We got into Belize City after our flight from San Jose, Costa Rica stopped over in Panama for a short layover. We saw the amazing Panama Canal from the air, and boy was she a beauty!
After we landed, we had an interesting discussion with the taxi driver who picked us up from the airport. He was raving about Belize, but in a used-car salesman kind of way, so I had a hard time believing his claims. After a few minutes he brought up the topic of safety. He again raved how Belize City was very safe, but in the very next sentence he said, “Just don’t leave the hotel after 6 PM.” Wait, what?! He just said it was safe! 6PM? I guess we’re eating dinner during the afternoons then.
We heard great things about Belize from others. Maybe raving about Belize is a pyramid scheme? I guess that blinded us to the fact that it has the 3rd highest murder rate in the world. Yikes! We definitely missed that detail when doing our research on countries to visit. While Stephanie was still recovering from her sprained foot, I went for a walk on the busy road to get groceries and visit an ATM. Oddly enough, our hotel was in the industrial section of town. Even in broad daylight I didn’t feel very safe. This was a rare occurrence during our round-the-world trip with the only other dangerous experience being taking a wrong turn out of Kruger National Park, ending up in a South African township on dirt roads, completely lost, and without a working GPS! I suspected I might be overreacting after the walk around town, but that’s when I looked up the city’s safety profile online and learned more about this high-crime country. It wasn’t just where we stayed either. I asked a waitress about safety too, and she said the industrial zone was safer than the city center. Anyway, we were determined the make the most of our trip despite the bad hombres around.
Our second day in Belize City we visited the Mayan ruins of Lamanai. We took a van about an hour to a boat on the Rio Nuevo. From the river we hopped onto a speedboat and spent about an hour whizzing through the windy river and mangrove jungle to Lamanai.
Lamanai itself was a bit smaller than we thought and crowded with cruise-ship tourists. Our guide told us that we were lucky there was only 1 and not 3 cruise ships at the port that day or else it would have been much more crowded.
You haven’t lived until you’ve walked through a rainforest and got the bejesus scared out of you by vicious-sounding Howler monkeys. They’re in the trees right in front of the main temple, Lamanai.
After a delicious Belizean lunch with spicy pickled salsa that I thoroughly enjoyed, we headed back to the boat followed by the van ride home. The one issue was that the tour guide picked us up 45 minutes late because he had to wait for another couple joining us from a cruise ship. As a result, we felt rushed during the whole trip as he whizzed quickly around in the speed boat, moved us from point-to-point in the ruins swiftly, and urged us to finish our lunch quickly. We spent 4 hours in transit and probably an hour or so at the actual ruins. Not a good ratio. We definitely could have used that extra 45 minutes. At least we did get to see a crocodile hanging out in the mangroves on the boat ride back.
The next day we left Belize City early to go to Ambergris Caye, a small island adjacent to the reef. Going from a setting in Belize City that indicated a pretty sketchy developing country to the touristic/expat beach island of Ambergris Caye was a major upgrade. It was a 1.5-hour ferry ride….but…the ferry died on us midway through. Luckily it started up again 5 minutes later, and we didn’t need to be rescued at sea!
The next morning I went on a half-day snorkeling adventure to Hol Chan Marine Reserve and Shark Ray Alley. Stephanie had her fill of snorkeling for a lifetime after everything we did in the Galapagos, so she relaxed on the island while I went out on the water. The reef in Belize is the 2nd largest in the world, only smaller than the Great Barrier Reef. I saw 6 different rays (multiple species) and eels, and got to swim with nurse sharks. I got a little too close to the feeding frenzy in this video.
The wildlife in Hol Chan was really amazing, but it was filled with a dozen boats with too many tourists. Plus, snorkelers had to stick close by our tour guide versus going out to explore on our own. As a result, I kept getting kicked by other snorkelers, and I’m sure they received a few unintended kicks from me as well — if that was you and you’re reading this, I’m sorry for the kicks!
We took it relatively easy the following few days at the beach resort, mostly lounging on the beach and eating jerk chicken and ceviche.
Our initial research painted Belize as a safe haven that is a unique place in Central America due to the Caribbean reef off the coast and its former status as a British colony. Everyone speaks English, the reef is great to swim, and there are tons of ruins. We could certainly see glimpses of the allure: beaches, wildlife, etc. But, it didn’t quite live up to our expectations, largely colored by our experience in sketchy Belize City. We would suggest skipping Belize City at all costs, with the exception of doing a day-tour at Lamanai or Altun Ha mayan ruins. Then head directly to Ambergris Caye or Caye Caulker. Lastly, the southern part of Belize also has beautiful beaches, islands, and ruins but we didn’t venture out that far.
