Un-belize-able

Hello again,

So, in my last blog post, which was part one to this story (go read that first) we had a mix up with our visas which means that we had to spend three days in Belize!

When we got off the boat in Puerto Barrios we had to go through immigration. We had to fill out a form which caused a lot more confusion than it should’ve considering we just had to write down our own information, but anyways Scottish is a nationality – enough said. The guy who handed us our forms was getting a lot of enjoyment out of this so at least we made his day.

In Belize they speak English, so it was weird going to speak Spanish then realising they speak the same language as us, although I couldn’t actually understand what they were saying – they had really thick accents that either sounded Jamaican or for some of the little kids, American. It almost sounded like pidgin English that honestly Spanish might’ve been easier.

When we stepped outside it was dark and we were all quite tired (it was 6pm) so we wanted to get to the guest house as quickly as possible. We asked around at the boat terminal if they knew where the hostel was. Worryingly nobody had heard of it. Until one guy took us outside the terminal and right there was a huge sign for A Piece Of Ground (name of hostel) – perfect. We started wandering down the street looking for it, but despite the sign that gave no direction whatsoever, it wasn’t there. We asked around again and someone told us it was a 25 minute walk. With it being dark and carrying our rucksacks we decided to get a taxi. Unfortunately taxis weren’t very common so half of the group got into one then the rest of us waited for the same taxi to return and pick us up. A recurring theme here – we were scammed. To be fair, I think this was partly our fault, we were just a bit too trusting. The guy said that the other group hadn’t paid so we had to pay for them as well since they only had $50 dollar notes (we’d all just been to the bank so this was true). Throughout the whole journey he kept checking with us that this was a fair price. We were just like yeh whatever, but we knew that this was a little suspicious. Writing this now is making me realise how stupid we actually were, but as you can guess, the other group had paid, wow big shock.

We stayed in a pod dorm room – not quite like the pod hotels in Japan (you know the ones, really swanky and cool but probs not good if you’re claustrophobic) – but they were still very cool and we were all very excited by them since they had windows (hey gurl heyy) that you could open to the next pod. But don’t worry you could also lock the windows, which Lois did quite a lot when she was sick of me – I know, I can’t believe that would happen either.

The first night we went to the restaurant at the hotel. There were so many options but I went for the cheese nachos, mainly because the were the cheapest #budgeting, however unlike Emily I didn’t ask for them without jalapeños #hardcore. That night since it was Halloween we decided to watch a scary movie, and after a vote we watched The Purge – was happy I was safely secured in my pod that night.

The next day we just spent our time chilling and doing our own bits and bobs. Some people went off for a walk and then for lunch. I wasn’t feeling too great (have I ever not said that in a blog post?! I promise I’m feeling good most of the time) so didn’t have much of an appetite. Later Em and I went along to the supermarket, it was the most like a supermarket we’ve seen in a longggg time since it had high ceilings but was still not like an actual supermarket. We bought a loaf of bread, cheese and butter to share between us as well as some chocolate of course. So for lunch/mid afternoon snack I had buttered toast, something I’ve been craving. It still wasn’t like home but did the job. That day, Esther, Lois and I went with Emily to the hospital since she’d been dying for a while and could no longer eat without crying. The doctors in Honduras had given her antibiotics that were too harsh for her stomach, so this gave her some sort of gastric acid thing – I really have no clue, just making this up now, but yeh it hurt. So, we went to a Belize doctors clinic for the first time – as exciting of an experience as it was, we were sitting outside of the children’s clinic so there was a lot of sick babies which was quite sad. Anyways Emily got given a prescription which seemed to help, so that’s good that we got that sorted. We were going to watch a movie that night but we ended up just putting on tunes and having a sing song, the way all good girls nights in are spent.

