Pat & Aaron’s 10 year anniversary trip to Belize Part 2

: upstream shot of our river entry point

Looking downriver from our entry point

: Aaron starting her float….Zeph is up ahead of her

The jungle was pretty thick in some places

Aaron floating

Some of the dense jungle on the river banks

more river bank shots

more Aaron floating

After we exited the river tubing we headed straight for the waterfalls and rock sliding opportunity. We left our tubes in the middle of the jungle and started to hike through some pretty tough jungle trails to get to the waterfalls and rocks that you can slide down. We were pretty jacked to give this a shot.

After a 10 minute hike we came to the first waterfall. Below is a pic of it.

The first waterfall. About 25 ft tall.

We jumped in and swam up underneath the waterfall itself. Very refreshing but kind of dangerous as the water coming down has a ton of force behind it. The deepest part of the pool was probably 10 feet deep.

From here its pretty common to hike the same trail we came in on and head back out. But our guide gave us the option to hike the waterfalls and stream downstream to another trail. Ya, we didnt hesitate to take that route ;). Here’s a shot of him starting his slide.

Zeph asked if we wanted to try sliding down as there is moss on the rocks and it creates a natural slide. We said sure lets give it a shot. So he sat down and showed us how to do it. As he was going down and literally bouncing off walls we got a little nervous. He looked like a pinball inside an angry pinball machine……i couldnt stop thinking about how bad it must hurt to bounce off those rocks. We couldnt chicken out now so we gave it a go. I went first and I was right….it hurt lol. Aaron went next and ya it hurt for her too

The first "slide" that we attempted. Zeph is getting ready to slide down

Here are a few shots of the stream and areas we hiked down. Some of it was pretty intense having to jump into a pool from a waterfall but having to jump in a certain spot, etc…. It was an incredible experience.

this is a shot from the trail in of one of the sections we hiked down in the stream. It was slippery :)

some more stream shots. We hiked right down the middle of all this.

After 40 minutes of negotiating the slippery wonderfulness we had explored we came to our exit point. I have to say I was bummed as I love this type of stuff, but at the same time it was good to see the exit as Aaron had Teva’s on and they had no traction at all. I was a bit worried for her safety but God guided and took care of us.

A shot from the trail back on the exit point of the stream

The trail out from the stream back to the jungle...as you can tell not many people walk on this trail

On the way out Zeph took us by a plane wreck that happened back in 1982….all 3 survived the crash forunately.

Plane wreck of 3 jaguar researchers/scientist people. All 3 survived

Another angle on the plane wreck

Day 5 - Heading to Thatch Caye Resort, a private 13 acre island of paradise!!

The morning of day 5 came quickly. I started it out fishing as usual on the beach. Caught another snapper and some more wonderful sunrise shots.

another wonderful sunrise

sunrise in Belize

Spike...sad to see us leave

We loaded up in the van with no air conditioning and headed to the Placencia airport to catch a quick flight to Dangriga. We arrived at Dangriga and were met by Travis, the owner of the island. Our first impression of Travis was a very good one. He was very friendly, happy, and made us really feel comfortable, unlike the previous resort owner.

We loaded in his newer van and drove to a private gated lagoon. At the lagoon we loaded into a nice boat and headed out of the lagoon. Here’s a shot of the boat ride out of the lagoon.

Lagoon ride

From the lagoon we had about a 20 minute boat ride on fairly calm ocean….which was good for me since I am a little sally when it comes to the ocean, boat rides, and leaving my lunch in the water during the rides. Approaching the island got us all giggly as it was such an incredible site!!

approaching the island

The Marina on the island

A distant picture of the main beach on the islandThe Marina entrance

the green/blue water....aw I miss it

This is the entrance to the restaurant, bar, etc...

inside of the main cabana, this is the center kiosk area

This is what you see when you walk straight in. To the left is the bar, straight ahead is the breakfast/lunch eating area, and to the right is a hallway leading to the private dining area. Seating areas are along all the walls. It was beautiful, everything made of local woods and hand crafted by locals.

This is the bar

breakfast/lunch area

Breakfast area looking out into main area

one of the side seating areas

Center island inside bar/restaurant

Computer we used to keep in touch....aaron at the computer

After we met Balin (the bartender/hospitality director), he took us to our own casita.

coming up to our casita

Casita steps leading to front door

this is the morning "nook" that you could sit on....if our luggage wasnt on it This is directly to the right as you walk in the Casita

as you enter the Casita this is the far wall. The wood door is to the outside stairs that lead to the roof top hammocks

This is our king size bed...its directly to the left as you walk in the room. It had a oscillating fan on each side of the bed and an overhead fan if needed.

