San Ignacio
From the Cockscomb Basin Wildlife Sanctuary, we got a taxi back to Maya Centre. While we waited for a bus to go past, we phoned Chocolate's place in Caye Caulker and were told that they had no one signed up for a tour over the next few days, so we decided to head to San Ignacio instead. There are various wildlife parks seemingly accessible from there that sounded good, so we wanted to give them a try. We got a bus to Belmopan and then another to San Ignacio (along with the three students from Vermont, returning to their school).
We headed to a guest house we picked out of the list in our guidebook, J & R's Guest House. The owners are John and Rosa, and they're lovely. Rosa speaks more Spanish than English, so she was happy that we can speak some Spanish, and we appreciated the practice. After dumping our stuff, we had a gorgeous dinner at a restaurant with loads of veggie options and the most heavenly, ice-cold, freshly-squeezed orange juice. Bliss!
We then went in search of information about these other wildlife areas we'd read about. It turns out that they ones we're interested in are all closed to the public. Boo!!! Och, well. We booked a tour to Actun Tunichil Muknal (or ATM cave, as it's commonly called), a limestone cave with Mayan artifacts and skeletal remains. We were told it's a Belize experience not to be missed, so we figured we should give it a go.
As we were walking back to the guest house, we saw some cats at a neighbor's house. A man walked out of the house and spotted us staring into his yard, so I said to him that we liked his cats. He was really friendly, and he wound up showing us the six precious wee kittens that one of his cats had a couple weeks ago! We were delighted. So cute! That really made our day.
The next day was our tour of the ATM cave. The cave is really special, and great care is taken to preserve it. Each tour group can only have 8 people maximum. We drove for about an hour, and then we hiked for about 45 minutes through the jungle to the cave entrance. Our tour guide loves this cave and Mayan history, and he had our group hold back until the 3 or 4 other groups had gone into the cave so we wouldn't feel hurried by groups coming in behind us. (Groups are staggered.) We wound up spending about 3 hours in the cave.
After donning helmets and headlights, we swam through gorgeous cold water to get into the cave. Then it was walking/swimming through water and scrambling over rocks to get further inside. We saw lots of lovely rock formations, some of them sparking with mineral deposits. But the best part was getting to a large dry chamber with pottery remains scattered all throughout. We had to take our shoes off at the entrance to the dry chamber and walk around in socks so that we'd take care where we stepped. All pottery fragments are left in situ; excavation has been avoided so as not to disrupt what was a sacred place to the Mayans long ago. There are also skeletons to be seen in the chamber, some scattered (perhaps by water) and some intact. It's believed that the pottery and skeletons were all from sacrifices. It was fascinating. We've seen various caves with cool formations, and we've seen Mayan ruins. But this was our first cave with Mayan artifacts inside. We really enjoyed the tour, learned a lot about the Mayans who lived and still live in Belize, and got to know some of the other people on the tour.
When we got back to San Ignacio, we made plans to have dinner with an English couple on the tour. First, though, we were on a mission to do laundry. It was desperate by this point. Our clothes were so saturated with sunblock, insect repellent, sweat, and sea water, hand-washing just wasn't good enough. We asked John and Rosa at the guest house if they could recommend a laundromat, and John took us to one operated by his friend. (It was a bit disturbing that he drove us there even though it would only take 2 minutes to walk there, but he insisted!) It was late, but they were fine with us dropping off the clothes then and picking them up after dinner. Perfect!
We met up with James and Charlotte from the tour, and we wound up in a group of 9 people at a Sri Lankan restaurant. We had a lovely time and lovely veggie curry. It's great to meet other travelers, hear their stories, and exchange tips on places/activities. And luckily the laundry people didn't mind us getting back there at 10pm to pick up our clothes!
The next morning we weren't sure what to do. But when we phoned Chocolate's place in Caye Caulker, his wife Annie told us they might have a tour going in 2 days! Time to head back to CC...
We headed to a guest house we picked out of the list in our guidebook, J & R's Guest House. The owners are John and Rosa, and they're lovely. Rosa speaks more Spanish than English, so she was happy that we can speak some Spanish, and we appreciated the practice. After dumping our stuff, we had a gorgeous dinner at a restaurant with loads of veggie options and the most heavenly, ice-cold, freshly-squeezed orange juice. Bliss!
We then went in search of information about these other wildlife areas we'd read about. It turns out that they ones we're interested in are all closed to the public. Boo!!! Och, well. We booked a tour to Actun Tunichil Muknal (or ATM cave, as it's commonly called), a limestone cave with Mayan artifacts and skeletal remains. We were told it's a Belize experience not to be missed, so we figured we should give it a go.
As we were walking back to the guest house, we saw some cats at a neighbor's house. A man walked out of the house and spotted us staring into his yard, so I said to him that we liked his cats. He was really friendly, and he wound up showing us the six precious wee kittens that one of his cats had a couple weeks ago! We were delighted. So cute! That really made our day.
The next day was our tour of the ATM cave. The cave is really special, and great care is taken to preserve it. Each tour group can only have 8 people maximum. We drove for about an hour, and then we hiked for about 45 minutes through the jungle to the cave entrance. Our tour guide loves this cave and Mayan history, and he had our group hold back until the 3 or 4 other groups had gone into the cave so we wouldn't feel hurried by groups coming in behind us. (Groups are staggered.) We wound up spending about 3 hours in the cave.
After donning helmets and headlights, we swam through gorgeous cold water to get into the cave. Then it was walking/swimming through water and scrambling over rocks to get further inside. We saw lots of lovely rock formations, some of them sparking with mineral deposits. But the best part was getting to a large dry chamber with pottery remains scattered all throughout. We had to take our shoes off at the entrance to the dry chamber and walk around in socks so that we'd take care where we stepped. All pottery fragments are left in situ; excavation has been avoided so as not to disrupt what was a sacred place to the Mayans long ago. There are also skeletons to be seen in the chamber, some scattered (perhaps by water) and some intact. It's believed that the pottery and skeletons were all from sacrifices. It was fascinating. We've seen various caves with cool formations, and we've seen Mayan ruins. But this was our first cave with Mayan artifacts inside. We really enjoyed the tour, learned a lot about the Mayans who lived and still live in Belize, and got to know some of the other people on the tour.
When we got back to San Ignacio, we made plans to have dinner with an English couple on the tour. First, though, we were on a mission to do laundry. It was desperate by this point. Our clothes were so saturated with sunblock, insect repellent, sweat, and sea water, hand-washing just wasn't good enough. We asked John and Rosa at the guest house if they could recommend a laundromat, and John took us to one operated by his friend. (It was a bit disturbing that he drove us there even though it would only take 2 minutes to walk there, but he insisted!) It was late, but they were fine with us dropping off the clothes then and picking them up after dinner. Perfect!
We met up with James and Charlotte from the tour, and we wound up in a group of 9 people at a Sri Lankan restaurant. We had a lovely time and lovely veggie curry. It's great to meet other travelers, hear their stories, and exchange tips on places/activities. And luckily the laundry people didn't mind us getting back there at 10pm to pick up our clothes!
The next morning we weren't sure what to do. But when we phoned Chocolate's place in Caye Caulker, his wife Annie told us they might have a tour going in 2 days! Time to head back to CC...
posted by Trace at
7:42 pm
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