Now that the holidays are over and we are all moved into our new home, it’s time to start enjoying everything. Such as getting the quads out for a run, inviting friends over for a BBQ or just walking around the property. On a  recent walk we found these beautiful Haliconias or Lobster Claws. It’s great to be able to just find treasures like this right in your own back yard.

I had mentioned before that we had ordered another Caja China cooking box. Our idea was to cook a whole pig and invite all of the workers and their families over for a BBQ so that their families could see what they had been working on for the last nine months. It turns out that our neighbor across the way raises and sells pigs, so this was perfect. We told him we would need a 50 lb. pig once it was cleaned, he said no problem that he had one that was about that size. He called us when it was ready, so we loaded up the big ice chest in the truck and headed over to pick up the piggy. We showed up and there was this perfectly dressed pig just waiting to be turned into something delicious. The only problem was that he weighed in at 110 lbs. and that was way too big to fit into our cooker. I guess he usually sells the pigs live so his estimate was way off, but not a problem he would have another one for us in a few days. We ended up buying just the two hindquarters, which weighed in at 40 lbs. This actually worked out perfectly because it would give us a chance to test out the new cooker, plus invite a bunch of friends over who have been wanting to check out what we have been working on for the past nine months.

Getting that delicious Mojo sauce all up in that pig leg.

This was great, our first jungle party with a pig in a box (well, part of him anyway). Now we have cooked a lot of pigs in a box like this, but not with the local charcoal which burns very different than a bag of manufactured charcoal. There was a big learning curve trying to keep the temp where I wanted it, plus when and how much charcoal to add. Once it was all said and done, it turned out perfect and everyone had their fill of some delicious pork tacos.

Everything for this meal came from within walking distance to us. The pig was raised just down the road, tortillas came from this little lady in the village, Ruben brought sour oranges for the Mojo injection sauce plus tomatoes, peppers, and cabbage, fresh picked from his farm. Everything for a great meal and all without going to a store. It was a very successful test run so now we are ready for the for the real thing in a couple of weeks. And yes, the next smaller pig is already in the deep freezer just waiting for the next party. The smaller pig weighed in at 80 lbs, still a little big, but we’ll make it work.

The other day Remo’s Roadhouse hosted a chili cook-off for CAWS, the Cayo Animal Welfare Society so of course, we had to go check it out. There were some very good chilies there as well as auctions and of course puppies that were up for adoption. It was hard to not take one of the puppies home, but at this point, we are not quite ready to have a dog. It was a great time had by all, tasting chili, drinking cold beer and supporting the animals. Sound familiar? Anyway, next year we think we might both enter and we’ll see how that goes and by then we might even be ready for a dog.

Now that we are settling in, it is time to get started on some of the landscaping. We have had Ruben clearing up a bunch of the underbrush and cleaning up some of the big palm trees around the house to give it a more open and well-groomed look.

Between people giving us plants, finding plants around the property and going to the nursery, we have gathered a bunch of very nice ones that will look great once they get established. Some of the elephant ear plants will get leaves that are 4’ long while some of the other variety elephant ears will get smaller ones only around 2’ long, but that is still a big leaf.

We got a bunch of plants (not sure of the names) to go around the house that get purple flowers year round and can be trimmed into a hedge. They are only one day flowers on them and then they fall off, but they are always in bloom, so there is a lot of color.

We also got a bunch of purple shamrocks that have purple leaves and get small white flowers, those will work well as a ground cover around the other plants. Plus we got some pheasant tail, red dracaenas and Brazilian torch that get a lot of big red flowers which will all add a bunch of great colors once they get going. Combine that with all the philodendrons, bird of paradise, lobster claw, and orchids we are finding around the property we should have the place looking good in no time.

Speaking of looking good, the other day there was blue sky and then out of nowhere, this beautiful rainbow appears right over our driveway. All the plants, animals, insects and Mother Nature in general never cease to amaze us.

Music is a big part of the culture down here and is heard almost everywhere you go. A lot of times the drum is the heart and soul of the music with multiple drums and drummers giving it a very unique beat. When this happens you can feel it inside your bones and you can’t help but want to get up and move around.

There was even this guy pounding out some good beats on his homemade turtle shell drum set. It was amazing how many different tones he was getting from those shells.

There are also some great guitar players down here, but there are a few that are starting to look a little worn out. If anyone knows any guitar players, please send them down, we’ve got a place for them.

That’s about what’s happening around here this week, we hope some of you are starting to think about planning a trip down here sometime to see all that Belize has to offer. So come on down, we’ll leave a light on for you.

What a wild and crazy ride 2018 has been for us. It was just one year ago we were ringing in the new year at our home in Cholla Bay, Mexico wishing some day that we would be living in the Belizean jungle. Well, careful what you wish for, because all of a sudden a piece of property we had sold, so we figured that would justify us building a small casita on our property in Belize. This way we could go down for a few weeks at a time until we got to that point in our lives when we were ready to make Belize our permanent home. Just before we were ready to start building a small casita, an offer came in for our house in Mexico,  plus we had buyers for a few other pieces of property we had in Mexico, so now it looked like we were committed.

Now everything is pushed into fast gear to build a new home since we soon wouldn’t have a place to live. After a couple of quick trips to Belize to line up workers and set up accounts for materials and such, it was time to pack up our Mexican home of 24 years and get ready for the big move. It took awhile to consolidate everything down to what we thought was important and could fit in a 20’ shipping container, but we did it. At this point everything we had, including us, was sent up to our kids home in Arizona for about a month until we could get it all lined up and sent to down to Belize.

By the middle of June our little casita was done and it was time for us to start this new adventure. So we decided to make the move and move into the little casita while our house was being built. Of course there were setbacks along the way, such as the wood we wanted for the entire house wasn’t available. We spent a lot of time running around and ordering materials and trying to figure out who had the best price and if or when they might be able to get what we needed. After six months of hurdles and constant construction, we believe all the basics are done for now, so we were able to move into our new home just before we leave 2018 behind us. It is now very peaceful and quite here in the jungle without all the construction going on, and a lot of the birds and other animals are starting to come back around. It’s nice to see all the parrots, toucans and other colorful birds around the property once again.

We are now moved out of our guest casita and it is ready for company. It has a king size bed, a fold out futon, a private bath with hot water (yes, we are civilized here), a nice porch for enjoying your favorite drink and of course a big Iguana and her baby keeping you safe during your stay.

Enough of that, here’s what is happening now. Kelley is very, very happy to have an oven, a stove with more than one burner and a real size microwave. For the last six months we have been cooking with a single induction burner, a tiny BBQ and a tiny microwave. Now Kelley is cooking turkey dinner, eggs Benedict, lasagna and of course Christmas cookies. All we need now is to get the big BBQ built, a pizza oven, a smokehouse and then we will be cooking fools.

The other day we were surprised when our friend brought over a hind leg from a Gibnut that he had just shot. Gibnut is a very tasty animal down here, so good that they served it to the Queen of England when she visited Belize. This was a very special treat for us and I’m sure it will be quite awhile before we get it again.

The one thing I’ve come to realize is that without an oven and only one pot to cook with at a time you will tend to loose weight. It’s having an oven that will make you fat, all those baked goods and everything else you can cook with more than one burner at a time. Actually, I think we can control the evil oven once we get past the holidays and get all those good foods out of our system that we haven’t had in awhile.

A lot of people don’t know where Belize is and think it is a long and expensive flight to get here. Well ,here’s the skinny on it. Belize is on the southern border of Mexico on the Caribbean side, it is only about a 2 1/2 hour flight from Phoenix to Houston and then a 2 hour flight down to Belize. If you look around, Southwest can usually get you here for around $500 RT. There are other major carriers that fly here, but SW usually has the best rates.

We are finally settling in and starting to enjoy everything we had worked so hard to achieve and we hope friends and family will come down for a visit to see our piece of paradise. See ya’ll soon!

The Christmas spirit is in full swing down here in Belize. A lot of the houses and businesses have festive lights and inflatable Santas and snowmen can be seen everywhere.  Christmas carols can be heard just about everywhere you go and of course they all seem to have a nice Caribbean beat to them.

A big tradition down here is to spruce up your home for the holidays, so you see a lot of new construction going on as well as everything getting a new coat of paint for the holidays. In town, the streets are alive with people shopping and talking to friends they meet along the way, everybody here really gets into the Christmas season. The other day we passed a Salvation Army volunteer in front of the bank and he was playing Christmas songs on a very shinny trumpet. Remember back in the day in the states when the volunteers would play an instrument or sing Christmas carols instead of just sitting there ringing their bell.

We are also getting in the Christmas spirit by sprucing up our home for the holidays, mostly because it’s done and it is move-in time. We have been out buying furniture, paintings and other decorating items to make it a home. With so much beautiful art and furniture around it’s tough deciding just what pieces to take home. We did find a couple more paintings that we thought would be a great addition to the new home as well as having an entertainment center made from Purple Heart hardwood.

We did manage to get a couple strings of Christmas lights up and I found a new palm shoot that was coming up from a tree that had been cut down. And guess what, it looked just like a Christmas tree. Who says a tree has to be traditional, just a few fronds off the bottom and it was ready to go.

Here is what the outside looks like so far, there is still a lot of little things to be done, but this is the kind of stuff we love to do. Now all the landscaping starts, along with finding all the colorful tropical plants and deciding where to put them.

We took down a few big trees around the house to give a little more open feeling and had another load of gravel brought in to create a nice sitting area just off the side porch. And yes, the toucans have migrated over to their new permanent home where they will live forever.

The guest house now looked a little bare without them, but no sooner did they fly the coop than a big iguana and her baby moved in. I know we need to stop going by the wood carver, but he does such beautiful work, his prices are great and he is on the side of the road we drive down all the time.

There is still a lot of detail work inside we need to do, such as getting doors on the closet and the laundry room (which are being made from mahogany for under $100 each), building shelves and a bunch of other small stuff. It’s not completely done nor decorated but here are some pictures of what it looks like so far.

After six months of living in a small casita and sitting on hardwood chairs, we finally got a chance to check out the recliners in front of the new TV. Our butts and backs really appreciated it, and the first movie in the new house was Christmas Vacation. Tonight maybe Christmas Story, Bad Santa or the Grinch, we have to get in as many Christmas shows as we can before the season is over. The next couple of nights the temp is supposed to be a little cooler in the evenings, so hot chocolate and schnapps will help make it feel a little more like Christmas. Now it is still 85+ during the day, so ice cold beer during the afternoon and then hot drinks in the evening, what could be better. Okay… temperature update, last night our digital temp gauge stopped working when it hit 52 degrees, and I know it got colder than that. We have never even considered putting a heater in the house, A/C yes, but a heater? I’m sure this is just a freak cold snap and should be gone in a day or so. Whoever thought it got this cold down here in tropical Belize.

Speaking of cold, we picked up a used beer fridge for the garage the other day. Got it for $125 usd and he even gave us a two-month warranty on it, you can’t beat that. So the fridge is stocked and ready for anyone who might happen to stop in or come down to stay here. Of course, the beer in the photo will not be the actual beer we will be serving you as it needs to be cycled in and out often to keep its freshness. So come on down and have an ice cold Belikin, the guest house is now ready for visitors.

Wishing everyone a very Merry Christmas and a Belize Navidad from Kelley & Dave.

The construction of the house is done! The only things left are waiting for the granite countertops to be finished, the upper cabinets need to be installed and the sinks hooked up. Once all that is done then we will install all the appliances and start moving in some furniture, and by furniture, I mean something soft to set our asses on. We are still waiting for our bed to be finished and another woodworker is making the medicine cabinet for above the bathroom sink and a small entertainment center for the TV, stereo, and DVD player. So now all the cleanup and tree trimming is about to take place to make this place look good.

Since we are in a waiting pattern for a week or more for our granite, upper cabinets and bed to be finished, the timing worked out perfect for our quick trip up to the states. We will be heading up to see the kids and grandkids for an early Christmas. We are also planning a short trip down to Mexico to visit friends we haven’t seen in a while. Once we get back to Belize it will be Christmas for us. We will get to move into our new home and open up all the stuff that we had brought with us that we have not seen in a long time and all the new stuff we bought at the last minute to fill the container.

The front door turned out beautiful!!! It all started with an idea not to have a simple front entry door since that is what makes the great impression of your home. We kicked around a few ideas of having a door made and then we said why not have a carving done on it. Our first thoughts were a toucan or a parrot or maybe a jaguar, but after thinking more about it we settled on just some big tropical leaves. So I came up with a drawing of what we wanted and gave it to the woodworker and he transformed it into this beautiful one of a kind door that is really amazing.

