Here is just a few leftover bits and pieces from our last trip to Belize.

The San Ignacio outdoor market has so many bright colors with all the tropical fruit stalls, clothing and other things, now they have added more color by adding some beautiful murals on the walls around the market. It’s a great addition that depicts some of the history of the local people who lived along the river.

The market is in San Ignacio and to get to it from Santa Elena you must cross the Macal River using one of the two bridges. They are both one lane, one way bridges, one into town and the other out. The one into town is a low narrow wooden bridge while the one out is the Hawksworth  suspension Bridge.  The Hawksworth Bridge was imported from Middlesbrough, England in 1949 and is the only suspension bridge in all of Belize.

We met our new neighbor a few lots up from us. A real nice guy from Canada, his wife had to leave before we got there so we will have to wait until next time to meet her.  They had been waiting for their house to be delivered to the property and set up, hopefully it was going to happen while we were there so we could see how this whole operation worked. It did finally arrive and got all set up in place , but it was the day after we had to leave. They said that they plan on spending 6 months there starting in the fall, so we will definitely catch up with them in our next trips down.

Our new neighbor helped set Ruben up with a cinder block making machine. They had just started making blocks when we were there, and there have already been a lot of people stopping by already and inquiring about them. Ruben said that his brother is going to  help him and they can make up to 1200 blocks a day. Sounds like a good little business and hopefully it works out for them.  It will be great to have blocks available that close to us.

We have met a lot of interesting people as we travel around Belize and this was one of them. We were sitting at an outside restaurant having a bucket of beer and watching all the people go by. This young guy walks by with a basket with some cinnamon bread, so we commented that would be a good breakfast the next morning. He heard our comment and asked if we would like to buy one. We bought his last two and he thanked us. He was a very nice guy so we invited him to have a seat for a few minutes and chat with us. He proceeds to tell us that his goal in life is to become the next Prime Minister of Belize. He tells us how he is raising money now and once he is elected all the differences for the better he could make in Belize. He seemed to be a great guy with big ambitions. Hopefully he fulfills his dream and some day we can say we bought cinnamon bread from the Prime Minister of Belize.

A lot of people have been asking us what type of food there is in Belize. With Belize having such a great mixture of cultural influences the food choices are unlimited. There are of course the local cuisines such as fish, conch and lobster out on the islands and stewed chicken and cow foot soup more prominent inland. There is literally something there for everyone, no matter what your taste is.

Here is just a small sample of some of the delicious food we had last time we were in Belize. Curry lamb, pizza, cow foot soup, chicken and waffles, tamales, stewed chicken with rice and beans, fried conch, t-bone steak, pig tail in split pea soup, fried chicken, smoked pork tacos, chicken wings, pibil tacos, club sandwich, fish and the best lamb burger we have ever tasted. You can always find something good to eat as you travel around the country.

And then there was this bus on the side of the road. As you can see they cut half the cab off and added a dump bed. All makes good since to me, because now you can carry a whole crew and material out to a job sight in just one trip. Or if for some reason it is still a school bus, then I really understand the true meaning of dumping your kids off at school.

That’s about all for now, but we do have more trips planned this year, one in September and another one in December, so we will continue with the updates.