Tuesday morning (yesterday) Annie and I woke up to more rain-odd how I never get tired of falling asleep and waking up to the sound of rain!-and got our things together to leave Caye Caulker for San Pedro/Ambergris Caye on the 11:15am water taxi. As a recovering teacher, I have a tendency of waking up annoyingly early, so I was actually up at 6 and then again at 7, so I journaled for awhile and got to know Mia, Krissy and Kylie, the three unbelievably cute daughters of a couple who were related to the proprietors of Daisy's Hotel and who lived in the room next to us. I'm not quite sure what the mother of these three did all day other than take care of her daughters, but her husband seemed to be the hotel handy man. I met the girls and their mother on the veranda of the hotel (the only place we could get wifi- we obviously spent a fair amount of time there, wandering around trying to pick up the sparse internet) waiting for someone to pick Mia up to go to her first day of first grade final exams- did she look forlorn! She definitely did not want to spend the day in school, although her mother said she normally enjoys it. Mia did not say a word to me, but just nodded or shook her head and smiled shyly at me. Apparently she opens up after she knows people, so I told her she reminded me of myself a little bit, especially as the oldest of three girls! Mia's little sister, Krissy, who is in kindergarten, was a lot more talkative, and I hung out with her and little little Kylie, who really didn't speak much yet, after Mia left. It's pretty hard to understand a little person who has no concept of the difference between regular English and Creole! At one point, I asked her if Krissy if she had eaten yet, and she responded,"Nooo- my mama's makin' lahbstah! Ya lak lahbstah?" tp which I obviously said yes. She informed Annie and me later on that her "mama was makin' lahbstah on de what stoff,"- the white stove :) So cute! I took some pictures of her that I'll try to add at some point. After some delicious meat pies from a guy on a bike that rode by (don't worry, Mom, they were fresh outta the oven, and our travel nurse said we could eat street food if it was still hot :) we made our way to the water taxi pier. The water taxi was about half an hour late- island time, ya know- but it got us successfully over to the town of San Pedro on the island of Ambergris Caye.
Ambergris Caye is the most popular destination in probably most of Belize (in fact, all of my parents Belizean timeshare trades are in San Pedro on Ambergris). As soon as we stepped off the water taxi (under sunny skies!), we could see why- it has a lot more vibrancy than Caye Caulker. Caye Caulker's residents, apparently, want it to stay very low key and calm, and the residents of San Pedro would call that boring. San Pedro is full of restaurants and bars and golf cart taxis and tourist shops. However, the one post office is already closed tonight so I wasn't able to get stamps :( San Pedro is not thaaat big in the end! But it sure has its fair share of forward cat-calling men- we've heard everything from "Aay gorgeous!" to "Sexy ladies!" to "Aay pritty gals!" to "The deals are better the more beautiful you are!" to "Prettier than Baywatch!" to "Ouch ouch!" to kissy noises to a man walking in front of us calling out "Mangoes! Hot bodies!" We just smile at the ground or say thank you and keep walking. Anyway, we were welcomed to San Pedro by a sting ray under the dock, which was still special even if we swam with them in Shark Ray Alley! We ignored the golf cart taxis in favor of walking the short distance to Ruby's Hotel, which is right on the beach and basically in the heart of San Pedro. It's really more like a backpacker's hostel, not too different from Daisy's, and outfitted with wifi. We spoke for a bit with a middle-aged Canadian man named Andy who had decided to reject the retire-at-65 norm and instead live out his life traveling and attempting to live off of investments. He also decided to forgo marriage and kids and living near friends, so I don't think I'm too interested in his lifestyle, but I do enjoy hearing life philosophies that involve enjoying life rather than working working working. He informed us that Ramon's Village, which is about 100 yards up the beach, clears out the seagrass from the water at their beach and, since it's all public beaches, we could swim there for free without the bother of seagrass.