This project is finally coming to an end, no more saws, sanders, constant hammering or people running around, just peace and quiet from now on. It seems like this was taking forever, but we think that was because we were here almost every day during the construction. In reality, it is amazing what has been done in the past nine months considering there was nothing here when we started. We now have a nice entrance and road coming in, a big garage\workshop, a guest house, and the main house, plus power and water where there was nothing before. There are still a lot of things for us to do around here such as landscaping, building shelves, building the BBQ, trash containers, etc., and that will keep us busy for a quite a while. After seeing everything all together and done I do see what the little boy meant when he said that we are building a beautiful resort. It does sort of look that way as you come through the front gate. Isn’t life wonderful when you have a dream and pursue it until it becomes a reality?

Since we are now starting to think about plants and landscaping we thought we would start by looking around the property for plants we could move closer to the house. We managed to find some nice big heliconia (lobster claw) plants that have the orange flowers on them, but we had to cut the blooms off because they were done. We moved a couple of them and I think we will be moving more once all the clean up is done. The picture below is what they will look like once they bloom again. Who needs a Home Depot garden department when you have a jungle full of tropical plants.

We always like to try new things whether it’s food we’ve never had before or exploring new things. The other day I got to do something I had not done in over thirty years. I got a ticket, for parking too close to the intersection. I guess you can not park within thirty feet from the corner. There was no sign or anything saying that anywhere, I guess you are just supposed to know that. The ticket was only $50 BZ or $25 US, so it really was no big deal and it only took about five minutes to pay it down at the Town Hall. At first, I thought there should be a sign stating no parking, then I thought about how you could get a ticket in the states for parking too close to a fire hydrant. They don’t have signs there either, it’s just something you are supposed to know. Oh well, lesson learned.

Once again it is that time of year when the new Belikin calendars are released. This years release party was not far from us so we decided to meet some friends, have a few beers, listen to some music and meet the models. They use to just sell the calendars, but for the past three years, you can only get them at a release party. We have somehow made it to the last three years releases and got to meet the models and get an autographed calendar. And the only reason we actually go every year is to get a calendar so that we know what day it is living out here in the jungle. Yah right!

The pig roasting box has arrived! In Mexico, we had a “La Caja China” cooking box that we cooked lots of whole pigs and other stuff in and everything always turned out great. After talking to one of our neighbors who raises pigs and lambs we thought it was only appropriate that we got another cooker. The Caja China cooker in Cholla Bay, Mexico was promptly repainted to read “La Caja Cholla” and now that we live in the Cayo Belize, you guessed it, new paint so it will read “La Caja Cayo.” One of the main reasons for ordering this (on Amazon) was to throw a big thank you BBQ for all the workers and their families who helped build our little piece of paradise. Plus you never know when someone might need an event catered or something.

We hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving and a great long weekend with friends and family. This is the first time in 24 years that we did not cook a turkey at our Bedrock home in Mexico and we have to admit it was a little different. They do have turkeys here and a lot of restaurants serve traditional Thanksgiving meals, but we decided to stay home and fix a nice ham on the grill for the two of us. Being a long holiday weekend it gave us time to go out and buy furnishings for the house. We found a great vibrant painting of a parrot, a reclining sofa with drink holders as well as a fold-out futon for the guesthouse in case anyone visits with kids. Our bed is also in the process of being made as well as some bar stools for the front porch and garage.

We also found a guy that makes live edge furniture, so we commissioned him to make us a big mirror for the bathroom wall. The wood we chose was Granadillo, a local hardwood, and it turned out beautiful. The fun thing here is that most of the furniture has to be made from scratch so that gives us the chance to design it and pick the type of wood, and with all the beautiful wood choices here that makes it tough.

The front door is also being carved from mahogany and should be ready real soon. This is a design that we came up with and once I had it drawn on paper he copied it exactly. The design on the 40” door will extend over onto the two 10” panels on each side of the door.

Since it was a long weekend we finally had time to build the workbench. It is 3’ wide by 18’ long using only 2 x 6’s and 4 x 4’s and it is anchored directly to the wall, I’m pretty sure I could drive the truck on it. Finally, a real place where I can get some projects done, up to now I’ve been using a fold-out table.

Also, we finally got the other half of the front entry gate painted and the locking hasp installed.

A lot has happened on the house this past week. There has been a big blue tarp all around it just in case it rained so that the freshly sanded porch won’t get wet. It sort of seems like that TV show Extreme Makeover where they will reveal your house once it is done. The inside is completely painted, the railing is up all around the porch, the electrician is here today, the lower cabinets get installed today, tomorrow the cabinets get measured for the granite so it should all come together this week.

A few years ago when we bought the property, Ruben had cut a trail down to a creek that borders our property. With everything else going on we had not given too much thought to it until the other day after a good rain. We could hear water running, so we put on our rubber boots and grabbed a machete and started chopping a trail down to where we thought the creek was. We found the creek and it was actually flowing pretty good. From what we remember from the first time we saw it there were some good size rocks somewhere in the creek that would make for a good little waterfall. Eventually, we will cut some trails down to where the best spots are and make small sitting areas so when it does run we can go check it out.

Kelley will not know I put this in the blog until she gets the post. The other day we were walking around the property and there was a huge vine hanging from this big tree all the way down to the ground. I chopped it off so that it was about three feet off the ground and then I pretended to swing on it like Tarzan. Knowing that it probably wouldn’t hold me I talked Kelley into giving it a try. She did a little test with her feet off the ground without a problem, so she decided to play Jane and give it a real try. Well you guessed it, it broke and she landed flat on her ass. She was okay, I just really wish I had the camera with me. Oh, what fun it is out in the jungle.

This weeks progress on the house was all about the things that don’t make for good pictures. The walls are ready for paint, the outside of the house is all sanded and clear coated and the floors are getting a good sanding. The interior mahogany doors are being finished and getting ready for installation along with all the window molding. The stairs have been put in place as well as the two small buildings for the water heater and the butane tank. The windows came on Friday afternoon and they managed to start installing them right away. The initial clean up has started and stuff is starting to be hauled away. Next week should be a big week of progress. The interior should be completely painted, the floors should have a nice finish on them, the railing around the porch will be up, the cabinets will arrive and hopefully, we will be able to turn on the lights. It should be a very exciting week.

Now, this house is not all that big and the only thing getting drywall is the walls. So the builder brings in a guy who all he does is drywall work, great! So I’m thinking a couple 5-gallon buckets of ready-mix drywall mud should be more than enough. No, he says that he needs five, so I buy three just so I don’t have to return any. After a couple days he says that he needs five more buckets and I’m thinking is this guy just eating this stuff. So now he has used eight 5-gallon buckets of mud, that’s 40 gallons of the stuff. But wait that’s not all, he still needs two more buckets. The finish on the walls is very smooth and the builder tells me that once the paint is on we will love it. Just as I thought it was ready for paint, guess what, that’s right… one more bucket. So a total of eleven 5-gallon buckets of mud, that’s a total of 55 gallons of ready-mix drywall mud. And I thought it was an overkill on all the cement they used on the garage.

This seems like exactly what happened last week. Saturday we get out there and built the other half of the gate. And I have to say, it amazed me that it fit perfectly considering that each section was 10’ and the hinge pins were cemented into the post already. Anyway since it was a perfect fit, we decided to take it easy for the rest of the day and wait till Sunday to give it some paint. Well you guessed it, it rained all night and now we have to wait for the wood to dry out before we put some paint on it. So it’s looking like this afternoon we’ll be heading over to Remo’s for some Sunday football and beer.

It has been about a month since we signed up and got our PO Box, but we still hadn’t gotten our keys. It turns out that the new cylinder and keys for the box had to be ordered from England. I think these PO Boxes were here back when Belize was still British Honduras and are still using the same locking mechanism. Anyway, we finally got our keys and unlike the states where the key usually says on it “Do not duplicate”, these did not say that.  Now I’m not a locksmith, but I really don’t think I could take these down to the local hardware store and have duplicates made. Always something interesting down here.

With us loving to cook, trying new foods and just a basic love of food, we really have to appreciate that you can just go out and find different wild edible plants growing around us. The other day Ruben found theses beautiful Oyster mushrooms growing on a palm tree right by the house. We have found some before close to the house, but we have never gone out and foraged for them. As soon as we get in our kitchen and can really start cooking again we will grab a bucket and be on the hunt for more of these tasty mushrooms.

The house is still moving along. This week they took down all the scaffolding, allowing us to really see how big the porch is. On the front of the house the porch is 10’ x 26’ and along the side it is 7’ x 20’ which should be great for relaxing and entertaining. Currently, they are making all the window molding, tiling the shower and a bunch of other finish detail work. At this point, we can actually see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Last Sunday we were going to paint the new fence but it started to rain, so football and beer sounded like a much better idea. Monday was a bright sunny day so we got out there and painted that sucker up. We think it looks good and blends nicely into the surroundings. We spent all of Saturday building and painting the first gate, we will build the other one next weekend and it should go a lot faster now that I have a good pattern.

We also had another truckload of gravel brought in to help finish up the road and to help with the mud when it rains. The whole thing is really starting to come together all at once. The contractor’s son (who is around 12 yrs) has been here all summer helping out, the other day he told me that we are building a beautiful resort. Not quite a resort, but in the eyes of some, I guess it could look that way.

The garden area where we planted all the trees is doing very well, lots of new leaves on all the trees. Although there is one little problem, we have a mole. I wouldn’t think too much about it but he is eating the roots on my cocoa plants and that will result in less chocolate, which makes that a problem. I have dug up his holes at night, during the day and even in the pouring rain all with no luck. I have even set a trap and sat out there at night with a pellet gun, but still nothing. I will get him you just wait and see. I know this is where you start singing the song from Caddy Shack.

We went to Belmopan (the capital of Belize) the other day to see about getting a permit for my LED light bar on top of our truck. The head of transportation told us that they are not issuing any permits for any type of extra lights on any vehicles. This order came down from the Ministry with the reason being that people were not turning them off when driving on public roads and cars are crashing.  Also, it has become a competition as to who can have the brightest lights. So at this point, it is now illegal to have any lights on your vehicle that did not come with it. I hate to take this light bar off especially when I see other vehicles still with them on, but on the other hand, I’d hate to end up in jail over a light bar infraction.

The creature feature of the week is the Tapir or Mountain Cow which is the national animal of Belize. This picture was taken at the Belize zoo, but they do roam all over the country. I have heard that there are a lot of them in Mountain Pine Ridge area which is right by us. Tapirs are herbivores eating mostly plants and fruits along the river banks. They spend a lot of time in the rivers as they are excellent swimmers as well as agile climbers. They are a big animal getting up to six feet in length and weighing up to 500 lbs. I guess they are hard to spot in the wild but their tracks are easily identified because their hoofs have 4 toes in the front and 3 in the rear. They range from southern Mexico to Columbia, but are now endangered due to poaching. Belize has the biggest population of these mammals so there is a decent chance of us seeing one in the wild someday.

Being November with the cooler weather just ahead, it is time to start thinking about some warm soups. Well that really doesn’t apply here… I just wanted some chowder. I have been making clam chowder for a long time now and if I have to say it’s pretty good. So for the last few months we have been looking for and asking everyone where we might find some clams, all with no luck. Then I got to thinking, we’ve got a bunch of lobsters in the freezer, what if we just substitute the lobster for the clams and make this a lobster chowder.

Now you have to remember that this has to be cooked outside on one induction burner and all with only one pot. So every time the bacon has to be cooked or the onions sauteed or the stock has to be made from the lobster shells the one pot has to be cleaned out. It took awhile and about six beers, but in the end it was great! Also there is a small French bakery here that makes a pretty good sourdough bread. Lobster chowder, sourdough bread and some cold beers, what more could you ask for. Once we are in the new house with a real kitchen this will be a lot easier to make. So if you are down here visiting and you mention how good some lobster chowder would be, chances are we might make some.

Final stages of construction

The house is still really moving along. All the drywall is up and wow those ceilings look tall. The electrical is all roughed in as well as all the plumbing. Everything is getting a good sanding again and the railings are being made. Next week the shower is getting tiled and the drywall will be done. He is now thinking maybe two more weeks till his part is done, but that does’t count for the cabinets and another week for the granite. I’m still thinking mid December before we are all moved in, but who knows.

