Belize Blog – Belizeadventure.com

Caye Caulker is a popular island for tourism in Belize. It’s kind of funky and fun, and has a lot of hotels, restaurants, and bars. It is right on the Belize Barrier Reef and gets a lot of traffic from the younger set. It is about 20-25 miles from Belize City, and is easy to get to. Sometimes our guests want to go there for a couple of days before or after their adventure island trip with us, so I do get this question periodically.

If you are doing the Caye Caulker trip before our island adventure, and planning to visit Caye Caulker as soon as you arrive in the country, I would recommend flying to Caye Caulker, not taking the water taxi. You could return on the taxi, but at the beginning it makes more sense to fly. The reason is you fly into an airport, so you are right there to catch a flight, and it is so much faster. It IS somewhat cheaper to take the water taxi, so if your budget is a concern, you might not wish to take my advice.

Here’s the $ comparison:

Flight: $65 per person

Water taxi: land taxi to get to the water taxi dock $30 per cab
Water taxi from Belize City to Caye Caulker $10 per person
Total: $40 per person or $50 for two

Belize airlines:
Tropic Air
Maya Regional
Water taxi:
http://www.cayecaulkerwatertaxi.com/

Here’s the time difference of each option:

Flight: wait for flight, approx 20 minutes, flight: 8 minutes, total: 28 minutes

Water taxi: cab to dock, approx 20 minutes, wait for boat departure, approx 20 minutes, taxi time: approx 45 minutes, total 1 hour 15 minutes.

Every year we watch tropical hurricane websites starting in July. If you own an island in Belize, believe me you pay attention to hurricane season! Every year, when November 1 comes around I breathe a GIANT sigh of relief. I waited a few extra days just to be sure, but I can now state that I am ready to proclaim the 2011 Belize hurricane season to be OVER!

This year was a breeze, only one evacuation. The hurricane that passed close to us did little, and the hurricane that could have come our way didn’t. We have heard there is a lot of trash to clean up from Rina (which never got any closer than about 250-300 miles from us). We can handle that! Cully goes out to the island for the first time this season tomorrow, undoubtedly I will be hearing more from him in a week or so about how it looks.

We haven’t had any major hurricane damage since Mitch in 1998. Since then there have been some scares, and a few cabanas that needed subsequent repair, but no mass-rearranging of the island like we had with Mitch. If you can visit us this year, you will see an island that looks like this:

I am back from MY vacation (backpacking in Utah), and I’m back just in time to see the van loaded to the gills for Cully’s annual drive south. He’s not taking a trailer this year, just a new van, so the load is particularly creatively packed.

Cully drives to Belize every year. That is the only way to get all of our kayaks, boards, generators, etc. down to Belize and out to the island.

Victor Myers, one of our Belize trip managers, showed up from Boise last week with most of the boats and boards Cully will be driving down.

Victor attended the Outdoor Retailer trade show for us in July and bought a lot of new equipment for us there, and this was the delivery of the new loot!

So it was basically a van swap. Victor pulled up to my house in Moab, unloaded everything, and then they loaded it all onto our new Belize Adventure Week van.

Every year we have other lodges in Belize wanting to buy our used equipment. Fat chance! We take very good care of our gear and use it for years. Some of our favorite sea kayaks go back to the old days on Northeast Caye, or even before when we used to kayak island-to-island out of Placencia, Belize.

This is why we have the best sport gear in the country of Belize. Each piece is hand-picked by Cully, driven down, and repaired onsite with parts we also drive down.

Every single life jacket, paddle, rudder cable, and surfboard fin is hand-carried by us to Belize.

Cully leaves on Monday! I’ll be posted more photos of the big departure.

Occasionally we get this question… people rightly figure that if they are going south, they want to stay south and see more than just one country. What a great combination! Belize for the coral reefs and Mayan ruins, and Costa Rica for the cloud forest.

Only one airline flies between the two, but there is only one stop, so it’s very doable. Taca Air can get you between the two in under four hours. They go every day, and have 2 schedules a week:

Sun, Tue, Wed, Friday
Leave San Jose, Costa Rica (SJO) at 6:15 am, arrive Belize (BZE) 9:37 am
Leave BZE 12:30 pm, arrive SJO 4:05 pm

Mon, Thur, Saturday
Leave SJO 12:20 pm, arrive BZE 3:42 pm
Leave BZE 5:20 pm, arrive SJO 9:05 pm

The cost between the two is $413 round trip. It is almost the same to fly to either, so there is no advantage I can find to flying in or out of one or the other (Houston to BZE is currently $710 RT on Taca, Houston to SJO is currently $690 RT).

There is a great travel company in Costa Rica similar to us: Serendipity Adventures. They come highly recommended, and are the only other company I have found offering as many sports as we do. Why not spend a week in Belize on our island, then fly to Costa Rica and do one of their week-long trips? For example, their 7-day Costa Rica Intrepid Adventure Tour which is 7 days of horseback riding, hiking and climbing trees, rafting, rain forest, cloud forest, hiking a volcano, soaking in hot springs, and a zipline canopy tour.

