Day 8 - Dec 13, 2018 Caye Caulker, Belize

Today is our final day on Caye Caulker and it's a land day.  After breakfast and packing up, we borrowed the bicycles from our hotel and rode all round the caye.  This island is perfect to be explored on bike.  There is not much traffic and the landscape is flat.

Caye Caulker is not big.  The main town is on a long narrow strip of land on the North side.  As we went South, the area turned more residential and less commercial.  There was even an elementary school.  The municipal airport is where the town stopped.  Below that, the trail went past many nice mansions and big properties.  We stopped to chat with an owner who put his 9 acres property up for sale.  He was born a Canadian but now lives in Belize.  He has a huge house and has now retired after successful business ventures.  On the way back, we found one nice looking hotel Colinda Cabana with several ocean facing cabins.  Out of curiosity, I asked about their price and the owner actually showed us the cabin.  It was a complete self contained one bedroom unit with full kitchen and living facing the ocean.  The rent is only $129 USD per day.  It was at least three times the size of our small hotel room and cheaper.  We will definitely stay there if we ever come back.

We went back to the seahorse place but unfortunately we did not see any this time.  There was a small barracuda trying to ambush its prey near the shore.  The 1:30p ferry back to Belize City was almost full and after we checked into the Radisson hotel, we found that we were upgraded again to the same suite as two days ago.  Afterward, we checked out the biggest department store, Brodie, in downtown and bought some famous local hot sauce to bring home.

Postcard Belize

Riding bicycle is a perfect way to explore Caye Caulker

Another day in the paradise!

These For Sale signs are real.  9 acres for $900,000 USD

With such great scenery, who wouldn't go "psy-quatic"?

One of the nicer accommodations on the caye

Caye Caulker's airport is in operation again

Time to say goodbye to Caye Caulker.  Taking ferry back to Belize City

Waiting to buy submarine sandwich inside Belize's largest department store

Day 7 - Dec 12, 2018 Caye Caulker, Belize

We finally had a warm Belize day today!  The cold front had passed and temperature climbed back to 28C and sunny.  We had our breakfast on the hotel terrace overlooking the Split (the artificial beach) before joining our full day snorkeling and spear fishing tour.

View from our breakfast terrace

Idyllic Belize

On Caye Caulker, beer and flip-flops rule.  The official motto here: "Go Slow"

We have 7 people in our group and the captain is Breeze who is a really nice fellow.  He has families still in US and mainland Belize.  He loves fishing and it shows.  He took us to three spots to snorkel and spear fish at the same time.  It's quite exciting since we never spear fish before.  Loading the gun is quite an effort.  Also the fish are all very smart and hide inside the caves and crevices so you don't have a clear shot.  There is also the problem of finding the right fish to spear.  All parrot fish and angle fish are protected.  So it is tricky to find the right fish that is close enough to shoot.  I managed to shoot one flounder but Yiling missed several big targets.  I was surprised at how aggressive my wife was.  I probably shot two times in total but she shot over 20 times!   One couple shot a crab and the three Danes shot the wrong type of fish.  At the end, I gave up on shooting and just admire the aquarium like setting with all the colorful tropical reef fish on display.  Schools of "dory" fish (blue tangs) kept swimming around us and we saw several nurse sharks and rays (without using food to attract them to come).  I even saw several small cuttle fish!  All in all, a very satisfying but tiring day!

Captain Breeze in his shop

Safety first - instructions on how to use a spear gun

Ready to shoot!

The water is amazingly clear and colorful fish are everywhere

Because Captain Breeze promised us dinner even if we didn't catch any, he was also busy catching fish while we were snorkeling.  Thankfully, he had much better success than all of us so our dinner was secure.  My flounder was surprising bony, unlike our pacific sole.  After our fish dinner, we went back to Willy to have a lobster dinner also because he is famous for lobster.  We were surprised to find Willy completely full but we were lucky to get a seat next to two brothers from Washington State.  One brother now worked in Alaska processing fish.  The other brother worked in La Conner doing commercial construction.  We made a mental note to visit the one in Alaska next time we are in Sitka as his Community Based Fishing Co-operative sounds interesting.

After our second dinner, we walked to the convenience store to buy two more beers and started chatting with the Chinese owner.  We found out there were 13 convenience stores on this caye and all are run by Chinese from Toi-Shan.  It's not a life for everybody as this family works from 7a to 11p everyday!  Fortunately, the business seemed to be doing well.

I wish I have shot all these fish!

All in a day of work

Dinner feast enjoying our (captain's) catch

Day 6 - Dec 11, 2018 Caye Caulker, Belize

Belize is one of the few countries that still recognize Taiwan as a separate country outside of China.  Apparently, Taiwan is giving Belize tens of millions of foreign aid every year.  We drove by a technical training center run by Taiwan on our way to Western Belize a few days ago.  Today right in downtown next to the Taiwan embassy, we saw a Taiwan Street!

