Splunking, Mayan Ruins and Rope Swings!

HAPPY EARTH DAY EVERYONE!!

This week we went back inland for the trip with our group to the mainland. It was a very different week than the week with the high school, but exciting none the less. We left Saturday morning and went back to Belize City where we returned to the Belize Zoo. That night, we stayed at the Zoo’s lodge which reminded me of a summer camp. The nine girls in my room even stayed up late that night playing cards! We had dinner and breakfast the next morning there and then headed to the ATM tour.

Cave Entrance

The ATM is a cave system in Belize. Belize has some of the largest cave systems in the world, and the tour proved to be much more than I expected. I’ve been on cave tours in other countries before where they take you into one large cave, however, the ATM was very different. At the beginning of the tour you are given a very attractive helmet and headlamp and asked to swim in water over your head to the inside of the cave. The first part of the cave had some tight places to go through and some deeper water. Most of the cave had ankle deep water, however, toward the end of the tour the cave opened up into large caverns full of stalactites, stalagmites, and different types of rock formations! The tour was definitely an Earth Science teachers’ dream!

             In addition to the formations, the cave is home to so ancient Mayan artifacts, from where they had used the cave centuries ago. The Mayans believe that there are three parts of the world, the upper world, earth and the underworld. Therefore, they thought that the cave system was a connection to the gods of the underworld. Including pottery and other offerings, the cave has a few human remains, which are believed to be human sacrifices. Most of the artifacts have been calcified; therefore some have literally been engulfed by the cave. The tour was fantastic, and a lot more adventurous than I thought it would be.

After the tour we went to our hotel, Cahalpeech, in San Ignacio Town. Monday, Kathleen, Kyle and I spent the day exploring the town. The hotel where we were staying sits on the top of a hill overlooking the very hilly town of San Ignacio. We figured out quickly that the best thing to do was to walk down and then pay a taxi $7 to get back to the top because it would be a very steep hike back up. The city is interesting because it is one of the most western cities in Belize, close to the Guatemala border and has a river flowing at the bottom with only two major streets that are filled with hills. It reminded me of a very small Belizean version of San Francisco. We walked down to the river and found a group of boys jumping from a rope swing into the river, before walking back up to look at the shops and find lunch at a good local restaurant called Elva’s. That afternoon we sat by the pool for a little bit, before returning back down the hill for dinner at a fantastic restaurant called Han-nahs.

The following day, we got up early and went to the Mayan ruins of Caracol. In order to get to the ruins you have to endure a very bumpy car ride along the windy mountainside, because most of road on the way is unpaved. Along the way we stopped at a cave system to look at the massive cavern formed by a 'dead' cave. I learned that caves dye when they no longer have rapid water running through them, therefore they cannot make new formations.
Unlike Tikal, Caracol was home to a large population of the Mayan people, so we got to see homes of both the peasants and nobles. I loved learning about the history of the people that lived there and seeing the amazing temples that they created, but I especially liked getting to walk through the forest and see all of the unique animals!

After Caracol they took us to stop at the Big Rock waterfall on the way back. It was a steep hike to get to, but then was beautiful to see. Most of the people in the group went cliff diving off of the ledges of the waterfall which was a lot of fun!

Wednesday, myself and a group of eight other people decided to go to the neighboring country of Guatemala, to see a town called Flores. The town sits on an island inside of a big salt water lake. I was very surprised how drastically different things became as soon as we crossed the border into Guatemala. First, the money conversions become much more difficult, because seven quetzal are equal to one American dollar, versus the two to one Belizean to USA ratio. We drove through some very poor cattle farmland to get to Flores, but it felt like we were in a different world when we arrived. The island was not extremely large, but had a plethora of little shops and restaurants, and actually reminded me of a small town in Europe rather than Central America. We shopped a little bit while there, explored the town and had lunch ad a fantastic little restaurant called Cool Beans. It was nice to get to see somewhere so different than Belize. After spending a few hours there it was time to return for another great dinner at Han-nahs. (In case you decide to do this trip yourself, you should know that you have to pay 37.50 Belize to exit this country, and another 10 quetzal to exit Guatemala.)

Thursday it was time to return back to San Pedro, so we got up early to catch a bus to the Belize water taxi station. Three of us stopped in San Pedro to spend the day on the beach :)

Until next time,

AAA