Belize and Caye Caulker

We arrived in Belize on Monday, Nov. 23. We took a bus from Chetumal, Mexico to Belize City where we took a water taxi to Caye Caulker. Belize city was really busy with lots of loud music playing out of all the stores. On the bus ride, we met a couple from Vienna, Anna and Ferdinand, who were also going to Caye Caulker. We made friends and went out for breakfast with them before catching the water taxi. We ended up being best friends for the next 5 days.
The water taxi to Caye Caulker was about 45 minutes on a large covered speed boat (maybe 30 feet?). Caye Caulker was just awesome. It was so small the main mode of transportation was bicycle and golf cart. Even the police had a golf cart. We stayed in a cabana on stilts (not over the water though) and was pretty shabby but it was the cheapest place on the island. But oh the LOBSTER!!!!!!! so much lobster. Before tourism took off, the main source of income for the island was lobster fishing. The other seafood was amazing too. We got to eat baracuda, conch and ocean jack for the first time, and had our share of snapper and prawns too. We also lived on tuna (the canned kind) sandwiches to balance out the costs.
We took a all day snorkelling tour on a sail boat. We got to see our first southern sting ray, moray eel and nurse shark up close. A ray almost ate our camera when Ian was taking an underwater video. I also got to see my first sea turtle in the water. And there were so many types of fish, all sizes. It was amazing.
We finally left Caye Caulker today. We said we were going to leave a few days ago but couldn't bring ourselves to do it. We are now in a really small and remote village called Maya Centre. It's inland but it's the entrance to the Cockscombe Wildlife Reserve, also known as the Jaguar Reserve. We are camping the first night at a little place where the owner is a medicine woman and the founder of H'Men Herbal Centre. Tomorrow we will head up to the reserve and stay there for a few days hiking around. We really hope we get to see some Jaguar tracks, the cat itself is very elusive. But we've already seen a Kinkajou, which looks like a cross between a monkey and a cat, climbing through the trees by our tent. We also saw a toucan and a bunch of parrots.
It takes so long to upload pictures on to the blog, so maybe we'll have some time when we get into the city next week.
Now for out first jungle trek of our trip.

Resort to Tulum

We spent 4 nights at a crazy big 5 star resort in between Tulum and Playa Del Carmen. It was over the top. We had an awesome time chilling with my family and got to drink Tequila and swim in the Caribbean with my Mom, which has never happened before (and I hope to happen again). My cousin got married yesterday. It was a beautiful wedding and the bride was gorgeous. The men wore flip flops, awesome.
We´re back in Tulum now and we´ll have 2 more days before we head into Belize on Monday. I´m very excited about my first border crossing in central america.

More Tulum

So we´ve been in Tulum for 3 nights and it´s awesome. Yesterday we just spent the day on the beach and I got my first sunburn. No more major plans for the rest of our stay, just lots of relaxing on the beach.

I forgot to mention that the day we went to the ruins, we rented bikes and biked all over. The ruins were a little too far to walk, so we biked there. Then the town Tulum is about 3km from the beach, so we biked there to stock up on food and booze. We decided to get a taxi today to come to town, which is cheaper than both of us renting bikes.

They have been feeding us pretty good at our cabaña. It´s almost like we have our own private chef. He makes us an amazing seafood dinner evernight.

One day, we were at a little restaurant down the beach and we saw a large ray jump out of the water. It was amazing, I´ve never seen a ray in the wild before, never mind jumping out of the water. Very cool. We bought snorkelling gear to try and find him but no success. We did see some very cool fish though. Ian found a living conch shell, it was bright orange.

We are off to the resort Tuesday morning to party down with la familia. We´re looking forward to that, then I think it´s off to Belize!

Tulum Pics

Tulum

Tulum beach is gorgeous. White sand and palm trees. We are staying at a place called Tribal Village, in a cabaña right on the beach and I think we are the only ones renting a place in this area. We have a tiny private beach and there is a restaurant just a 10 min walk down the beach. Our cabaña has big windows facing north east, so we can see the sun rise from our bed. Sorry no pictures this time, we didnt bring the gear to upload into town with us. We will put up a bunch of pics later.
We went to the ruins today. They are stunning against the backdrop of the carribean sea. They werent as big or spectacular as Chichen Itza, but they hold a mystic of their own.
There is actually some swell here, Ian and I wish we had surfboards cause we can see some decent sized waves breaking on a outer reef. So far we have contented ourselves with body surfing the shore pound. We want to come back again, maybe October, with boards and tear it up. Cowabunga!
We bought masks and snorkels today so we are off to check out some fishes now.

