Belize - Day 1

Crossing the border alone and boy am I an idiot. I’m pretty sure I filled out the customs paper work wrong. They probably think I am exporting native vegetation and importing American made methamphetamine. I’m not even sure what to write on the entrance paperwork under the line ‘intended address of visitation’ … Um… Something about Glover’s Reef, some other cities along the way? All I want to say is “I have no idea” but I don’t think that would go over well. The downfall of someone else planning your vacation… I haven’t the slightest idea what I’m doing or where I am going. I fear these first hours render me a failed traveler. I don’t even have the slightest idea how to make an international call home to tell people I am not dead. Ah well, leave my family in suspense for a week.

Day 1

Best airport experience of my life. Enter MSP International. Not a sole at the counters. Not an employee at the security gate. EMPTY. The place is deserted aside from a single file line taking shape in the middle of the spanning hallway. I trust the herd mentality and hope this is going to take me where I need to be. My plane is one of the first to leave the tarmac on this day. Both of my flights were empty. I got a stretching 3 seats to sprawl out on, I got two blankets to snuggle up with, and two bags of peanuts to thoroughly parch my mouth. Hardly a half an hour between flights. Best flight ever! Thanks Delta.

The airport arrival was something else entirely. The travel itinerary was very vague about pick-up. I head outside and hope to see someone standing there with my name in front of their chest. I don’t see it. I don’t see it for a while. In fact, I never see it. For a split second, I almost believed the cabbies that would tell me Island Expedition (yeah, it was a good 20 minutes before I realized it wasn’t an REI company leading the travel) would never pick me up on a Sunday. I thought better of it and stuck it out. Plus, I had no idea where I would even have a cab bring me. I knew the first night was supposed to be by some zoo, or something??

After a bit of waiting, I was found by Anatashio and was whisked away in a sort of official looking van. I was happy not to be the vacations getting piled into the dented caddy with company names spray painted on the side. I spent a few hours waiting at a hotel near the airport until the other travelers arrived. Then it was off to the Tropical Education Center, owned by the Belize Zoo, the sleeping quarters were built by Island Expedition and regularly house researchers, students, and eco-interested travelers.

Rattling of role call and assigning bunk mates. I was paired with twenty-something Heather in cabin 7, but Heather has already formed an earlier alliance and opted to continue their budding relationship. So I became the 13th of 12. The odd man out and the single living lady. Was I sad to miss out on pillow talk? Maybe. I enter my forest cabana complete with tiny porch to find a double bed. I thought, was this the cabin I was supposed to be sharing? I would have had to sleep in the same bed with the people whose names I can’t remember? I find out later that there were double occupancy cabins with two single beds. Here I get to sleep like a queen with two pillows, drape myself in two towels and make myself squeaky clean with two tiny soaps.

Dinner was meager for a vegetarian. I already ate potato salad just for the helping of veggies and egg within. I hate potato salad. Off to a nocturnal visit of the Belize Zoo. I didn’t take a single picture because I was overwhelmed by every other flash and the flood of Petzl headlamps at their highest setting. May as well have been set to strobe.

The zookeeper brings us up some stairs to a wooden deck nestled between two banks of trees. He tells us to look up and then performed his best impression of the Howler Monkey call. As the branches all around us started to shake, I was sure something prehistoric was about to emerge from the canopy. That sound made me bet that T-Rex was about to show and I was the unlucky one who’d get eaten off the toilet. The sound of Howler Monkeys is like freight train meets lion meets the torture device in the Princess Bride. All this sound coming from your average sized, unassuming monkey. Had I heard that sound alone in the woods I would have shit my pants and run the other way. I wish I had someone with me to hear that noise. I would be talking about it for the rest of my life.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=REPoVfN-Ij4

I like this moment to myself in my forest cabana. I’ve stumbled through the day not knowing what to think. Too much to take in. Too touristy? Too peopley? Too planned? Too unreal? Too early to tell. For now, sleep. Can’t wait for the 5:30am bird awakening.


PS Now I know why cashews are so expensive. I have seen a cashew fruit. Yes, fruit! It’s one of the few fruits that the seed grows outside of its body. It has a bright, acidic plum-like fruit and a single nut sits atop. I can imagine the harvesting process. To pick each handful and remove the nut from its body. The fruit itself is rarely used … Cashew wine, not so good.




Speed bumps are sleeping policemen.