This is our king size bed...its directly to the left as you walk in the room. It had an oscillating fan on each side of the bed and an overhead fan if needed.

looking back at the entrance door to the casita

I am certain that I will not be able to even begin to explain the wonderful Mayan breeze flowing through the open and airy main floor of the casita, the incredible smells of the ocean, the sounds of the island, or the breath taking views, but believe me when I say we had to lift our jaws off the floor before we headed out the door to the long anticipated roof top hammocks.

These are the two rooftop hammocks on top of our Casita. Directly behind them are the stairs you take leading back down to the main level of the Casita

This is looking east from our roof top.

This is a trail on the island. They all look like this, beautifully maintained and surrounded by lush foliage.

boardwalk that ran along the west side of the island. In the distance you see the dock with two palapas, each with a hammock and our casita in the distance

closer view of that dock.....beautiful place to relax and to swim...our casita overlooks this side of the island

close up on one of those palapas...i love this picture!

sting ray we saw below the dock on opposite side of island, school of sardines swimming over it

Pat's first attempt at fishing on the island (same dock we saw the sting ray under)

another view of Pat fishing

This is looking directly south from our roof. This is our neighboring casita.....that was unoccupied the entire trip :)

a sunset rooftop picture as best as we could do by resting the camera on the ledge The roof was quite simply one of the most magnificent places we could hang out at.

beautiful sunset from our rooftop

The second day Pat went fishing in the morning with the resident boat captain while Aaron relaxed on the docks and listened to music. Later in the afternoon we took the boat out again to do some snorkeling. Pat actually got to do some spear fishing while Aaron snorkeled. He got quite a few fish and had a blast doing it!! Except for the time he saw the nurse shark right by where he was trying to spear a fish!! Yikes! There are actually quite a few critters on the island (coata mundi, racoon, monkey, lizards, crabs and other things I can’t remember the names of.

Resident raccoon, she is only chained up because she gets into peoples things :)....she is totally tame (like a house cat)

Wild pig that is fenced into a pen...the raccoons and coata mundi can get in to play with it, but it can't get out

Coata mundi..there were a lot of these and they just walk all over the place and play in the trees..very cute (although they did tease the raccoon that couldn't get off it's leash :)

This monkey was tied up when we saw it (thank goodness!), because we were advised to run the other way if it came at us as it is apparently mean and would try to beat us up!

Little lizard peeking up through the crack..cute how it has it's hand resting on the dock...

Some kind of bird (obviously :).. I just don't know what kind. It let us get within a foot of it before it flew off.

This is a "water duck". It let us get within a foot of it before it "pooed" and flew off.

Pat relaxing in the hammock

Aaron relaxing in the hammock

Pat enjoying the view from our rooftop

on our rooftop

On the last full day there we went scuba diving. What an amazing time! We saw a sea turtle, many colorful reef fish, corals and sponges, a nurse shark, barracuda and a school of dolphins swam right above us (which is apparently rare)! Pat also did some fishing and caught a rather large barracuda and a bonito (small type of tuna). Then we wandered around the island taking pictures of the areas we hadn’t seen yet. Much of the southern part of the island is kind of undeveloped with nothing much more than paths to walk along….beautiful though.

Aramais (our boat captain's assistant) trying to catch some bait for fishing (little sardines)

South Water Caye. In the distance you can see waves breaking..that is the reef. This is where we snorkeled and went diving.

Pat fishing after we got done diving

This is the barracuda being reeled in

Pat and Chico (the boat captain/divemaster/fishing guide) and the barracuda

barracuda's nasty mouth

bonito fish

This is the north end of the island...that is a mangrove plant...they are all over in belize and many of the island are made completely of mangroves.

This is the dock at the north end of the island, you can see the neighboring island (coco plum)

Us on the dock at the north end

Our feet in the sand (Aaron wanted to take this picture :)

going towards the south end of the island the vegetation is much lower, less dense and the cabana's are off to the right

this is one of the cabanas...they are right on the water with a dock out to them, cute.. but much smaller than the casitas

: neat little thatch umbrella just off by itself

: never really expected to see bunnies on a tropical island, but they were all over

looking down the path toward the south end of the island, all the white ground on the left is actually shells (crushed and whole), there are tons!

another neat umbrella down at the south end of the island, really unused beach area

sailboat we saw from the island

enjoying the beautiful evening, our last on the island

As our 10th anniversary trip comes to a close, we thank the Lord for the amazing time He allowed us to spend together.

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 8th, 2009 at 6:06 pm and is filed under Belize 2008. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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Pat & Aaron’s 10 year anniversary trip to Belize Part 2

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