The cabinets are coming along nicely. He has got one of the lowers stained so we could see the color before he did the rest. The drawers and the doors are now being made along with all the uppers.  One of the owners of a resort in the area saw them and commented on how he loves the wood and the color and wouldn’t mind that in his resort.

All the mahogany has been bought and is ready to be made into our front entry door. We gave him a design of what we wanted and after the door is made he will start on the carving, it should be spectacular.

This week we also had them make a couple pillars at the entrance to the property so we could eventually install a gate. We spent a sweaty Saturday building a small fence on each side of the pillars. In the next week or so we will be building the gates that will go across them. Each gate will be 10’ allowing for a 20’ opening into the driveway. That should big enough to bring in big trucks if needed. I was hoping to get a picture of the fence all painted but it started raining today. So since it is a Sunday we will have to go to Remo’s and watch a little football and maybe have a couple beers till the rain stops.

Christmas is right around the corner and I’m sure the stores are filled with the beautiful red poinsettias. After the holidays I’m sure almost everyone just throws them away, well not down here. Our neighbor down the way has one that is huge in their front yard. I didn’t even know it was a poinsettia until it started to turn red. Now is this the biggest poinsettia you’ve ever seen?

Weezz get’n modernized now. Took down the old clothes line and temporarily hooked up the clothes dryer in the garage. We have not had warm really dry cloths since we’ve been here, and they are so nice! We have a garage full of appliances and stuff just ready to be installed so we figured why not start using some. Next thing you know Kelley will be baking cookies in the garage on her new stove.

Funny little rule and regulation. In Belize they have check points along the highway mostly to check to see if you have current registration and insurance. And so we were on one of our many runs to the hardware store and there was a police check point. We have been through many of these with no problem, but this time he didn’t just wave me through. He asked me if I had a permit for the LED light bar on top of my truck. Then he wanted to know why I needed such a big light bar. I explained to him that we live way out in the bush and it is very dark and I don’t want to hit any animals. I assume he must not have spent too much time out in the bush at night and seen how dark it can really get plus not knowing when an animal might run in front of you. Anyway he told me I had to go to the Department of Transportation and get a permit for my light or I had to remove it from the truck. Who would have thought you needed a permit to put a light on your truck. Then again we had to get a permit for a cell phone booster. It’s always interesting to find out what rules and regulations they have in other countries.

Sorry there is no creature feature this week as we have been too busy with finishing up the house. Also the last time I checked the cameras there was really nothing on them, but once all the noise and construction stops I’m sure all the animals will be back.

The house is still moving along at record speed and we couldn’t be happier as his plan is to have it done by December 1st. Right now he is bringing in people who specialize in drywall, electrical and plumbing so that his crew can continue doing what they do. The red zinc roof is on now that the insulation and all the wiring for the ceiling lights and fans are in. The flooring is all down even around the deck outside, there is still a little of siding to finish, but that should not take more than another day. Starting next week the drywall guy will be here and should have it all in by the end of the week. At this point everything is on schedule including the cabinet guy, the granite guy, window guys, etc. We are so excited to have this all come to a reality and who knows, we might even be able to put up some Christmas lights this year on our brand new jungle home.

The garage is getting close to being empty of all the wood for the house, which is good because we are filling it up with other stuff. Although it is starting to look like a hardware store with all the appliances, door handles, air conditioner, light fixtures, water heater, propane tank, fans, etc. Very soon it will be empty again and I will be able to have a real garage where I can actually work on stuff and not have just a big storage shed.

Now that rains have seemed to have stopped for awhile, it was time to get a water line up to where the new fruit trees are. Of course, no matter how much you plan you know there will be one little thing about the job that won’t go right, and that is what happened to us. It seems that when the original water pipe was run it was all 2” right up to the property line. So when we ran ours down to the house we stayed with the 2” pipe for the whole run. So we buy all the elbows, T’s, reducers and shutoff valves to make this all work. Two inch pipe at the driveway coming in and two inch pipe at the house, everywhere except where I had dug to splice in the for the new line, it was 1 1/2”. No problem I’ll go the the little hardware store in the village to get all the new parts. Perfect except I had forgot that I now needed a couple of feet of 1 1/2” PVC so the shutoff valve would be above the ground. So back to the store for some PVC and of course they didn’t have any, so now we have to run to town and the simple water line has turned into a two day project. No problem I’m sure the trees can wait one more day for some more water.

We are always looking to try new and different foods, especially when they are indigenous to the region. The other day we stumbled across some local wine that is made not far from us here in Belize. It is a Sorrel wine from Swirly Head Fruit Wines. It is made from Hibiscus sabdariffa, in Belize it is called “Sorrel” and in Spanish it is called “Flor de Jamica”. It’s an organic wine that is made with all local ingredients and taste like a good rosé. We will definitely be buying more and maybe even go for tasting if they offer it.

A few yeas ago we took a picture at the market of something that we did not know what it was, but now we know that it was Sorrel that can be used to flavor all kinds of stuff including wine and even Belikin beer during the Christmas season.

Scary things in the jungle

Living in the jungle is something new to us and getting use to some of the sights and sounds that we are unfamiliar with takes some getting used to. All of a sudden it is dead calm and you hear a bunch of branches rustle and you can’t see what it is through the dense jungle. Is it an animal jumping around or is it just branches falling and it is even worse when it is totally dark outside. One night when it was very dark out we were doing dishes out back in our little temporary sink with just a small light when a big possum runs down a tree about 10’ from us. A little scary when you don’t know what it is at first. There are lots of animal noises that we hear in the night, for instance the big thing that kept running under the house for awhile, still not sure what that was. Sometimes we hear wild cats (not your typical house cat), every so often you can even hear the howler monkeys and a bunch of other animals we have no idea of what they are. We were even informed by the vet in town to be careful of the vampire bats.

As far as insects go we have seen more insects and spiders in the 4-6” range than ever before. At night when you shine your flashlight on the ground all you see is eyes shining and looking at you from everywhere. These are just small 2” spiders that will run from you if you get close to them, well sometimes, one did make Kelley do a little dance one night.

The ground spiders and the tarantulas are our favorite because they usually just go away from you unlike others that make big webs that you could unknowingly walk into when you are strolling through the jungle. That’s the last thing you want is a giant spider stuck to your face.

Then there are the big black scorpions, a little scary when a 4” scorpion takes 4-5 smacks with a shoe to kill it.

You have heard of it raining cats and dogs but have you ever heard of it raining snakes? The other morning Kelley was outside when she heard a loud thud on the big blue tarp covering our house. It seems that a snake had fallen out of a tree and landed on the tarp, and people say we should be careful of falling coconuts.

I think the scariest thing we have experienced living in the jungle was this unforgettable cry we heard. One night we were sitting outside enjoying a cold beer when we heard what sounded like a child crying.  It went on for only about ten seconds or so and then it was gone. We looked at each other got our flashlights and a machete and started looking around. After about ten minutes of searching we sat back down and tried to figure out what we had just heard. The next evening about the same time we heard it again and this time we swore it said “Help me”. Up to that point we assumed it was an animal of some type, but now we were getting a little freaked out. By the next morning we had forgotten all about it, but as the sun started to go down we started to think about it again. That night after dinner we decided to stay inside and watch a little TV. Then about the same time as the other nights there it was again, crying and then a very clear cry for help. That’s when we decided that we should just turn off all the lights, lock the windows and door, get the machete and the pellet gun ready just in case. At that point we were pretty much scared shitless. We never did hear that same sound again and to this day we still don’t know exactly what it was.

All the bugs and the animals are for real, but as for the child crying… HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Oh and one more scary thing. The other day we were driving around and all of a sudden out of nowhere this big Jaguar appears.

We are not trying to scare anyone away, but like anywhere there are bugs, snakes, bats etc. We in fact we have only seen 2 small snakes, 3 scorpions and 2 tarantulas since we have been here. We just thought it would be fun to highlight the few we have seen just in time for Halloween.

The house has now officially shifted into high gear. The roof is about done, the floor is going down and the siding is going on. Next week the electrician will be here to run all the outlets and switches and to run the underground power from the main breakers. We have been shopping and comparing prices for lights, appliances, doors, fans, etc and are starting to stockpile them in the garage. If all goes well, he is estimating another six weeks till completion, even if that is off by a few weeks it should still put us in there by Christmas or the end of the year. Still a lot to accomplish for them and for us, but time is flying by and we can not wait to be in a bigger house with a real kitchen and living room.

There is no big retail stores here, so any type of cabinets, vanity’s, dressers or other stuff like that has to be made. There are a few bed and dresser sets available, but the options are very slim. It is also challenging to shop for appliances, lights, fans, etc. So far we have only found one store that carries a built-in microwave, the good thing is that it was what we were looking for. And it seems that no one down here carries a dishwasher, in fact our cabinet maker has never even seen one before. We did locate a nice stainless dishwasher at one store so we are off to get it before someone else does. Not many choices on outdoor lighting or fans either, but with enough shopping around we usually find something that will work.

We had to go see the cabinet maker the other day to make sure the measurement was correct where the microwave, stove and dishwasher are going. We were very surprised to see that so much of the work had already been done on the kitchen cabinets. Kelley could almost picture herself standing in a real kitchen, cooking up some amazing food again. Jose had told us before that the framing is the part that goes pretty fast, and it’s making all the doors and draws that take time. Still it was nice to see the cabinets taking shape, and it is all hardwood, no plywood or particle board here. Plus he is making them extra strong so that they will support the weight of the granite.

We’ve been saying how it would be nice to have some more bananas in the entrance side of where we planted all the fruit trees. Ruben said that he had some that he could dig up for us if we wanted them, so of course we said yes. So first thing Saturday morning we took the truck over to his house to pick up six very big banana trees. There was a variety of plantains, apple bananas and local bananas, all of which are very good.

The little mini orchard is starting to look great with all the trees, the new grass coming up and the addition of the new bananas, it going to be a regular fruit-topia of trees once they all get established.

We are big fans of funny signs and when we see one we try to get a picture of it, which doesn’t always work when you are driving down the road. This one we just had to stop for because it was funny and because it was put out by the Department of the Environment, which even made it better. The sign reads “No Dumping of any kind, Let’s keep Belize clean”. A very good and positive message. Okay, so let’s look at the pictures and think about this. A person throwing trash, very understandable. A person sitting on the toilet, understandable, but funny. An emoji with a broken heart??? Okay, so no dumping of your girlfriend, boyfriend, husband, wife or even your dog? I guess in order to help keep Belize clean you should not throw trash, poop in the proper receptacle and do not break up with anyone. Funny right?

And speaking of signs, I added a few more to the funny sign section on the blog.

The creature feature of the week is the White-nosed Coati or commonly called Coatimundi. There are a lot of these roaming around the property, we have captured up to twelve at a time on some of our trail cameras. The males can get up to three and a half feet in length from nose to the tip of their tail and weigh up to 27 lbs. Where as the females are a lot smaller with some only getting up to six pounds or so. Coatimundi’s are found from southern Arizona all through Mexico and through Central America, from sea level up to 9,800 feet. They are considered omnivores and will search for small vertebrates, fruits, insects, snakes and eggs during the daylight and then spend the evenings sleeping in the trees. Coatimundi’s will easily adapt to human presence and will have no problem raiding a campsite or trash can.

Usually at night we hear some sounds that we just can’t identify, but a few nights ago we must have slept right through the big trash can raid. When we got up in the morning our covered trash can that is kept under the house was drug out and spread all over the place. We are assuming that it was the work of some mischievous Coatis and not the cat that we keep hearing. Wait a minute, didn’t I just say that Coatis sleep at night. Anyway the other evening we heard a small kitten calling for it’s mother, which makes sense because a couple weeks ago we heard a bigger one making a lot of noise. We are going to assume it was a fox or a possum that got the trash and not a cat, and we’re pretty sure it wasn’t a monkey because all of our beer was still there in the morning.

Like I said last week, October is here, which means lots of rain. Not knowing when the sky will open up and there will be a major down pour makes it a little hard to cook dinners outside, since at this point we don’t have a kitchen. Last Saturday we decided to set up a makeshift kitchen in the garage and cook up a bunch of meals to store in the freezer for a rainy day. We set up the table, got out the cutting board and Kelley fired up the induction burner. She made up a bunch of burritos and enchiladas while I grilled up a bunch of pork ribs. This will get us through on those days when it is too wet to go outside and fire up the grill.