Taiwan Street in Belize!  Btw, most grocery stores are owned by Taiwanese or Chinese

The final leg of our trip started today.  After a full breakfast buffet at Radisson, we left our big luggage at the hotel and walked to the ferry terminal few blocks away with just two backpacks.  These ferries were similar to the ones we took in Galapagos.  The journey to Caye Caulker is only 45 mins.  The boat then would continue to San Pedro on the much bigger Ambergris Caye.  Caye Caulker is quieter and more relaxed than Ambergris Caye.  There was no paved road, just one dusty main street going North and South.  Locals used golf carts as cars.  Caye Caulker does not have good natural beach so swimming is not the best.  The only "beach" they had are artificial beach at the tip of the caye.  The main attraction here is snorkeling or diving.  Our "high end" hotel was disappointing.  The rooms are so small they can compete with Japanese hotels!

Speed boat ferry to Caye Caulker and Ambergris Caye

Caye Caulker

Everyone has a jetty due to the shallow water.  In fact, from the shore to the barrier reef, water is not deeper than 10 ft 

Here in Caye Caulker, police car is a golf cart!

Artificial beach!  No need to worry about beach erosion!

We booked a half-day snorkeling tour for the afternoon.  This tour took us to the barrier reef just outside the shore.  We followed Andrew our tour leader in the water as he tried to tell us all the names of the fish we encountered.  Next, we went to a spot where lots of nurse sharks and stingrays would gather around the boat.  These animals now had expectation of food hand out when they heard the boat motor.  Even though I had reservation about feeding wildlife, it was still amazing to see all these magnificent creatures so close up.  Yiling is fearless as she did not hesitate to touch the sharks!  We did free snorkeling afterward before being fed some fruits/water.  They also brought us to see big tarpon fish and sea horses on the other side of the caye as bonus items.  Teasing the tarpons with tiny sardines was loads of fun as we watched in awe how high these fish could jump to get the food from your hand.  Our dinner tonight was also memorable.  We went to this highly recommended place to eat but there was no server!  We sat wherever and grabbed ourselves beers from a cooler at the back.  Then the chef came out and told us what he DIDN'T have tonight.  Basically, he was trying to tell us he only had two items for tonight's dinner: curry fish or conch.  We ordered one each and the food was delicious and the price was very reasonable.  Maurice the chef only cooked what he could source that day.  Some regular customers there told us that they never had one repeat dish from Maurice in the five days they ate there!

Leaving for snorkeling tour

Nurse sharks and stingrays gather to feast

Shark Whisperer!

Gigantic Tarpons!  These fish are super aggressive and highly prized as great fighting fish for fishermen

Day 5 - Dec 10, 2018 Belize City, Belize

The humidity in the mountain was super high.  Everything felt damp.  On top, it rained very hard last night.  The resulting cool temperatures really soothed our sleep though.  We woke up at 6 am and quickly got ready to go outside to do more bird watching.  Although we have seen many beautiful birds on this trip so far, one bird still eluded us - the keel-billed toucan which is also the national bird of Belize.  Just as we entered the bird watching deck in the restaurant, we were told the bird watching guide had sighted a keel-billed toucan with a scope!  We looked carefully and there it was, a beautiful keel-billed toucan standing on a barren tree up on top of the mountain across the river.  There were actually two toucans standing there, one on each side of the tree.  What an awesome sight to spot both of them calling out to each other!  This is the first time we saw keel-billed toucans in the wild.  Then, after breakfast and packing, just as we were ready to depart, there was another commotion and excitement because the staff had spotted a red capped manakin in the garden.  This bird is so striking with its red head.

Birdwatching

Keel-billed Toucan in the wild!

Close up in the zoo

Red-capped Manakin

Close up look if my camera is as big as others

We drove to our next stop at the Belize Zoo.  This is a well-run zoo.  Only animals that can be found in Belize and its surroundings are exhibited to encourage conservation.  Many of the animals were either orphans, injured/rescued, or born in captivity.  From the zoo, we drove to Belize City to return our rental car and checked into Radisson Fort George Hotel.  We were told Belize City is not safe to walk after dark so we did our walk about first and returned to the hotel restaurant for dinner.  As expected, we got upgraded to an ocean view suite.  This hotel is quite historic and is considered the best hotel in the city.  It's 70 years old and survived the great hurricane Hattie back in 1961.  We found the tourist zone where our hotel was located was quite deserted.  It looked like this area only comes to life when cruise ship calls to port.  The walk around the waterfront is very scenic, especially with the sunset.

Our hotel Radisson Fort George Hotel and Marina

View from our suite

Clock Tower

Free Postcard!

Belize City Waterfront

Waterfront view of Belize City

Sunset at Lighthouse Fort George

Sunset at Lighthouse Fort George

Sunset at Belize City

Romantic Belize!