The next day, four of us went for lunch to this little place on the seaside that was very scenic and had good food. I got a wrap that I can’t remember what it had in it, but it was tasty. I also tried my first Belizean beer which like all other beer just made me feel bloated, but Iona and I’ve decided for travelling we need to learn to like beer – it’s so much cheaper. Esther bought some ‘sea – treasures’ from these little children who we think were the children of the owners, but they were soo cute and we promised we’d take a look at their stall. The restaurant had led down to a dock/pier thing, I can’t remember the name for it but in the photos you’ll see what I’m chatting about, so we went down there for a bit and decided it would be a good place to swim and we would bring everyone back the next day. After lunch we went for a walk to the market to get veg for tea and headed to a supermarket where we found this hugee big dairy milk chocolate bar. Oh em gee it was the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen but it was also $20 dollars so with much regret I didn’t buy it. That night for tea we were planning on having fajitas however unlike Honduras where tortillas are literally everywhere, like for real EVERYWHERE, apparently the don’t sell them in Belize. So instead Esther, Iona and Flossy (I think) made this rice, mixed with bean paste vegetable thing which didn’t look very appealing I must admit but actually tasted quite nice. The only reason I didn’t eat it all was because I was still ill, I promise.

Okay I’ve just realised I’ve spread the activities of one day between two days, so technically I’ve created a day that never existed, but I can’t be bothered to change it so oh well soz my mems bad.

The next morning we got up and went for breakfast, the breakfasts were so big and delicious and most importantly free! After a great breakfast me and Emily went back to the doctors just to get a repeat prescription, but we had to go through the whole process again and in the end, we didn’t even get the prescription since the doctor wasn’t there. After this we all went out for lunch to the same place, and I just got ‘an oreo frozen delight’ which was tiny and such a rip-off, unlike all the other amazing lunch foods they had. After lunch, we all went swimming in the Caribbean sea, it was a lot of fun and quite toasty. Unfortunately Izzy dropped her phone into the sea so those of us who were already In the sea went on a search. We eventually found it however by this time it had been at the bottom of the sea for quite some time so it was looking unlikely it was past the rice trick. We watched pitch perfect on the last night, a classic, despite the fact I fell asleep halfway through.

The next morning, we had breakfast, paid for our room, got a taxi to the boat terminal, seen a dragon and got on the boat. Esther, Lois and I had bagsied the seats at the back – we’d only just begun to recover from the boat ride over and I wasn’t up for another five days of pain. That boat ride was a lot smoother that the first one – in fact a few of us fell asleep. When we got off we had a shuttle bus waiting for us that was going to take us the full day journey back to Santa Rosa where we were going to spend the night. It was a bit of a squeeze for all ten of us in the shuttle bus – I was in the back with all the luggage. Any sharp corners and I would’ve been squished. They did however make a comfy pillow for me to sleep most of the way.

The next day was the end of our little visa adventure so before we all went our separate ways back to our projects we made a stop at pizza hut. We’d been wanting the cookie dough pizza all week but hadn’t found it in the pizza hut in San Pedro, so three of us shared one, and lemme tell you it was defo worth it. Yum. Iona and  I had a few hours in Gracias before our bus to Belen so we went to the post office and collected our parcels! We sat in Izzy and Lois’s hotel room (they were staying in Gracias) and opened our mail. I had birthday and Christmas presents as well as just random bits and bobs. Thank you everyone who sent me mail 😊

Back in Belen for a week before our main travels. The day I’m writing this is Saturday and we head of for our Christmas holidays/travel time for almost three months tomorrow. It’s been a quiet week, although we arrived back mid exam week which is always a little stressful – who thought exams were stressful for teachers as well. We went out for coffee one night as well with one of our friends. He thought it was just a date with Iona (I turned him down obvs) but Iona made me tag along which I don’t think he was too happy about since he couldn’t give her his roses and put them in the bin instead, but I’m sure he’ll get a chance one day. I’ve been watching a lot of Christmas films to get me in the mood (not proper ones, just the cringey Netflix ones) and somebody sent Iona facemasks so we did them one night, so I can thank my new glowy skin to that. I put up some fairy lights around our bathroom door that mum sent me in a parcel which are really cute, and Anderson loves them and is very intrigued by the “mucho luz”.

The past couple of days we’ve just been getting ready to leave, last night I tried to fit everything into my rucksack. I was very close to a breakdown and so just went to sleep instead so I’ll need to try tackle that some point today. The annoying thing is that I thought I’d done well to pack light – it looked as if I had a lot less clothes than Iona, which I made sure she was aware of. Yet somehow, with the same sized rucksack, she’s managed to fit all her stuff in. When we came back from Belize our Birkenstocks were covered in mould, so we put that off for a week and have spent this morning cleaning them, that was definitely a highlight of this year so far.

So that’s everything that’s been happening the past couple of weeks. I can’t wait to go travelling, and funny enough our first stop is Belize!

Hasta luego!