Before our swim, we searched for food. Since it took awhile for my discerning self to decide on a satisfactory place to eat, we got some fresh smoothies- watermelon for Annie and banana for me- to sustain us. We ended up eating our first fry jack (a delicious puffy fried tortilla with some combination of beans and cheese and chicken or whatever else folded inside of it) and some tostadas from a little stand. At this stand, Letty's, we sat for a bit with Elliot, a middle aged Belizean of African descent who told us he was a millionaire for a living and asked to kiss our noses for luck. I responded with a very firm no, and Annie did likewise. I am all about learning about a person, but I am not down for any type of touching other than handshakes. That was strange. But the food was awesome and he made some good recommendations. I'll remember him as a true character. On our way back to Ruby's we stopped at a place for some weak but tastey two-for-one Rum Punches- the Cayes' typical alcoholic drink. We sat on the beach between two diving company piers with a couple from Washington D.C.- one was a marine biologist-turned-chiropractor and the other was a Peace Corps member-turned-documentary film maker who spent 13 years with National Geographic and now has a contract with Discovery. We really enjoyed talking to the couple, John and Carrie, who were here for not for the first time to dive the renowned waters. It turns out that Carrie was in the Peace Corps in Guinea, where my 6th graders had pen pals all year! I love coincidences like that. We discussed last names of people there- she recognized Banghoura and Camara from near her placement region- and she described life and work there, as well as her fascinating take on how documentary filming has changed over her career, which has taken her all over the world. She even got to interview Jane Goodall in Tanzania! John and Carrie suggested we try Warugama for dinner and really encouraged us to go to Ak'bol Yoga Retreat Center for 9am yoga and the best breakfast on the island.
And so, after a swim and some internet cafe time, we tried out Warugama, which was absolutely delicious! When you walk up to a place and 1) all the tables are full, 2) it's a hole in the wall with no decorations or pretenses, and 3) they're outside handmaking every type of pupusa imagineable, it's probably going to be good. We ordered lobster pupusas, shrimp pupusas and bean and cheese pupusas- all were good, and lobster was divine. We washed that down with a Rum Punch each (better and stronger than the earlier ones), followed by a Belize Breeze (a few different types of rum and blue curacao and maybe other stuff) for me and a Dirty Banana (Kahlua, lots of vodka, Bailey's, and chocolate and stuff and obviously banana) for Annie. Aside from the overly chatty waiters (we enjoyed it at first but then got a little annoyed after one of them had us watch videos on his camera, but hey two young girls by themselves I guess invites some of that), we loved Warugama. The waiters wanted us to go to a bar with live music, but we declined and went home to go to bed so we could do our 9am yoga at Ak'bol!
Well, the sunny skies held up during the day, but the night skies opened up and we were again serenaded to sleep and awakened by the falling rain. We decided to rent bikes to get to Ak'bol, which is over on the other side of the island over the bridge near the resorts. We got ready while it was still pouring, and we decided to be determined young ladies and to brave the rain for the 2 mile bike ride. We were somehow blessed with sunny skies ALL DAY LONG! We had a beautiful early morning bike ride through town and down along the beach (there's a beach bike path of packed sand that is suggested rather than the road on the other side of the bridge because recent harsh weather has torn up the main road) to Ak'bol. At Ak'bol we had a little scare when Annie realized she didn't have her debit card (and mine was compromised and shut off the day before we left the US) and I didn't think I had my pay power card and we didn't have enough cash to pay for yoga, let alone breakfast afterward. Luckily, I am a smarty and packed my pay power card with my passport in my travel pack at the outset of the trip, so after beating myself up for a second, I checked the pack and found it. Kirsten, our American yoga instructor, led us in one of the best yoga classes of my life at the end of the pier under a thatched roof over turquoise waters. Although we have been on the beach and snorkeled and all of that, I had not felt in touch with nature until we did that yoga class. The sea breeze on your skin and the lapping of waves in your ears really pushes you to complete relaxation and peacefulness. We followed our yoga class with a ridiculously yummy fry jack with beans and cheese, coconut french toast, and horchata while we discussed travel with the Mr. Thompson, the retired UBS-Payne Weber guy that sat next to us with his Fox Terrier, Axel. It was so ideal! After Ak'bol, we rode bikes further north and checked out the view of the resorts from the beach- we could definitely come back here, we thought. Mom, Dad, check out the timeshare exchanges! We made it back to Joe's Bike Rental two sweaty messes and went and chilled out at our hotel and in the water at Ramon's, where we played with 5-year old Emilio (the son of a Mayan couple selling necklaces on the beach)- soooo cute!
Since then, we've showered and bought some souvenirs and now we're here, at the second overpriced Belizean internet cafe we've visited, drinking Belizean beer and updating the important people in our lives about what life is like on the Cayes of Belize! We'll pack up our bags in preparation for our 6am departure from the Cayes back to Belize City to catch our flight to Guatemala City tomorrow, then we'll head next door to Wild Mango's for dinner- we've gotten a couple of recommendations. We'll be spending tomorrow night in Antigua en route to Pachaj, where we will attend Spanish language school for 4 or 5 days at the Chico Mendez Project where our little sister, Becky, studied a couple of years ago. I am not sure of the internet situation in the upcoming days, but I will be journaling if I cannot blog, and then I will post those journal entries if need be. We're off to the next country- adios, Belize; hola, Guate!
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