Being the rainy season it also is a little tough to get your cloths to dry on the clothes line outside. Since we do not have a clothes dryer yet, the only sensible thing to do was to string up a line in the garage with the fan blowing on them. It was quite a sight, Kelley’s in the garage cooking up a bunch of food, laundry strung up between a pole and a ladder with a fan blowing on them, piles of lumber, tool boxes and quads all in the same room, while listening to good ‘ole country hillbilly music on a Sirius radio station. Now if this ain’t living, we don’t know what is.

Soon enough we will be a little more civilized with a real kitchen and an indoor laundry facility, but in the meantime we are making memories, Yee Haw!

Since we cooked up all the meals for a rainy day we have had seven days of beautiful weather with only a few showers here and there. Go figure.

As for the house update, they are still working like crazy and the lack of rain and the really big tarps over the house are really helping. The big pile of wood in the garage is getting smaller and smaller everyday which means our garage is getting bigger each day. At this point, all the framing is done and now it’s time to start with all the other stuff that will start to make this look like a real house. Almost all of the tongue and grove for the ceiling has been sanded, sealed and coated with a nice varnish and is starting to go up. The zinc metal roof will be here next week and should also be going on soon. The flooring was going to be the last thing to go down, but now the gears have shifted and he has hired a drywall guy. So next week they will need to start getting the flooring down so he can start with the walls.

All of the big beams for the ceiling are bolted together with big lag bolts that are countersunk. That means there is a 1 1/4” plug that needs to go into the hole to hide the bolts. Up to this point they have been hand grinding each plug, so we talked to our cabinet guy and it turns out that he has the equipment to make dowels that can be cut to size for the plugs. This alone probably saved at least a couple of days worth of work.

And speaking of the cabinet maker, he has already started on the cabinets. He was suppose to start in a couple of weeks so that the wood could have a chance to dry a little more, but it turns out that he rounded up enough of the Santa Maria that was already dry. At this point most of the pieces are all cut, sanded and starting to be assembled. We also dropped off some plans for the bathroom vanity. Things are just really moving along here.

For the month of October, Belikin Beer came out with a Black and Tan Beer just for Oktobeer Fest. I had seen their promo poster a few times but it wasn’t until Kelley pointed out that it wasn’t October Fest it was spelled Ok-to-beer Fest, pretty clever we thought. We are usually just regular old beer drinkers and usually don’t go for the ‘so called’ specialty beers, but the other night while enjoying a few of our regular beers I thought I should at least give one a try. It was good, a little heaver than their regular beer, but just not my thing. Recently they also made a chocolate beer, we didn’t try that one only because, well it’s chocolate beer and some flavors just shouldn’t be mixed.

The other night while sitting outside the garage we did see our first snake on the property, we know they are out there we just haven’t seen any up to this point. It was a beautiful little snake, orange with black stripes, we figured it was either King snake (non-venomous) or a Coral snake (highly venomous). It didn’t have any yellow stripes on it so it was hard to tell if it was even one of those two. After a few pictures Kelley flicked him off into the darkness with a big stick and hoped he would just go away.

After posting the picture on ‘Creatures of Belize’ the general consensus was that it was a false Coral snake and was totally harmless. As you can see with my shoe in the picture for comparison, he was huge. I know a lot of people don’t like snakes and think they should all be killed, but there are some that are very beneficial. There are some that are called scorpion eaters and some that actually eat the other venomous snakes, plus they help to keep the rodent population down. There are a lot more harmless snakes out there than there are harmful ones, you just have to be careful and try to know the difference.

After a good search we found some more coffee and cocoa plants to fill in the voids where the other ones are. These were almost twice the size of the other plants that we put in recently, in fact the coffee plants are already bearing fruit. This brings the total to nine coffee trees and nine cocoa trees, with the coffee already producing hopefully next year we will have some to roast and taste.

Creature Feature of the week is the Tettigoniidae, Bush Cricket or Katydid. I’m featuring him this week because it is a big insect and we see quite a few of them. I guess there is over 6500 types of these insects and they range in size from 5 mm to 130 mm in length (that’s a little over 5”). They are found on every continent except Antarctica and are mostly found in the tropics. Most of them will feed on leaves, flowers, bark and seeds, but some will also feed on insects, snails and even small lizards or snakes. They make a chirping sound like a cricket and supposedly you can count the number of chirps in 15 seconds and add 37 to that and that will give you the temperature in degrees Fahrenheit. So next time you are outside and wondering how hot it is just listen for the chirps and then add it up. If for some reason you come up with a number that just don’t make since then chances are you were probably counting cricket chirps.

Unlike last week, this has been a very busy week for us here in the jungle, even with all the rains.

The rainy season here started in June and is supposed to go until early November. Up to this point it has not been bad at all. The heavy rains seem to come at night and only last for a short time every few days which gives time for everything to dry up pretty well. This is great for our construction, as I think there has only been a few days that they haven’t been able to work. The big tarps that they have covering over the house and all the extra gravel around the work area have really helped keep the mud to a minimum and everything dry during construction. Everyone says that October is the month that usually gets the most amount of rain and we should be ready for it. Almost like clockwork, it has been raining every day in October so far, and when it does they are major downpours. The good thing so far is that the rain comes in spurts and there are some clear skies in between, but I think that might change. This weekend we will be setting up our weather station so we can actually see how much rain we are getting, then again maybe we really don’t want to know. Everyone keeps saying that once October is over, it’s clear and sunny days again as we enter into the dry season.

They have made some good progress on the house this week. They have the center main beam up and most of the main rafters are sanded and ready to go up next. They have also got a bunch of the tongue and grove sanded, sealed and ready for the ceiling next week. The beams around the porch are now up so you can start to see the outline of the house. Of course with all this wood there is a lot of sanding going on, which if you didn’t know better you would think there is a huge swarm of killer bees circling our house all day till five o’clock. And I don’t even want to talk about all the sand paper that we have bought, but it is all worth it because the wood is turning out beautiful.

Woo Hoo! The order has been placed for our kitchen cabinets and they should be ready in about two months. Jose is a local wood worker up the road that does amazing work, if you get a chance check out his Facebook page (Belize Exotic Arts). When we stopped and talked to him the other day we were surprised to hear that it would take two months for the cabinets to be done, but that is actually just about the time the house will be ready for them, so all is good. The wood we chose will be Santa Maria, a local hardwood that will have a beautiful finish when done. We had trouble locating the color stain that we wanted, but Jose had one that he mixes up that was the exact color we were looking for. In case you are wondering, the cabinets will be stained red with the grain showing through and then be topped with a black granite counter top.

Jose will also be making our front door out of Mahogany that will have a carving on the front. Our front door opening is 60” and we have an idea of what we want, but of course you will have to wait until it is done before you get to see it. We did luck out getting our order in, there were two other customers that also wanted kitchen cabinets done soon, but they had not finalized anything with him yet. So we got our plans to him and got him a deposit to start and now we are first in line. I guess it pays to be on top of things and have cash ready to go. Other things accomplished this week were the ordering of all the windows and the glass shower door, picking out the the tile for the shower and checking out the granite for the kitchen and bathroom. The whole thing is really starting to come together and we could not be more excited.

We finally got all of our trees planted. After the initial clearing of the area where the mini orchard was going it still took a couple months to get the area ready. Once the jungle plants were cut down they all had to dry so they could be burned. Then after that it was time to level the soil, rake everything up, clear all the stumps and burn again. This all took time in between the rains and other stuff, but now it was ready for the trees. The soil is rich and black which should be perfect for all those trees to thrive in.

Here is a quick rundown of what kind of trees we planted, Avocado, Mango, Starfruit, Orange, Lemon, Grapefruit, Lime, Cinnamon, Macadamia Nut, Coffee, Cocoa, Custard Apple, Wax Apple, Dragon Fruit, Bananas plus a couple of Vanilla vines. There are multiples of the Coffee and Cocoa with room for a few more of each, because you can’t have too much coffee or chocolate, can you? Over time the natural grass will eventually cover all the ground around the trees, but this could take awhile. So to help it along we bought a couple bags of grass seed and spread it all around to help speed up the process.  Eventually this will become a nice grassy area with some great producing trees. And just in case anyone is wondering this area is where a couple years ago the electric company had cut down the bigger trees to make room for the power poles, so it was just a bunch of smaller under growth that needed clearing. This section runs north and south so it should be perfect for the plants with good morning and mid day sun.

Now that all the fruit trees are in, we thought we should start planning ways to preserve some of them when the time comes. There is always making jams, preserving whole fruits and dehydrating them, but we thought we should try something a little different. This past weekend we decided to try our had at making some liqueurs. The first one is a Jamaican Lime (which is a green skinned citrus that is orange inside) mixed with sugar and Cuban Rum. The second one is a Dragon Fruit mixed with sugar and Vodka and the last one is a Wild Grape (that we picked on our road) mixed with sugar and Vodka. They should take about two months to do their thing and then they will be ready for some awesome holiday drinks. If these turn out good we can’t wait to start trying some of the other exotic fruits that are available here.

Finally we  found time to take a break from everything and get the quads out for a ride. Up till now we have only rode them a few miles and Kelley hadn’t even rode hers by herself yet. We loaded up, put our helmets on and headed off into the jungle for a little trail ride. We had hoped to stop at the Malfunction Junction for a cold beer but they haven’t been open in months so it was further up the road we went. A few miles up the road was the guard gate heading into Mountain Pine Ridge. We said hello to the guard and told him we were just on a ride, he said have a good day and we were on our way. It started to rain pretty good which we thought made the whole ride just a little more fun.

After a while the rain had stopped, and would you believe right on the side of the road was a little place that had a sign that read cold beer. Thinking that if this guy can sell beer in the middle of nowhere then we should probably stop and support his efforts. His name was Kevin and he had some of the coldest beer anywhere. After a good rest and a couple beers we decided we should probably start to head back to the house and get the grill fired up before too much more rain came. We said goodbye to Kevin and told him we would stop in any time we were up that way again. It was a great day for a trail ride and we know there will be many more to come once we really get settled in here.

We are both finally P-O’ed, post officed that is. Up in San Antonio where we are we have a general delivery Post Office, but we thought that we should have a real PO Box down in San Ignacio to make it easier for the banks, insurance and other legal stuff.  So now after all this time we have an actually place where stuff can be sent. Our address is…

Dave & Kelley Adams

PO Box 331

San Ignacio, Cayo, Belize

Central America

Creature Feature of the week is something right out of Jurassic Park. We were watching TV the other night and there is a loud thud on the screen door, (we’re glad we had the door shut). We assumed it was our local tree frog or maybe even a big grasshopper, but we had no idea what strange creature this might be. The first picture is of him on my flip flop so you can see that he is a very big insect. He is a very weird insect that has a head that looks like a Hippopotamus. After a little research it turns out that it is a Peanut Head Moth, which really isn’t a moth at all it’s a member of the plant hopper family

They say that they are harmless but, local legend says that if a young girl gets bit by one she has 24 hours to sleep with her boyfriend or she will die. You gotta love legends! This creature is very unique, but is not really a thing of beauty until he spreads his wings, and when he does, WOW! Besides looking like an owl he also has a spray that resembles that of a skunk. Now those are pretty good defense mechanism that should scare off just about any predator. This is just another fine example of some of the amazing creatures we have encountered in Belize.

After a week of peace and quite, here we are back to the sound and the rhythms of sanders, saws and nails being pounded in. The quietness of last week was great and we can’t wait for that to become the norm. But for now, every time we hear the buzzing of the sanders, the whining of a saw or a nail being pounded in we know we are just that much closer to that day when it will be sitting on that porch relaxing.

This week has been a busy one for us, running around ordering up supplies, picking up more materials and taking care of personal business. One big accomplishment this week was getting the two quads re-titled, insured and registered in Belize. After a bunch of running here and there plus throw in an hour for lunch when everyone closes, it took the better part of an afternoon. But it was all worth it because now the quads are insured and have Belizean plates and can be driven anywhere. Oh course the plates they gave us were full size car plates, I guess the smaller motorcycle size are only for two and three wheel vehicles.

Amongst all of our running around we had to head over to the Mennonite community of Spanish Lookout to get some more metal brackets made. I am still just amazed at the steel place down here. We needed 16 metal  “L” brackets made out of 1/4” stock, they were 2” wide by 5” with four 1/2” holes in each one. Plus I had them laser cut 2 door striker plates out of 1/4” stock. Of course they always ask if we wanted to wait for them, but we had some more stops to make so we said we would come back for them. About an hour of so later they were ready when we showed up and all to the tune of around $30. I bet they could build me a whole tractor in a couple days.

