mope around the hotel all afternoon. So we visited an iguana preserve that we had heard about. It was pretty cool. We also chatted with another family who had done a jungle adventure and highly recommended it.  They gave us the card of the tour guide who had taken them and when we got up in the morning we decided it might be worth seeing if the guide was free.

Hey, you, over there. You have something in your hair!
Mom being a good sport with our guide
As it turns out, Orlando, the guide was free and agreed to pick us up in an hour. Our recommended packing list for the day was intriguing, a change of clothes, a towel, socks and no camera. After picking up a packed lunch in town, the three of us started our journey with an hour long car drive, mostly on dirt roads. At the end of our car ride we got out and were given bug spray and helmets. We took our socks and lunch but nothing else. Orlando led us to a path that led directly into the jungle. We hiked into the jungle for about 45 minuets, wadding (up to our waists)  across a river three times before we reached the entrance of the cave that had been our destination all along. We had a quick snack and bathroom break before we began the second part of our journey.

Pretty!
The second part of the trek began by swimming into the entrance of the cave with our head-light equipped helmets. The water was so deep at this point that I could not touch the bottom. For the next hour and a half we hiked, waded and climbed deeper and deeper into the cave. At some points we were up to our necks in water where as at other parts we had to hold our heads in a certain position just to make it through the tight spaces. The cave was so dark that head-lamps were necessary to move anywhere. About an hour and a half in, Orlando asked us to take our shoes off and we put on our socks that had been protected in his water tight bag. We continued to walk until we reached an area that was determined to be a location of Mayan human sacrifice. Orlando explained that over 1000 years ago the Mayan population was suffering from an extreme drought which led them to take some pretty extreme measures to get back in the good graces of their gods. They started with blood letting and eventually ended up sacrificing 14 members of their society. During our time there, we were shown 5 skeletons, 4 partial skeletons and one full skeleton, who they called the crystal maiden. The whole trip was really quite incredible. It is amazing that tourists are allowed to enter the cave at all. All of the artifacts are in their original locations and the only thing separating the artifacts from the tourists are small lines of tape that have been placed on the ground. The cave is called Actun Tunichil Muknal, in Mayan, translated it means Cave of the Crystal Sept. Another epic day.     
Drinks with the Binders, a little blurry, but proof is proof.

Since the hurricane had moved on, when we got up on Thursday we headed back to San Pedro. It was a relaxed day that ended with drinks with a family we were neighbors with in Alexandria who happened to be in San Pedro the same week as we were. Neither of us knew the other would be there until my Mom saw pictures they had posted on Facebook. Oh the magic of social networking.

Time to go diving!
Friday morning I got up early and went for a full day of scuba diving. After a two hour boat ride I dove the infamous Blue hole that was discovered by Jaque Coustaue. It is hard to explain what the blue hole looks like under the surface. But basically it is a huge underwater cave with stalactites bigger than a school bus. Oh and sharks. Visibility was not very good so it gives the sharks that much more of a scare factor. It was the deepest dive I have been on yet, ending around 130 feet down. The second dive of the day was equally as cool but a total 180 from the Blue hole dive. There were tons of fish and coral on the second dive. Along with more sharks, rays and turtles. Also on this dive there was more lion fish killing. But what made it more interesting than on my first day of dives was that we were followed by a barracuda that must have been 3 feet long, eating the lion fish as the dive leader killed them. Just when you think it had gone away, there it would be right underneath you... After the second dive, we stopped on a small island for lunch. The island is home to a Red Footed Booby Bird sanctuary. Pretty cool. The last dive of the day was at a place appropriately named the aquarium. I was less than impressed and getting pretty tired at this point when the leader of the dive took out a bag of left over rice and beans from lunch and shook it into the the water. Almost immediately our group of divers, myself included, were in the middle of a feeding frenzy. Though I do not know the type of fish they were, most were as big as my head and there must have been a couple hundred of them. This dive may have been my favorite. Once again a fantastic day. 
Island where we had lunch
Not sure why I was the only one who found this funny
You can just see the outline of the blue hole












 Saturday morning came too soon and Mom left to go back home. I had an extra night in San Pedro so I used it wisely and locked myself in the air conditioned room, made some shrimp for dinner and watched the beginning of Shark Week. I begrudgingly left the next day to head back to reality. Vacation is great, especially when you have an awesome Mom to share it with!



Prince Charming?
Yes, this happened...
   

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