Cruising

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May 11, 2024, completed May 13th.

I am sitting at a rolly, smelly marina dock waiting for my bother and sister-in-law to arrive for a visit in Belize. This is a good time to talk about cruising things and Belize things as well. So, as we are at a marina, lets start there.

Marinas

Forget everything you know about marinas. They are not big with lots of luxury boats. Most of the marinas are working marinas, with dive boats, small ferries and small fishing boats. There might be a few slips for visiting boats. Maybe they will have water and electricity, maybe they wont. Don’t count on bathrooms. Mexico had several fairly nice marinas, although small. Belize is a much different story. They are few and far between and are primarily a place to tie a boat.

Two Belizean marinas. This is the ONLY sport fish we’ve seen in Belize. Very simple, but this one did have power and we made water from the dock water.

In general we don’t really need or want marinas down here, but after our grounding fiasco, we needed and wanted a place to deal with our various issues with making water, dumping and power. We also wanted to make sure the dinghy was all OK after we tried to sink her.

The best kind of marina!

Poop

No clog in the poop lines. We took the lines apart and checked them all and all was clear. We took the poop-overboard-pump apart, cleaned it and put it back together. Tested and it worked fine. We don’t understand the issue, but it works and life goes on.

There is some “stuff” in the piping. Thus, the bad collected that. Then remove clamps and put plugs in the pipes. Not the most fun job, but not as bad as one might think.

In the US and Canada, they are pretty strict on where you are supposed to dump poop. At a pumpout station or 3 miles off shore. In general there are lots of dump stations and except for the liveaboards whose boats never move, most people are pretty good about following the rules. In the Caribbean, there are no pumpouts. No, you are not supposed to dump except offshore. In Mexico, we were offshore. In Belize, we are inside a reef. We asked the locals in San Pedro (Belize) how folks deal with pumping their boats. They guy told us the spot folks went south of San Pedro to dump. He told us, “it is fish food.”

Sshhhhhhh! We saw nothing. Really.

Language in Belize

Belize is a fascinating country. Once British Honduras, it became Belize in 1973 and gained full independence from England in 1981. One would think it would be seeped in “Britishness.” Yes, English is the official language and all signs are in English. However, many folks speak as many as 4 languages; English, Spanish, Creole and one of several Mayan dialects. Asians also seem to have a strong hold on groceries and restaurants so throw in some Asian languages. A much more multicultural place than I thought.

In Caye Caulker, there was lots of Creole, “rasta renditions” and less Spanish. But everyone spoke English. This guy made as coco drinks where he put the lime in the coconut and added some rum for good flavor. When we were done, he opened them up further and brought us the coco meat.

Playing in Belize

On this trip we are naturally on or near the water and thus are doing water things. We’ll come back another time to do the inland visits to nature reserves in the mountains and Mayan ruins. We’ve been dinghy exploring, walking beaches, checking out towns and snorkeling.

We have slowly transitioned from margaritas to rum punch (pineapple juice and local rum) as we have moved from Mexico to Belize. Another sighting of a saguaro. The guy at the restaurant knew nothing about saguaros.
I was very surprised to see this in San Pedro. Belize is very anti-gun as best I can tell. But, there are some cowboys around apparently. I wonder what the rules are…
The fish could be thick near the shores. Big fish, LOTS of little ones.
Water bars/restaurants, complete with table service!
Caye Caulker is 3 dirt streets, Front, middle and back. A very laid back and relaxed island.
San Pedro is mostly paved and filled with golf carts. This as a quite early morning shot. In the shoulder season, the streets are full of carts!
Lobster season starts the end of June. I chatted with a man building/refreshing the traps. No lines with floats. They drop them on the bottom with a weight, remember where they are (maybe with a stick in the water) and then pull them up with a hook. So much nicer than tangling them in your prop.
We went snorkeling on Caye Caulker. The nurse sharks came to visit at our 2nd stop.
Ok, they do feed them to get them to come. Jim and I over on the right in the water. There were lots of sharks and rays.
I knew you’d want to see the video of the sharks swimming. Quite amazing!

We went to see and feed the tarpon. They are quite “happy” to be fed and pack a punch. One must hold the fish with a flat hand.
The Belize fishing fleet. A bit of a different approach than in Canada. A boat sails out with a bunch of small boats which are then deployed to fish.
Our first night in San Pedro with visited this restaurant where you select your seafood. You then take it in and the waiter helps you pick the preparation.
Our selection. All local. Snapper, shrimp, snow crab and scallops. All wonderful!

And On with the Fun!

So the fun continues. Chuck and Jan are here now and we are dinghy-ing around, swimming and moved to a new location today. Jim and I are still a bit anxious about shallow water, and northern Belize is full of it. We are now to deeper water as we move south, but there are LOTS of corals around that one needs to be aware of.

The space creatures have arrived!
And they get even odder!

Enjoy your day!

Comments

Cruising — 2 Comments

  1. With thanks to Harry Nilsson:
    “Brother bought a coconut, he bought it for a dime
    His sister had another one, she paid it for a lime
    She put the lime in the coconut, she drank ’em both up
    She put the lime in the coconut, she drank ’em both up
    She put the lime in the coconut, she drank ’em both up”…