It really doesn’t look like much has changed this week on the house and that’s because they have been working on the interior walls and sanding all the main beams for the ceiling and getting ready to put the roof line on. We did get the garage reorganized and the container pretty much cleared out. The remaining stuff in the container is crammed in the very back, this allows them to now use the front of the container for their tools and materials in a more secure environment. Which also meant that they could tear down the little shack that they built earlier this year for storage. And beside, Antonio was wanting to take the wood from the shack home so he could build a chicken coop. So all is good, we no longer have a small shack and the chickens are getting a new home.

Grocery shopping here is always an adventure, for that matter any kind of shopping is because you never know what you might find. This weeks find of the week was Ritz Bacon and Black Pepper flavored crackers. Oh are they good, or maybe it’s just because I haven’t had a decent cracker in months. Anyway, shopping here sort of reminds us of Costco in the states, just because you see it there once doesn’t mean you will ever see it again. So if you even think you might want it, buy it now while you have the chance.

The Creature Feature of the week is the Golden Orb Spider. This one here was found on a big web in one of the window openings of the new house. If you look closely at the picture you can see a smaller spider near the back side of the big one, that is the male. The male Golden Orbs spiders are very small compared to the female, this female was about 4” in length. In their web they will catch flies, moths, bees, beetles and butterflies, but some butterflies they will actually free and release from their web because of the toxins in them. They say that the Golden Orb spiders are not dangerous, but I believe that they would cause uncontrollably flailing of the arms, running into things, sore throat from screaming and a possible heart attack if one were to get on you.

Not much really happening here this week, mostly just day to day stuff, but we hope you are still enjoying the updates anyway.

It’s hard to believe that we are at post 100 of our little Belizean adventure. Over the past three years since we started this blog a lot has happened in our lives. First we buy some property in Belize with a dream of someday living there. Then we start clearing a spot in the jungle where someday we could build a small house. With no plans on when this might happen we decide that we might as well go ahead and get some power and water run so someday we will be ready to build. Since we now had a road, water and power there was only one thing left to do, and that was to put our house in Mexico up for sale. We really didn’t think it would sell as fast as it did, but it did. Now we had to pack up 24 years worth of memories and move it up to the kids house in Arizona where we stayed while we got a container ready to ship everything to Belize. At this point we were committed and there was no turning back. So now here we are in the Belizean jungle, living in a small casita with a big garage watching them build our main house. This is all just the beginning of our latest adventure and we would like to thank everyone who has been following along with us and commenting on this wild ride we are on. We hope you have enjoyed it so far, I know we have. 

There’s not much really happening around here this week (it’s nice and quite actually) as the workers have taken a week off to relax and probably get some things done around their own houses. So this time I will just post some before and after pictures of how this whole thing is evolving.

This is our initial cut in to the jungle, when we had no idea of what we were doing. I’m still not sure we know what we are doing, but at least we are doing it.

After all the plants are down and burned it was time to level it up and put down a solid foundation for a road.

Everything has grown back nicely and is creating a nice entrance into our place. There are still lots more plans for the entrance, but we will have to wait till all the construction is done.

This is the clearing where the first casita was to be built and where our guest will eventually stay.

The first casita is done and very cozy and comfortable. This is where we are currently living while the house is being built.

Tony on the backhoe clearing out all the trees and stumps and leveling out the ground where the garage will go.

Always nine to eleven guys working hard to get this garage done.

And the finished garage which only took about eight weeks from start to finish. Finally we have a place for tools and to store stuff. It is 25’ x 35’ with 11’ walls which is more than big enough for us.

The clearing under the palms where we thought would make a great place for our new home.

Now the palms trees are trimmed up, a few more plants have been removed and a house is growing up between it all. We can’t wait to be sitting on the wrap around porch enjoying a cold beer with friends and keeping an eye out for whatever animal might wander by.

That is our progress so far in a nut shell, but come next week everything will kick into full gear and the building should not take a break until the house is done.

Independence Day

September 21st is Independence Day for Belize. The whole country celebrates with parades, music and fireworks in every little town and village, and after only 37 years of independence they party hard. Our little village of San Antonio celebrated with lots of music and fireworks, but we opted to go to San Ignacio for a bigger celebration experience. Along the three or so mile parade route there was hardly a place to stand, with everybody waving flags, blowing horns and showing pride for their country. Of course the parade started a hour and a half late, but that didn’t stop anyone from having a good time.

The parade ended at a big park where there were beer tents, food booths and live music. We decided to skip that and get back up the hill to our place before it got dark, after all everyone was drinking and celebrating pretty heavily and we thought it would be best if we just had a few beers back at home.

There was even a beer truck in the parade handing out free beer.

More Bits and Pieces

Last weekend we were having a beer at one of our favorite watering holes when we started talking to a guy about fishing. It turns out that he is the lumber management person for the Chiquibul National Forest. We started talking about how we had some trouble getting the Nargusta hardwood to build our current house. He said that they manage a lot of Nargusta trees and he doesn’t know why more people don’t use it because it is a plentiful and beautiful wood. We told him about and showed him pictures of our small casita built entirely out of Nargusta and he was in very impressed. He wanted to know if he could come by sometime and take some pictures and maybe even do a brochure with our house in it. He also remembered the big order we placed for all the lumber for the main house and said that he could actually take us to the exact trees stumps where our wood came from, because all the stumps are tagged and recorded. We thought that was pretty cool! Oh and back to the fishing stories, he showed us a picture of his son with a 5-6 foot Tarpon that he caught not far from here where the ferry crosses the river over to Spanish Lookout. I think we need to go fishing with this guy.

Okay, so the other night around 6:30 we had just finished doing a little painting in the garage and we had just sat down in a couple chairs in the garage to have a beer. Now we have yet to have one of those “WHAT THE F#%K WAS THAT?” moments and this didn’t actually count as one of those because we actually knew what we had just heard. Somewhere between us in the garage and the house off in the dark was a very loud “Hissing Growl” from some kind of cat, and it wasn’t your typical house cat. We both looked at each other and at that point there it was again and it sounded like it was really pissed off. I’m still sitting in a chair with a cold beer not thinking too much about it, but as for Kelley, she has already jumped up from her chair, grabbed a machete and is now standing close behind me. We don’t know what kind of cat it was but, we do know that it was very loud and very close to us. It could have been a Jagarundi, Margay or one of a few other cats that roam the Belizean jungle. Oh and did I forget mention that we had to walk back to the house without a flashlight. Life in the jungle is always exciting.

Some people have been asking us what it cost to fly to Belize and how long is the flight. We fly Southwest Airlines and it goes from Phoenix to Houston and is about a 2 1/2 hour flight. Once in Houston it is another 2 hour flight down to Belize City. Southwest fly’s in only once a day to Belize and will get you there at 3:45 pm. I believe other airlines will also use Houston or Dallas as their main hub down to Belize. As for cost, if you are flexible and use the Southwest low fare calendar you can usually find a round trip flight from Phoenix for around $450. I know the prices do go up around holidays and during their busy season (November to May). American, Delta, United and Southwest all fly into Belize, we have just always had great luck with Southwest and you can’t beat their prices, plus two bags fly free. If anyone is considering coming down please let us know and we will help out in any way we can.

Creature Feature of the week is the Ctenosaur, Black Spiney Iguana or more commonly know as a Wish Willy. Not to be confused with the green iguana, these lizards will only grow to a few feet long where as the green iguana will reach almost seven feet in length and is one of the largest lizards in the world. The Wish Willy is omnivorous feasting on green leaves, insects, eggs and even small animals. He is also the fastest lizard in the world with a recorded speed of 21 mph, and will live up to 25 years. These are very common in Belize and especially out near the coast and on the islands where you will sometimes see bunches of them all together.

This will end our 100th post, hope everyone has been enjoying them and we hope there will be many, many more to come.

Well we made it back to the old homestead in the Jungle after a two week visit to the states. We saw a lot more friends and family than we expected and got to spend some good quality time with the grand kids which made for a great visit.

Of course you know we couldn’t go with out putting a couple pictures of the grand kids in here. In case you are wondering (yes they are growing fast) Luke is now 4 years old and Tyler is 8 months old. It was nice for us to get away from the construction for a little while, but now here we are back at it working and ordering more materials. It seems like a never ending  cycle but we know it will all be done soon enough.

Since we were gone they have finished up the garage, complete with windows, doors, lights, fans, etc. Now it’s ready for us to paint, build work benches and most importantly start emptying out the container.

Now that the garage is done it was time for them to get started on the house. Before they got started there was another load of gravel brought in to put around the foundation of the new house so that when it rains it wouldn’t be so muddy. Ruben also took care of cleaning up and removing a few of the big Cohune palms around where the house is going. A couple of years ago when we initially cleared the area where the house is going everything looked great, but in the meantime, everything grew and got bigger, including the house plans. Now that the gravel was down and the palms were cleared ,it was time to start the build on the main house, and that they did. When we showed up they already had the subfloor and the framing for the walls up. At the rate they are going the plan is to have it done by December.

Since the house is started and most of the materials have been ordered our focus has changed from ordering cement, rebar and wood to finding a cabinet maker for the kitchen, getting someone to make the front door, finding the right tile for the shower, rounding up all the appliances and all that other stuff we will need to finish up the house. The good thing is that now we have a garage to store stuff in, so when we see something that we like or need we can just buy it and store it until the house is ready for it. Considering that this all was just a road into the jungle seven months ago, it is amazing how quickly this project is coming along.

Next week the crew is going to take a week break, which is well deserved since they have been working straight since March. This will give us a chance to work on getting the garage in shape and unloading the container, plus it doesn’t hurt to let the main beams for the house dry for a little extra time.

The other day Ruben brought over some wild grapes that are growing on our road. Now granted these are small grapes not what most people are used to seeing, they are about the size of peas and have a good size seed inside. They are a little tart and sweet all at the same time and I guess people around here will gather a bunch of them and squeeze them to make juice. I imagine wild grape juice with rum would be pretty good, then again what fruit really doesn’t go with rum. We have eaten a lot of things that were found growing on our property such as, mushrooms, wild grapes, passion fruit, Cohune nuts and more. It sometimes surprises me that on the TV show Naked and Afraid that they can’t find anything to eat when they are out in the jungle.

Little bits and pieces

Last time I had mentioned how our Firestick for our TV worked great, but it ate up too much of our data. Well, we figured out a way around that so we can now have some TV shows to watch in the evenings. When we were up in the states we just started downloading shows like crazy to the computer and storing them on 128G flash drives. So now we just hook up the laptop to the TV, plug in the flash drive and select a show and we are in business, besides that we now have enough shows and series to keep us busy for a good year.

The frog who likes to come out in the evening and sit by the blue tooth speaker seems to have spent a couple of weeks inside our house. When we left we put the patio chairs and the washing machine inside the house so that they could refinish the porch. When we got back there was Mr. Froggy inside the house just sitting on the lawn chair. We assume he was either in the cushions or up in the washing machine when we brought them in, but now he is back out where he belongs. The good thing is that we didn’t see any bugs in the house when we got back, just a couple of froggy turds.

The other night when we were in town having dinner we passed this guy selling some of his paintings. Of course, there was a toucan that caught our eye so we had to stop and talk to him. This guy is a very talented artist and showed us a bunch of paintings he had done and some big murals from around town that he had done. We got his contact info and will definitely be talking to him in the future to do a tree frog painting for our little Froggy Cottage. Yes, we did end up getting the toucan painting, it is only 10”x 12” so it should be able to fit in anywhere.

And speaking of toucans, the second big toucan has landed at the Toucan Hideaway. Currently, they are taking up nest at the small casita until they are ready to fly south 80’ to their permanent home in front of the main house. They seem happy at the moment facing each other, but if I ever see them turned away from each other then we will know something is up.

Sorry, there is no creature feature of the week this time as we have been gone for a couple weeks and we also need to move the cameras farther away from all the construction. So this week we will just call the toucan the creature feature of the week.

Just when I said there were no creatures this week here walks a beautiful gray fox about 20 feet from me next to the house. He didn’t really seem to care too much about me and even waited around long enough for me to call Kelley with the camera. Every day there is something new and amazing to see here, whether it be a frog who likes music, wild foods growing around us or just the pure beauty of this place.