Wouldn’t this be a great honeymoon? Or why not a second honeymoon if you already took one?

One month ago tomorrow I turned 55. Somehow, the double number made a bigger impression on my psyche than even the big five-o did. That, combined with the fact that in the past year I’ve developed a few chronic aches and pains, got me thinking that maybe this was it – life was beginning to leave me behind, whatever new and exciting experiences I’d had in my life were now becoming things of the past.

Then I stumbled across this article in the Poughkeepsie Journal about this guy, James Curran, who discovered the sport of scuba diving as he turned 60 and in the three years since has made 167 dives. The article featured a picture of him diving off the coast of Belize.

James Curran dives off the coast of Belize, Central America on a recent trip. / Courtesy photo

That brought back memories of my last dive. It was eight years ago off Long Caye in Belize during a week’s stay at Adventure Island. We took a five minute boat ride from the rustic, island resort, out to a site they call “The Wall,” one of the top-rated Belize dive sites. We flipped over the side of the boat and suddenly, 40 feet below loomed one of the most amazing sights I’ve ever seen — an underwater cliff dropping 2600 feet into the depths. We cruised along the rim of the cliff exploring the extravagant corral formations and gazing out into the abyss as huge sea turtles swam into view. It was the dive of a lifetime.

Recalling that adventure reminds me that despite my age, new experiences still await if only I remain open to them. It’s never too late.

So you want to go to Belize? When someone signs up for a Belize adventure we always remind them that it’s a great idea to purchase travel insurance. Once we confirm a reservation, we don’t cancel; if our guide gets sick we have others who can take their place. But if something happens to you, you might not be able to go.

Many people say: “I’ve been traveling for years and I’ve never needed it!” That may indeed be true, but we have seen MANY unforeseen things happen to our guests, and the ones who did take our advice were so thankful that they did.

Our guests are active people, and by far the most common reason for trip cancellation is a skiing accident the week before they are scheduled to go to Belize. You can’t paddle a kayak or hold on to a windsurfer with a broken arm!

Other things that have happened to our guests on more than one occasion: illness of one of the members of the group traveling together, death or illness of a family member back home, and changes at work that make travel a bad idea at the time they planned to go.

In deciding whether or not to buy travel insurance, consider the investment you are making in your vacation and whether or not you could afford the loss if you did have to cancel.

Every travel company has a cancellation policy where they retain some or all of your payments if you cancel. If you expect them to do otherwise, you are basically asking them to insure your non-attendance at no cost to you. It is your outfitter’s responsibility to run the trip they promised you, no matter what emergencies may arise for them immediately before the trip. It is your responsibility to pay for the trip on which you reserved a space, and a travel insurance policy helps make your disappointment in missing your trip not be a financial burden as well.

The reason travel companies are unable to refund your payments is that as a trip approaches there is little chance they could fill your spaces, and they may have turned away others who wanted space on that date. By the time it is 60 days or less from your departure date, companies have spent considerable time and energy preparing for your arrival: confirming guides and drivers, making non-refundable hotel reservations, and planning countless other logistics. With a travel insurance policy you can also insure your ticket to belize in addition to your all-inclusive package.

We recommend Travelex travel insurance, a company we have been recommending to our guests for over 10 years. We have received no complaints about their service beyond a somewhat expected “it’s a hassle to collect” from just a few who purchased a policy from them. It is an extra step, but if something goes wrong and you can’t make the trip you signed up for, you will be VERY glad you purchased a policy. When someone makes a claim, a form is forwarded to us, which we fill out with the amount of money you have spent, date of trip, whether you attended at all or arrived late, etc. So we do help with your claim and provide all necessary documentation to the company.

Travelex has 3 policies to choose from, but we recommend you choose one of the two least expensive options: Travel Basic or Travel Select. At this writing a policy covering $2500 worth of travel expenses for a person in the 35-50 age bracket would cost $85 per person base rate for the Travel Basic plan and $132 for the Travel Select plan. Both policies include a “Ten Day Free Look” which means you can change your mind after purchasing for up to 10 days as long as you have not departed on your trip yet or filed a claim. Some of the differences between Travel Basic and Travel Select are:

Travel Select includes everything Travel Basic does. Coverage limits are higher with Travel Select for trip cancellation, trip interruption, trip delay, baggage lost or delayed, emergency accident and sickness medical expense, and emergency medical evacuation. Travel Select also includes:
-One child under 21 is free for each adult purchasing a policy.
-If you purchase the plan within 21 days from the day you confirm your Belize tour, all pre-existing medical conditions are eligible for coverage.
-Mandatory evacuation coverage

We recommend you imagine just what could feasibly happen to you, and then look those instances up in each policy to see if they are covered. Do you have a sick or aging parent that could worsen and interrupt your travel plans? Do you have a chronic illness currently in remission that could flare up unexpectedly? Is the company you work for rumored to be soon undergoing major reorganization? Compare the two policies for any eventualities that could happen to you.

