you better belize it

The bus over the border into Belize requires the usual entry formalities of any Latin American country with having to pay the negotiable 'entry fee' to the border guards. And if anyone wants to smuggle copious quantities of chang over the border then put it in guitar shaped bag, they seem to be invisible to border guards! But at least you can haggle a bit better over here, as they do speak some form of English, albeit with Creole words randomly thrown in just to throw you off guard. The whole country only contains 200k people, (less than Clapham) so is quite easy to get around after the monster bus journeys of Guatemala.

Needing to get some hammock time in, it was straight to Belize City (with the strange entry into the 'city' via the municipal graveyard), then on the fast boat out to Caye Caulker. A beautiful white sand and palm-treed island where everything is painted in Dulux Caribbean colour range,

with big old Rasta mummas cooking up jerk chicken at the sides of the paths (there are no roads or even any cars on Caulker), and the inventive naming goes as far as Front Street, Middle Street, Back Street and Very Back Street. ha ha, you got to love the Belizian vibe.
Got all settled in to the wonderful Tina´s backpackers, which has got to be one of the best hostels I´ve ever stayed at with hammocks strewn around the palmed gardens looking out onto the bright blue sea,

the Caulker motto of ´Go Slow´ really applied to this place and the hammocks lived up to all expectations.

The island itself was split in two a few years ago when a hurricane blew on past,

which is also where the beach ended up; making swimming interesting as you dodge the crocodiles/ hammerhead sharks/ power boats and attempt to make it over to the other side of the island.

As with all Caribbean islands, the sunsets and sun rises are typically stunning, probably going to have millions of these pictures in the same way as the fire ones from camping,

but you really can´t get enough of it out here.

So its not all lazing around in hammocks, drinking copious quantities of rum. One of the best activities you can possibly do on this island is hire one of the beach cruise bikes (which really do only have a max speed of just above walking pace) and ride around trying to find all the strange signs that are littered around the island.

Oh and also trying to race a plane on the runway, although they don´t tend to take too kindly to that.

Being the hunter-gatherers that we are, the temptation of sitting around on a dock drinking beer trying to catch dinner proved too much, and for the first time in my life I actually caught a fish!

although when it got round to killing the poor little thing I failed miserably but gave the locals some amusement as I tried to smack its head really gently against the dock. It was just about edible, so cooked it up with some of the Brixton recipe jerk sauce and fed the five thousand.

The reef is so close to the island here and shallow, you don´t have to worry about expensive dive trips, and with captain Miguel taking the Tina´s crew out on sailing/ snorkeling tour on the good ship Ragamuffin, it was always going to get a little messy. We went to the three main snorkel sites just inside the reef and within seconds of jumping in the crystal clear turquoise water

we were surrounded by sharks, rays and supersonic jacks swimming right at your mask going wild for the chump that Miguel threw in right in front of you!

Setting the boat on ´auto pilot´ after the last of the sites, a few bottles of rum emerged

and the 2 hours cruise back to the island turned into quite a hedonistic 18-30s stylee booze cruise.

Can´t quite remember much after that, but I did manage to see the sunrise from where I must of passed out on the dock!

My first dive back in a few years was quite sensibly straight down to 42m at one of the greatest dive sites in the world, the great blue hole.

This is a 200m wide sink hole in the middle of lighthouse reef, 2 hours off the island, which is definitely quite fun to get out to in a small dive boat when the seas are running 10ft swells. But once you´re on the way down into the hole you enter a whole other world.
It really was one of the greatest dives I´ve ever done, you drop straight down one side of the hole to swim through a giant stalagmite cave, then slowly ascend up the wall with the perfect dive photo above of 6m nurse sharks silhouetted circling above you. Coming up to their level is a terrifying prospect as even though they are ´vegetarian´ they really do look like proper sharks should when swimming right towards you. Unfortunately without an underwater camera its still only in my head, but these guys have got some
http://www.nationalgeographic.com/photography/galleries/belize/photo2.html
The other dive sites were just off deserted Half moon caye

, where we lunched with the red footed boobies (ha ha, must resist) and where for their own sake we should of really left the cruise-ship divers in case they even think about diving again without learning how to actually dive properly without running out of air at 20m!

After being stuck on the island for going on for 2 weeks (its very very easy to do) we decided the only way to get off was to have a blowout party for everyone, so 20lbs of bbq´ed shrimp and 30 gallons of rum later we all ended up in Oceanside shaking communal booty with the locals.
Thanks to Amy, her sister and husband for dropping on by, laughing at our pathetic attempts at cooking and taking over the whole thing; creating the greatest feast I have had since I have been out here.