Like always, there is a lot of stuff happening around here and this week was no exception. It didn’t seem like there was any real progress happening because this week was spent plastering the garage in and out and finishing up a bunch of small detail work. The plastering over the block is something like I’ve never seen before. There are three coats of cement plaster going on to build up a good 1/2” base over the blocks before the final 1/8” finish goes on. The fine sand used for the finish is being washed and sifted so once done it will be as smooth as a nice piece of sanded wood. Not sure we needed this nice of a finish on a garage, but he said this is how he prefers to do it.

We are taking a break from all this construction and heading up to the states for a couple of weeks visiting friends, family and of course the grandsons. This will be our first trip back to the states since our big move to Belize. Amazingly there really isn’t very much stuff we need to get and bring back. Most things are available here, it’s just figuring out which store has what. For example… there is one gas station where you buy all of your electrical needs, you can get plywood at the grocery store, you can get frozen meats where you order block and cement and of course you can get a cold beer where you buy your sand paper. It has been fun and challenging trying to remember where we saw what and who had the best prices. By the time we get back the garage should be done and they should have a good start on the house. With two buildings down and one more to go (for now), we now have our sights set on living in a real home come Christmas time. Wouldn’t that be a great Christmas gift!

We took a little drive over to Branch Mouth the other day, that is where the Mopan and the Macal rivers come together to form the Belize river. There used to be a small suspension bridge there until a big flood a few years ago washed it away. The new bridge is all done and just like before it is only meant as a walking bridge, although we have seen motorcycles use it. It’s a neat little bridge with cables and wood boards that would fit right into any Indiana Jones movie. Once you are out on the middle of the bridge there are some great views of where the two rivers come together. I walked across the bridge swaying up and down with every step and took a bunch of pictures, as for Kelley she wanted no part of stepping more than a few feet out onto that bridge.

The other morning Ruben brought over some mushrooms that he found around the yard and said were very good to eat. He said to put some salt and pepper on them and microwave for half a minute or so. Weez 8 da much rooms an wow waaz day gooood! Just kidding they weren’t that kind of mushrooms, but they were very tasty. We believe they were oyster mushrooms and the good thing is that mushroom season is just getting started down here. We will definitely be on the lookout for more of these and any others that Ruben says we can eat. If we do start finding an abundance of mushrooms then we can always throw them in the dehydrator and save them for later in the year. Kelley and I both love mushrooms and especially if they are growing around our property and are free.

Creature feature of the week is the walking stick. The other day we found a great example of a big (9 inch) bright green walking stick on one of the palms out back. We have seen a few brown ones but this is the first green one we have seen. Walking sticks are incredible harmless insects that are very hard to spot unless you know what you are looking for. Here’s a few facts about the worlds longest insect (up to 22 inches long). There are over 3,000 species of walking sticks, they can regenerate limbs if needed and the female can reproduce without males. When a female reproduces without a male all of her offspring will be females, but If she reproduces with a male then 50% will be males. It surprises me that there are still any males out there.

This week we got the cell booster antenna off of its tree and onto a more permanent mount on the house. Of course we had to cut down a couple of 35’ long palm trees fronds and some other trees that were in the way. There’s something about cutting down something that big with a machete that makes you feel… well you know.  Anyway, our signal at the house is good and the mifi is giving us good internet so we can connect with the rest of the world. Speaking of connecting with the world, we hooked up our Amazon Firestick the other day and we now have TV. Well the TV was short lived, after a few days it seemed to have sucked up all our data. Data here is expensive and you can only purchase a certain amount at a time when using wireless cell service.  So for now it is back to watching dvds in the evenings, but the good news is that we should still have phone and internet that will last quite awhile on our data plan.

The garage is getting close to being done. The roof went on the other day and it is looking like a real enclosed building.  They should take another couple of weeks to finish up with the rest of the plaster, electrical, doors and windows. After that we can come in and start to paint, build work benches and get a lot of the stuff out of the container. I haven’t seen most of my tools in 4 or 5 months, and that’s driving me crazy. The other exciting news is that next week they are starting on the main house and will be going strong on it until it’s done. The rest of the lumber for the house showed up which is good timing because now we have a place to store it out of the sun and rain.

This seems to be the time of year where everywhere you look there is corn growing, so it is only fitting that there is a celebration and party. Last weekend in San Ignacio town they held the Cayo Corn Festival. We got there a little late and didn’t get to experience too much of it, but we did get to see some of what was left of it. There was food booths, demonstrations, bands and of course beer tents all set up in the streets. Toward the end Dave even tried to get some drum lessons from one of the locals, but the guy was just a little to “Smokey” so it wasn’t much of a lesson.

While at the Festival we met these two gals from Arizona, one was from Scottsdale (who just got back from a weekend in Rocky Point) and the other is a firefighter from Phoenix, AZ. It turns out that she knows John Teefy, a friend of ours who is also a firefighter from AZ and has a house in Mexico where we used to live. It seems like such a small world as we have actually met quite a few people down here from Arizona and California where both of us grew up.

Then there was the other day when we were down at the river and we saw our first crocodile. We knew it was just a matter of time before we would come across one, we just didn’t think it would be so close to where people were playing in the water. The local kids were even playing with it and trying to ride on him like it was something they do all the time.

On one of our many trips to Spanish Lookout we decided to take the hand crank ferry across the river instead of going all the way around to the bridge. As we settled in for the short ride across the river a small barefoot, blue eyed, blond kid climbs up on the side rail of the truck, plops his arms on the window frame and just starts talking away. I guess he was hoping that we would have said “Hello” because his answer he said was going to be “Jello” and if we spoke Spanish and said “Hola” his answer was going to be “cola”. He had an answer for English and Spanish, but our bad… we just said “How’s it going?”. Anyway it turns out his name is Bernard, he is 9 years old, off for summer break, starts school in three weeks, but not until he gets to fly on a plane to Mexico to visit some family. He also told us that when he is 16 he can get a job and when he is 14 he can get a phone and that his brother got a phone when he was 11, but all he did was play games so dad took it away. He asked us why we were not buying stuff from a vendor on the ferry and that we should support him because he is working hard. We finally had a chance to ask him why he is on the ferry and where is he going? He said that he just rides the ferry back and forth all day long, we assume at the end of the day he will either walk home or someone will come and pick him up. He sorta reminded me a little of Tom Sawyer, just being on the river all day with nothing else to do. We sure did hear a lot from Benard in the short ten minute ride across the river.

Needing a break from all the construction and stuff we decided to take a road trip for the day over to Pamona to see how Sammi and Rick are coming along on their place. We met Sammi and Rick through our son Randy who use to work with one of their kids or spouses or something like that. Anyway they moved down here about the same time we did and are building along the same lines as we are (build a small place to live in until the big house is done). Pamona is about a 2 1/2 hour drive from us down the Hummingbird Highway towards Hopkins, and of course since we were on the Hummingbird Highway we had to stop at Bertha’s for some of the best tamales in all of Belize.

Since we were only a few miles from the beach we thought we would grab a nice lunch on the beach and then try to find some lobsters to take back with us. It didn’t take long before we had our ice chest full of lobsters and were headed back up to the jungle. So for the next couple of months, our Sunday menu includes lobster.

When we lived in Mexico we would have what we would call “date night” on Wednesday nights. This was usually the best day for some quite time when no one else was around. We would usually cook up a nice surf and turf dinner with a bottle of wine and just spend some quality time with each other. Now that we are in Belize, Sunday is our best day when no one is around and we have time to relax and enjoy a good meal. Good steak and of course lobster are not a problem finding here and you can find some decent wines, but wine glasses are another thing. In the beginning we were using plastic tumblers and just splitting the bottle of wine between the two cups, until we became civilized and found wine glasses. I guess you would actually call them wine coconuts that we got from a local vendor. Now when we have our Sunday bottle of wine, we can sip it with our pinkies held high in the air and pretend we have a little bit jungle class.

Creature feature of the week is the Agouti. A cute little rodent type creature that is related to the Guinea Pig and the Chinchilla. These are very common around the property and sometimes you can spot them during the day when they are out foraging for fruits and nuts. I understand that they are quite adaptable and when they can’t find fruits or nuts they will also eat fungi, plants or insects. They can get up to 2 1/2’ long and run as fast as a rabbit for long distances. This is one of the most common animals that we capture on our trail cameras.

After nearly two months of driving up the hill to get cell service we now have it available at our house. We are down in a small valley with a hill between us and the cell tower, which blocked us from all service. A couple of the service providers even told us that we needed to construct an eighty foot antenna for us to get any kind of service. After talking to our workers, they said that when they were putting the roof on our place they could sometimes send text messages from from the roof top. This meant that they were getting some type of weak signal, so we looked into a signal booster to see if that might help. After exhausting all sources in Belize we decided to order one on Amazon, which was going to work out because we had some friends coming down from the states and they said that they could bring it. Well it got held up in Customs because it was an “Antenna” and they were sure we were going to use it for something we were not suppose to. Anyway, after a couple of trips to Belize City, letters from the cell service company saying it will not interfere with their signal, a special permit from the Public Utilities Commission, and a good size duty fee at Customs, we now have a signal booster that gives us 4-5 bars of 4G. Oh Happy Days! Granted right now the antenna is on a 20’ piece of pvc that is strapped to a tree, but this is all temporary till we can make a more permanent mount. The other day we purchased a MiFi wireless router for the internet. It seems to work great so now we have cell service and wifi where there was nothing prior. Life is good!

I had said in an earlier post about the big carved toucan that we had bought and that the wood carver was making another one for us. Since we were driving by his shop the other day we thought we would stop in and see how the new bird is coming along. To our surprise he already has most of it carved, he just needs to do the detail work and give him some paint to bring him to life. We will adopt him in a couple of weeks once he is ready to come to his new home.

A good portion of our lumber for the house showed up the other day, a lot earlier than we wanted it, but we will make it work. Since it was recently cut, it is all stacked in single layers with space between each row to allow it to dry better. The lumber company recommended that we put a coating of “stuff” on the ends to prevent it from splitting as it dries. We had never heard of this, but I guess this is common to use on fresh cut wood. So now off to find this “stuff”, you would think in a country that has so much wood, this “stuff” would be available everywhere. Not so, but we did find some “stuff” that would work so we spent a couple of hours coating up the ends of all the lumber, hopefully this will stop it from drying too quick and splitting all the beams. And if some do split, I guess we will just call it character.

And then there’s the garage. The plaster is going on, the roof beams are being welded and the two garage doors are being built. We found a guy in Orangewalk (which is about a 5 hour drive from us) that will build us a steel roll up door with chain mechanism, a heavy duty man door and come all this way to install it for a very, very reasonable price. By next weekend the roof should be on and most of the plastering will be done and then they will start on the main house while the electrician gets going on all the wiring.

The creature feature of the week is the Green Parrot. Every morning at the crack of dawn hundreds and hundreds of parrots migrate over our house to the feeding grounds and in the evening they return back to roost. This morning they decided to make the big tree over our house their stop over point. A bunch would land in the tree and squawk very loud, I guess calling their buddies in. Then a flock would fly over and a few would take off, but not all of them, then more would land and squawk and wait for other to fly over. This went on for a good half hour or so. I guess parrots are a lot like people, there are certain ones you would rather fly with and others… not so much.

We have also recently had a bunch of toucans in the area, but they have not landed around our place, probably because all the construction going on. We even tried putting out some Fruit Loops cereal to attract them, but nothing. We thought for sure that would work, because when we put Trix cereal out we had all kinds of rabbits show up.

We have also got some Moringa trees started and they are growing fast. If you have never heard about this super plant then click on the link below to see what this plant is all about. https://www.organicfacts.net/health-benefits/vegetable/moringa.html

I realize that these posts used to be stories of all the fun places we were going and things we were doing and now it is all about construction, finding a new store or finally getting a cell signal. I guess the difference between vacation and actually living here is achieving all these small hurdles you used to take for granted. Most of our weekdays are spent working, running around getting supplies and setting up deliveries. And when the weekend comes around we are doing stuff around the yard and the house all day and then we head to town for dinner and a few beers. We are hoping that by the end of the year the whole project will be done and we can relax and get back to enjoying all that Belize has to offer. In the meantime, we are still enjoying seeing all the construction taking place, putting in new plants and picturing what it will look like once it is all done.  And once it is all done, we will have the satisfaction of saying “Look what we built where there used to be just raw jungle.” As we get older we seem to settle into the same old routine, so get out of that routine and challenge yourselves…it feels good!