Chichen Itza and Piste

Piste is the town that´s right next to Chichen Itza, it´s about 1-2 Km down the road. We arrived in Piste yesterday at around noon and went for an excellent BBQ chicken (pollo asadas el carbon) lunch. We´re staying at the Piramide Inn which has camping and a pool. Bonus! So we´ve finally got out our tent. We got up early today and walked to Chichen Itza. We made it before the crowds. What an amizing place. But unlike Uxmal, you can´t climb on any of the ruins. But after seeing how busy it gets a little later on in the day, I can only imaging what kind of erosion that much foot traffic would cause. We hired a private tour guide, a local Mayan. His second language was spanish and third English. He tought us some Mayan words, like Chichen Itza means Mouth (chi) Well (chen) and Itza was the name of the prominent family that lived there. We spent about 2 1/2 hours wandering around the place, it was huge. Then we wandered on home and I had another swim, Oh so nice.

Our bus for Tulum leaves at 8:10am tomorrow morning, so it´s up early to pack up. We´re both really looking forward to seeing the beach and yes, more ruins (on the beach).

More Pyramids

Uxmal and Kabah

We took our first trip to see Mayan ruins today. We went on a tour with 10 other people. We went to Uxmal (pronounced Ooshmal) first. The site was huge with a giant temple at the entrance. The ruins were between 1000-2000 years old. We climbed to the top of another pyramid and drank in the view (the stairs were very steep!). We had lunch at a nice restaurant then went to Kabah, which was smaller but no less amazing. Both temples featured the Mayan Rain God, Chaac-Mool, also just known as Chaac. The pyramids were in alignment with Venus, and the equinoxes and soltices. For example, one pyramid had the sun run through it at 45 degree angles at both the winter and summer solstices. The Mayans were an advanced cuture. A very successful (and sweaty) first day in the jungle-clad ruins.

The streets here get blocked off around the Grand Plaza for a market that assaults the senses of sight sound and smells, mmmmmm epanadas!!!!

street in Merida

Merida

We made it to Merida and we are staying at Hotel Trinidad, a cute, cozy Bed and Breakfast/Hostel right downtown. It´s been raining on and off but we´ve had a few good days so far. We walked all over town and visited the Museum of Anthropology. We saw Maya skulls with Jade encrusted teeth and modified skulls. There were also Mayan art and reliefs. Merida is a beautiful Colonial city, with 16th and 17th century architecture and churches (churches built from demolisted Mayan temples). Last night and today the streets are blocked off around La Plaza Grande for a fiesta and market. We indulged in some Margaritas and Pina Coladas last night. Ian also had the best burrito he's ever tasted from one of the street vendors, with shredded chicken, vegetables and mole and green sauces. Yum. We´ve also been living off of Avocado and Tomato Sandwiches. We´re off to see some ruins tomorrow at Uxmal (pronounced Ooshmal) and Kebah. The tuesday we´re taking a bus to Piste, which is a little town about 2 Km from Chitchen Itza. We´re planning on staying there 2 nights and seeing the ruins. Then we´ll head to Tulum and chill at the beach (finally!) until we meet the family at the resort. The weather is starting to clear up, it rains during the night with the occasional afternoon shower. But it´s hot hot hot!

Cancun

We arrived in Cancun last night at about 6:30. It was dark (sun sets here at 5pm). The shuttle to our cheap hotel took us along the strip, so we got to see all the ginormous resorts. That was crazy. We woke up this morning to a tropical storm, wind howling and raining like crazy. It´s lightened up a bit now. We´ve booked our tickets to Merida today, our bus leaves at 10am. We´re 2 hours ahead down here. We´re off to find breakfast now.

Bon Voyage

We are all packed and ready to go. We moved out of our place in Nanaimo and did the last trip to the storage locker on Oct. 31. We've said our goodbyes to our beautiful island and are chillin in Richmond now. Our flight leaves at 7:40am tomorrow, so we'll have to be up at 4am, if we're even able to sleep. Ian and I are getting really excited and freaking out quite a bit. This is the longest trip either of us have ever been on. We'll be going from Cancun to Panama City.
We're just doing our last minute load of laundry then we're going to relax for the rest of the evening.
We're hoping to post a note at least once a week, even if it's just to say we're still alive. We'll definitly post a note when we get to Cancun.
Adios! Via Con Queso!