When I flew to Belize a few weeks ago, I entered the immigration area just like always. But something was different… I was surprised to hear some really great Belizean music coming from the baggage claim area. While waiting in line to get my passport stamped, I couldn’t see exactly where the music was coming from because there were so many people waiting for their luggage. This sounded like live music! What was going on??? After finishing the immigration process I made my way over to the luggage claim area and there was this really great 5-piece band set up right by the revolving luggage belt. They finished the rasta song, and switched to country! What the heck? I asked the woman at the Belize Tourist Board office what the story was with the band. She said they had hired this band, Li’l Beats, to play every Wednesday and Friday all day long throughout the rest of the year. I was super psyched since most of our guests arrive on Friday. Fantastic!

We just finished an exquisite dinner at Ka’ana Boutique Resort, a truly lovely hotel just outside of San Ignacio, Belize. I’m not even sure what a ‘boutique’ resort is, and I think I’m supposed to know, because no one else asked, and they were nodding their heads like they understood… but maybe it means the best of everything, because that is obviously what they are shooting for here.

It has everything you would expect a super high-end resort to have with a few surprises: perfectly tended grounds, spacious rooms complete with small sitting area, a glass-block window in the shower, iPod docks in each room, wifi everywhere, and the swimming pool has two levels and a waterfall spilling from one to the other.

Their intimate spa uses only Belizean products for the masks and scrubs (coffee, cacao and sugar), and each room has a flat-screen TV (although why anyone would want to watch TV in a $400/night room is beyond me), welcome air-conditioning, delicious smelling lotion in the bathroom, and a deck on both ends of our casita. Our room also has an espresso machine, but sadly neither myself or my roommate know how to operate it. The room has a safe, although their staff is so good I would fall over in shock if anything were missing. And possibly the nicest touch of all, our back deck has a yoga mat sitting there in a basket waiting for you; a very thoughtful touch.

I loved my dinner, we had a choice of four entrées, all provided as part of the tour. I had the Garifuna Sera soup. WOW, fantastic. Our gracious hostess, Joanna Evans, born and raised in Dangriga, Belize, told me she would send me the recipe (!) Now THAT’S service. And for dessert I had corn gelato. Yes you heard me right. It tasted just like corn on the cob. It was kind of strange, although delicious. Ryan Kalous of The Mark Travel Corporation ordered the berry flavor, a fruit name I can’t remember, and he let me taste it. That is what I should have ordered, had I been smarter.

I just asked my roommate what a boutique resort is. Yvette Restrepo works for a luxury travel agency named BigFive.com. A boutique resort is a small resort, and there’s only one – as opposed to a chain. It’s high luxury, like a boutique clothing store, which only sells a few of each item, and each item is superb.

Every year we are asked about whether traveling to Belize or the tropics is a good idea during ‘the rainy season’. Slickrock is not open during this time (summer and fall) and it is partly due to bad weather in Belize, although the weather in the summer (June – August) is often not too severe until hurricane season arrives in September (although it can, of course, begin earlier). The other reason we close our operation during this time is due to the general decrease in interest people have in going south for the summer.

The rainy season, which affects all tropical regions on the planet, is caused by the equatorial weather zone – a low pressure, rain bearing climate zone – migrating north or south depending on the season. In the northern hemisphere’s summer, this climate zone moves north, affecting the latitudes of Central America and the Caribbean. This weather pattern creates periods of intense rainfall and humid, muggy weather which starts in June and lasts until November. However, the rain patterns are not the typical daily rainshowers during the afternoon which mist people associate with tropical rainy seasons. Rather, Central America experiences a series of tropical ‘waves’ of low pressure which sweep ashore off the Caribbean. These waves bring in 4-5 days of intense rains, then clear out. So in fact Belize and its neighboring countries have long periods of good weather in the summer, interspersed with rain events of a few days. Central America in general does not get the equatorial daily downpours found in such places as the rainforests of the Amazon or Congo.

The fall sees the most intense period of Belize’s rainy season. More frequent and more intense tropical waves sweep ashore, and monthly rainfall totals are the highest of the year. The trade winds slack off and it gets extremely hot and humid. This is the time of the year when hurricanes become a threat, as tropical storms in the Caribbean are able to grow and intensify into monster storms due to the heat content of the sea and low wind shear.

As fall approaches winter, the equatorial climate zone retreats south and a drier, cooler climate moves in. The tropical waves cease and rainfall decreases, and by spring the dry season is firmly entrenched and we sometimes see no rain at all for two months at a time!

It is always exciting when I finish the Belize brochure each summer. It’s a huge decision deciding what photos to use because we have so many more than we can fit into our 12 page catalog. I JUST finished it… it’s not printed yet but it’s ready online! Please check it out, and send me an email and let me know what you think. (And if you find a typo, let me know by next Thursday when I go to the printer in Grand Junction to finalize it!) [slickrock(at)slickrock(dot)com]

Download Slickrock’s NEW Belize brochure