Our good friends Ron and Rhonda from Cholla Bay stoped by for a few days on their way to vacation in Playa del Carmen, Mexico. They stayed at a little Airbnb just up the road from us that they had found, this is also where Darren stayed when he was here last month. We gave them a tour of our property with everything we have going on and then took them to town to a bunch of little places we like to go. As we were leaving this restaurant one afternoon there was cricket game going on it the street and they were kind enough to let me take a swing at it. I did hit the ball on the first swing, but of course the only video taken was of me totally missing the ball on my next swing. Of course that’s the one that got put on Facebook for everyone to see.

The last day they were here we had to go to Belize City (which is a good 3 hours each way) so they went off and explored the ruins at Xunantunich and also to the Iguana Sancuary. After a long day for all of us we needed cold beers and some food. We headed down the road to the Bluff’s where we ordered up a couple of pizzas and cold drinks. The bartender was even kind enough to put on some Roger Clyne and Black Moods videos for us, we almost felt like we were back in Cholla Bay. Ron and Rhonda were only here for a few days, but it gave us a great chance to catch up and to get out of our busy construction routine. It was great to see them and hopefully they will be back for a longer visit and we can show them more of what Belize has to offer.

The garage is going up very fast and should be ready within a few weeks. So far they have used 1,500 blocks, 261 bags of cement, more rebar than we care to think about and a lot of trucks full of sand and gravel.  All I know is that this thing aint going anywhere. Yesterday all the 2 x 6 and 2 x 4 galvanized steel beams and zinc roofing showed up and the roof should start going up next week. It was just one week ago that they started the pour on the floor and now the walls are up with pipe and outlet boxes run down the walls for electricity and even water for a sink. At this point there is a rush to get the roof on because the lumber company is getting a huge load of lumber and needs to get ours out of their lot. They said that they would give us a few more days before they have to deliver, so lets see how quick they can get a roof on this garage.

Three hundred 14’ treated pine 2 x 4’s arrived the other day. The treated pine was chosen for the wall studs in the house instead of the Nargusta because it is easier to work with, lower in cost and they won’t be seen anyway. As soon as the roof is on the garage the rest of our lumber will be delivered and stored inside out of the rain and sun.

Up to this point the only exterior light we had around here was a yellow bug light on the porch. When the moon is out it is fairly bright around here, but with no moon it is down right dark. We had the electriction come over and put up a nice dusk to dawn led light on the meter pole at the entrance to the driveway. It’s nice to have that little extra light when we come in at night, plus it looks like someone might actually be living out here. We did bring a couple more of the lights so one will go on the garage and I’m not sure about the other one yet, but it will be light enough to walk from building to building without a flashlight.

The other day when we were in Belize City we had some time to kill so we went and checked out a couple stores that we have heard about. The first one was Benny’s Hardware store. Wow were we blown away compared to the other hardware stores we have been into in Belize. It was sorta like a Home Depot without the industrial look, there was even an escalator to take you up to the second floor. Everything you would need to build a custom home including appliances, tile, doors, lighting, lawn furniture and so much more. They even had a black granite sink like we were hoping to find for the new house. Their prices were higher than you would find in the states, but I don’t think there is anywhere else you could find this variety and quality all in one place in Belize.

The other place that we stopped in was Brodie’s grocery store. They seem to have the best variety of things you didn’t think you could find down here. Just a few things we noticed that we haven’t seen in any other stores were; anchovies, calamari rings, frozen duck, enchilada sauce, caviar, Good Season’s Italian dressing mix, Balsamic vinegar and so much more. They even had a Subs Way in there (not the chain like we know) but still a good sandwich, and the combo with a 16 oz drink was only $3.75 US. The only drawback to these stores is that they are a good 3 hour drive each way for us and that kills a whole day.  I know we will be going back to the hardware store once the house gets close to being done and I can guarantee we will have an ice chest with us to hit the grocery store to stock up on things we haven’t had in a while. We will eat just about anything and make due with what we have available but, I never thought we would get exited about certain food items until they are not available to us.

Creature feature of the week is the Blue Morph Butterfly. This beautiful butterfly grows to about 4-5” and can be seen almost every day flying around our property. Besides the Blue Morph there are many other brightly colored butterflies around here, but we think this is the most beautiful maybe because you don’t often see many blue creatures in nature.

The workers are usually not here on the weekends so this is the time when we can do some stuff around the yard like some clean-up and taking care of the plants. Today was the day we got some squash plants in the ground that we have been growing from seed and also to trim some palm fronds that were starting to touch the roof. I got my machete out and started hacking away at the palms, actually I’m getting pretty good with a machete, this is a skill I never thought I would have. As you can see in the picture (yes that is Kelley holding it) these fronds are huge. This one here is about 36’ long and there is still another 5’ that I left on the tree. I’m thinking a half dozen of these cut in half and you would have a very nice little palapa. In case you are wondering what kind of palm can grow fronds like this it is the Cohune Palm. It gets huge clusters of nuts on them and this is where they get palm oil and cocoa butter from. I know we have hundreds maybe even thousands of these growing all over the property, maybe some day we can process some of the nuts. Speaking of processing nuts, we’re sure there’s a few of you who still think we are nuts, but we are loving it!

Well, after seven weeks to the day we had to turn in our free loaner truck. That’s because our brand new 2019 Mahindra Pik Up was finally ready for delivery. The Mahindra truck is a quad cab 4 x 4 turbo diesel with a six speed transmission that gets 31 mpg. When we placed our order it was for a 2018 model in red, but all they had at the time was a silver or a white one. The dealer told us that there was another shipment in a couple of weeks and there should be a red one if we wanted to wait, plus he would give us a free loaner in the meantime. Basically the shipment was late and it turned out that they were the 2019 models not the 2018 like we put the deposit on, but the good thing was that the price was the same.

When we ordered it we wanted a big front bumper that would hold a winch and a good steel rear bumper with a trailer hitch. I did not know that they would have to fabricate the front bumper to fit the new model, but what a job they did. The bumper looks awesome on the truck and now they have a pattern for the front bumper when anyone else wants one. All I have to do now is to add my winch and a light bar and we will be all set.

When we got to the dealer in Belmopan to pick up the truck there was basically a photo shoot going on, because this is the very first 2019 in the country and it has this nice new bumper. We also opted for a tire upgrade to some Pirelli scorpion mud tires. Plus being red instead of white or silver really helped bring it all together. They took pictures of us with the truck and asked if it was okay for them to use them in their promotions and such.

After we went and got plates and insurance for it it was back to the office to sign a couple more papers. They have a brand new promotion going on when you buy a new vehicle, where you spin the wheel and win cash, service or credit there. Kelley was the very first person to spin the wheel and she won $200, what a great way to leave the dealership. Of course there were more pictures of the promo wheel because this was the first time it was used. We were told that there were only five trucks in this shipment and they were all ready spoken for, we got one, the head of the biggest radio station got one and the Prime Minister of Belize got one. I wonder what the Prime Minister will win when he spins the wheel?

Since we were already in Belmopan and we had just won some money, there is a fruit tree nursery down the road that we have been wanting to go to. A few miles down the Hummingbird Highway and then six miles down a dirt road to the Mennonite community of Springfield where horse and buggy are the standard vehicles of choice. There was even a sign as you entered that read…Welcome to Springfield, dress decently. And no, we did not see a Mennonite Bart Simpson running around in Springfield. Anyway they had lots of exotic fruit trees and other plants. After studying the list of plants for awhile, here is what we came away with. A mango tree that will produce two types of mangos, a citrus tree that will have red grapefruit and valencia orange on the same tree, a lemon tree, a lime tree, cocoa (chocolate) trees, coffee trees, cinnamon tree, starfruit tree, macadamia nut tree and a couple vanilla plants. Combine that with the bananas, pineapples, black pepper, oregano, basil and other stuff we have growing, we should be able to open up our own little fruit stand in a few years.

In case you are wondering where this mini orchard is going, it will be along the road bordering our property. When they put in the power poles they cut back the bigger trees and everything else a good fifty feet from the road, since then the plants have come back and are now 10-15’ tall. Ruben has started clearing a good section of that but leaving a 10’ buffer of plants so that from the road you will not even see the little orchard on the inside. It will take a couple years before the trees will start to produce, but with the way things grow here it could be sooner.

The floor for the garage is done, but not without a couple of setbacks. We had planned to use a batch truck where they mix everything on site in a big truck. It was going to save a significant amount of money over doing it with a small mixer. The day the first pour was scheduled to be here the truck broke, but they thought they could fix it by later in the day. By the next day we find out that it’s the transmission in the big truck, so on to plan “B”. We were scurrying around to get two 14 yard trucks of sand and gravel here as soon as possible, (which one didn’t show up till 7:30 pm in total darkness) plus another 90 bags of cement and renting a mixer so that everything could get going once again. Since they were already a couple days late on the pour they got going at 6:00 am with 11 guys working like clock work. The first half was poured and finished in a few hours and then they called it a day. Now here it is at 6:00 am on a Saturday morning and again the cement mixer is going strong.

A little more chaotic and expensive going with plan “B”, but the floor is done and it looks great. The walls are going up now and everything is back on schedule. The galvanized steel beams for the roof are ordered along with the zinc sheets to cover it as well as the windows. About the only thing left is to get a hold of the guy who makes the metal roll up door and the steel man-door.

Creature feature of the week, the giant grasshopper. The grasshoppers here are huge, usually 4-5” long and the most amazing colors. I don’t think we have seen any two the same yet. They range in colors from bright green, yellow, red, black and yellow spotted and every other color of the rainbow you could imagine.

The last couple of nights Kelley has heard something big running around under the house, I think it’s time to put a camera near the house and see what it might be.  A couple of the locals are guessing that it is an armadillo because they are clumsy and loud when they walk, hopefully the camera will capture something.

So far the rain has not been anything like we were expecting, and this has made it great for building. The garage which wasn’t supposed to be built until the house was done is now the main focus here. This is actually working out great because it keeps the workers going while we are waiting on all the lumber to be cut and dried. And once the roof is on the garage all the lumber can be stored there out of the sun and the rain. The garage so far is built like nothing I’ve seen before. There are ten footers on the garage that are 2’ x 2’ by 3’ deep where the columns will go. Then there is a foot and a half deep trench between each one with rebar columns that connect them all together.

Once that is poured then there are two blocks high built all around that divide it into six sections. Then it is back-filled with some special mix of rocks and sand and compacted down. The reinforced rebar web of 12” squares is set where they will eventually pour 5” of cement. Antonio says that is how they do it here in Belize, and who am I to argue. Anyway it will be a 25’ x 35’ enclosure with 10’ walls and a galvanized beamed steel roof, with some of the biggest hurricane ties available to hold it all together. There will also be a nice six foot concrete ramp leading up to it.

Other construction news happening here is that all of our lumber is cut for the main house. We got a chance to go to the mill the other day and see it, and it looks great! All they have to do now is dress it (sand it all down nice and pretty) and let it dry. We are hoping that in about a month once the garage is done they will get started on the house. I know that once the garage gets close to being finished some of the crew will get a head start with some of the small stuff on the house.

After the rains and with all the big trucks coming in, the driveway was getting to be a muddy mess so we had to order another load of the white rocks to help it out. It looks pretty stark white right now, but the good thing about the rocks is that grass will eventually grow up through it making it a solid grass road to drive on. The first load of rocks we put around the house already has a bunch of grass coming up through it.

Another little construction thing is the cell phone charging station that they built. There are only two outlets so all through the day everyone takes turns charging up their cell phones. It is very practical and even has a rain cover. I hope they leave it once they are done.

A couple of weeks ago I had mentioned how we missed out on two wood carved toucans. Well Eduardo the artist knew that we really wanted them so he carved out another one in hopes that we would drive by and see it. Well we did and we now own a beautiful toucan and have one more on order. He went on to tell us how this one is much better than the other ones and we will be much more happy with this one. I guess the other ones were carved out of cedar which is a softer wood and only painted on one side, where as this one is a solid piece of mahogany and painted on both sides. The other one he will be making for us will be the same size except facing the opposite direction. Once the house is done they will greet you as you walk up the stairs, but for now they will be tucked away in the container.

We have taken the quad out a couple of times, but we just don’t have time with work and trying to line up deliveries and picking up supplies. Although we do have time to cook some pretty good meals, after all we do have to eat. Kelley is getting real good on her single burner induction cooker and I am doing pretty good on a very small grill. Last weekend we had some friends over and thought we would try making Kelley’s beans and some baby back ribs with some grilled corn. Considering the very limited amount of cooking instruments and ingredients, they turned out very delicious. Before you know it we will be the King and Queen of cooking in the jungle without a kitchen. Sounds like a TV show.

The creature feature of the week is a little white frog that was on a plant in front of the house. We’re not sure what kind he was as we couldn’t find any info on a small white frog. It has been a few days so far since I’ve touched him and nothing has fallen off or turned green so it must have been a good friendly little frog. As for Kelley, she thought he might be a prince and was going to give him a kiss. After talking it over for awhile we thought, how big could this prince actually be and do we really need a tiny prince sucking down more of our beers. So we just left him there to do his thing.

Up in the hills where we are it is considerably cooler than down in San Ignacio. So far the weather has been great! Mid 80’s during the day and with some humidity, but nothing outrageous. The evenings are wonderful when the temp drops to the mid 70’s and in the mornings wake up to the high 60’s. We sleep with the windows open, a sheet over us and a ceiling fan going and we are very comfortable. The past few nights the temp has dropped to the low 60’s making us turn off the fan and pull the blanket up. Who would have thought it would be this cool in July in the Belizean jungle, I guess enjoy it while we can. So far we have not installed an AC unit, just using fans and that work great. There will be AC units installed in the future, but as for now everything is good. I’m still not sure we can bring ourselves to install a heater, but we will see.

And we will end this with a sunset picture from Belize. Not as striking as some of the ones we have seen in Mexico overlooking the Baja peninsula where we lived, but still beautiful.

A lot of people have been asking us what are the prices on things down here and what are the cost of the essientals. Like most places the cost of local services and products are relativily inexpensive as opposed to imported items. Of course if you shop around you will find who has the best prices and if you frequent them for a while they will start to give you discounts on their merchandise. Sometimes at first glance it seems like the prices here are a little high because the Belizean dollar is 2-1 based on the US dollar. For ease of understanding here I will base everything in US prices.

Food

A trip to the open air market will get you enough of the freshest fruits and veggies you’ve ever seen for a week for around $10. Dairy products are what I would call average price of what you would find in the states and most everything you can think of they will have at one place or another. Overall meat prices are lower than you would find in the states and the quality is very good. T-bone steaks at the butcher run about $5.00/lb. and chicken, pork and lamb are also inexpensive. Our first grill night here we splurged and picked up two 30-day aged prime ribeye steaks and they set us back $15.00/lb. Delicious steaks but we will have to save those cuts for special ocassions.

We are trying hard not to use any canned or boxed food, but somethings you just can’t avoid. Most, but definently not all, food items can be found in Belize, but you will have to shop around or maybe even learn to substitute certain ingredients when needed. There are a lot of states brands available, but they tend to be on the expensive side. Brands found in Mexico or other off brands tend to be a lot cheaper. For instance we just bought a big box of off brand corn flakes for $2.00 (fruit every day for breakfast is great, but sometime you just need a little crunch). We have found things in the grocery stores that we never thought we would see here such as, Spaghetti-O’s, Slim Jims, canned squeeze cheese, Kraft Mac Cheese, Lipton tea bags and so much more. We have even found one store that imports Members Mark brand from Sam’s Club, but of course all these items come with a premium price that is almost double of what you would pay in the states. Although it is good to know that if I ever have a break down and need my can of squeeze cheese, it is available. Now I just have to look for Chicken ‘n Bisket crackers and I’ll be set. Basicily food prices here are very reasonable if you shop around and not just go to the main grocery stores looking for the name brands you are used to. Grocery shopping here is always an adventure trying to remember who and where you saw those certain items that you need. And it will usually take a few hours by the time you go to the butcher, fruit market, baker and then finish it up at the grocery store, plus chit chatting to everyone along the way.

Like anywhere going out to eat can be fairly expensive or almost nothing at all. Most lunches with chicken, burger, tacos, etc and a juice or soda will usuall set you back $5-$7. A real good dinner with a couple of beers will usually be around $10-$15. Of course meals can be found even cheaper and a lot more expensive depending on where you go and what you have. And just about any cuisine you can imagine can be found here in Belize.

Happy Hour stuff

Local beer is usually $2.00 in most restaurants and the few imported beers they do have are usually double of that. For happy hour you can usually find buckets of seven Belikin beers on ice for $11.

Basic rum drinks at happy hour I’ve seen for $1.25 and the speciality drinks up to about $10.00.  Of course the speciality drinks are usually a work of art with colored liquors and fruit carved animals. Local rum is definently the cheapest hard liquor to buy as all the others have to be imported and are stuck with a big duty tax. I have seen just about all types of liquor available here such as Jack Daniels, Grey Goose, Southern Comfort, Patron Tequila and everything else, it’s just that they get premium prices for them. If you head out for happy hour and stick to local beers and rum then at the end of the night your wallet will be happy too. As for buying drinks and bringing them home, we go directly to the beer distributer and trade in our empties for full ones, which end up costing about $1.25 a piece. I assume you have to go to the grocery store to buy hard liquor and I believe they are all about the same prices. There are duty free stores at the borders and airport where liquor is a lot cheaper. If you fly in, stop at the duty free store and grab a couple of cheap bottles and then go to the line that says something to declare and declare it, there is usually no one in that line and you get through a lot faster.

Services and such

I’ve said before that our water bill is $5.00 per month for unlimited use. They were going to install meters for all users, but the locals fought it so for now… no meters. Everyone we have talked to says that our village has the best water in the whole country and we beleive it. We have been drinking it since day one without any problems and it is really good water. Our property taxes are a total of $5.00 per year, which is unheard of. Our power bill has been very minimal so far, but after talking to other people who live here they say it should rarely be over $100 when we are in the bigger house running everything. Fuel here is expensive, diesel is around $5.00 gal and gas is around $5.75 gal. Since our truck is diesel and gets 30-32 per gallon, it’s not really that bad.

We had bought some drapes that were way too long for what we needed, but we put a clothes pin on the bottom and made them work. Then we find out from Ruben that his neighbor has a sewing machine and can fix them. She cut the drapes to length and double hemmed them, then they were delivered back to us all for $2.50. We saved the materiaI from the drapes to have our chairs upholstered and we can’t wait to see how much that will cost. I am putting up a shelf so that we can have a TV and DVD player for a little entertainment. We stopped at a small local wood shop to see if he has a piece of wood that is 1” x 8” x 30” and I tell him just something close it doesn’t need to be exactly that size. This very nice man cuts me a piece of beautiful hardwood to size and then planes it and sands it all while we wait and he only wants $3.00. He is an incredible wood worker and cabinet maker and we may use him to do our kitchen and doors when needed.

That’s a little summary of some of our expenses down here, hope this gives everyone an idea of some of the prices in Belize.

Of course there were problems along the way, but all of our stuff is now sitting on our property in the middle of the jungle. First off we had to get the container from Arizona to Houston by a Wednesday so it could make the ship by Friday. Of course we had it there on a Tuesday just to be sure but, there was some type of holdup there at customs so it would have to wait until the next Friday’s ship. So then it’s finally on its three week cruise through the Gulf of Mexico and onto the Carribean, stopping at other ports along the way. Once it arrived in Belize it sat at the docks for about a week as it went through Customs, the Ministry of Finance, and a couple other authorities. Our brokers estimate was a little off on the duty cost, so we had to hurry and run back to town to get him more money.  All is good now for the port to release all our stuff, except that while it was at customs they had only recorded one of the quads. The duty on importing a quad is 45% of it’s value, so off to get another check to the broker. It’s a good thing we got a good deal on the quads and had “receipts.” So now after waiting a few more days for the road to dry up a little so the truck wouldn’t get stuck, it was finally delivery day.

The big tilt bed truck with 15,000 lbs of our prized posessions pulls up and is ready to back up onto some 35’ of ground that I had Tony with the backhoe clear and pack for us. The truck is in position and guns it, he makes it about two feet in before burrying it up to the axles. It really didn’t help that when he burried it he broke the main water line making it a lot more muddy than what was really needed.

This spot is not going to work to set the container he tells me. If he drops it where it is it will stick out in our road and not allow other big trucks with material to get in or out. We looked at a couple other spots to set the container, but since they wern’t prepared they wouldn’t work either. The big concern at this point was, is he even going to get his big truck unstuck or is the whole truck going to fall on it’s side. One hour later with a lot of digging, jacking, rocks, boards and the help of ten people we were ready to try to get it to move.

I told the guy if we could at least get it a few more feet back that would work for me. Reluctently he said he could try, with boards behind the wheels and everyone pushing from the front he popped out of the big mud hole and hit solid ground. We had gathered up a bunch logs that Ruben had cut up so that the container would set up off the ground. I mentioned to the guys that if they could get it fairly level that would be great.

After awhile of moving logs and beating them in the ground with sledge hammers they had it level. When Antonio, our contractor, got the level out I said “I’m sure that is good enough”, but he’s a perfectionist, so it had to be just right. The truck driver did a great job of finally getting the container in the original spot I had intended for it to go, thanks to the help of a lot of people.

We unlocked the container to check the condition of everything and to also make sure it was our stuff and not a full of plastic plants from China or something. They had rearranged a bunch of stuff while going through customs so not everything was where I had put it or even strapped down. At this point there were only two things that we were really looking for, an ice chest and a gas can. I’m sure you can guess why we might need an ice chest, and a gas can is needed so that the quads can be moved out of the container. In case you are wondering, all gas had to to be drained from the quads before they could be shipped. With no gas can in sight it was off to town to get a can and some gas so that in the next day or so we could get the quads out and actually be able to walk into the container. The container is set a little higher than I would have liked it but after all that trouble I couldn’t complain. So it looks like we will be setting up some type of ramp for the quads and proably a step to make it a little easier getting in and out.

After the major accomplishment of finally getting all of our stuff delivered to Belize and since we were in town anyway getting gas, we thought some food and a celebratory beer was in order. As we were sitting there enjoying the moment, the phone rings. It was our lumber company and they said that the mill was to start cutting our logs this week and we should have delivery in a couple weeks. So we enjoyed a couple more beers and thought that this was a day of accomplishments!

Well the rainy season has arrived.

So far it only seems to rain in the middle of the night throughout the early morning hours and only does so every few days with blue skies in between. Which allows time for the ground to dry back out, but right after the rains the ground gets very slippery and sticky. The road towards our property and the road into our property is a good hard pack that dries very quickly, but the small area around the construction site gets very slippery.

At this point we have only lost two days of construction due to the rains, but we know there will be a time when the rains might last for a few days or even a week if a big storm passes through. The good thing is that Ruben says that in August and September there is usually a mini dry season, which is good because that is about the time our lumber will arrive. The rains here seems to fall straight down with no winds which make it perfect for sitting on the porch and watching the rains and listening to all the birds. We know that there has to be a lot of rain to make this the green tropical jungle we love and so far the rain has not bothered us a bit.

What’s happening around the property

More truck loads of gravel, cement, block and rebar. There is a crew of seven that are constantly doing something, except for two breaks and an hour for lunch. Our electrical breaker room is now complete, it is where the main power comes in and will then be distributed to all the other buildings. This got started before we were here and is a little bigger than I expected, but it turned out ok because now we can put a trash can and some yard tools in there also. And yes, I know that if I cut a moon in the door it might get used for something else.

Ruben brought over a couple of banana trees for us and we got them planted right in front of the casita. One of the trees is a regular banana and the other is an apple banana and they should start to produce later this year. The apple banana is a smaller fruit that is very sweet and would probably make an awesome banana bread. Ruben wanted nothing for the plants so we traded him some basil plants that we had growing and everyone is happy.

We bought and installed a 200 gallon water tank as a backup just in case there is a big storm and something happens to our water supply. We were also looking at small generators especially since we are now getting some food in the freezer. Speaking of food, when we fire up the grill we are now cooking up extra so we can save it for a rainy day. We finally get the true meaning of that!

A hummingbird feeder got put up with a little sugar water inside and immediately it started to attract them and of course they started playing this is my feeder game like they always do. There has been a few different ones but the most common are big white belly, blue winged ones that are always here. We are constantly busy with painting, cutting plants and trying to put our own touches on our little piece of jungle paradise, in fact we have only sat on the porch a few times and enjoyed a cold beer together. As soon as we get a chance we will take a walk around the property and look for a couple more orchids to move over towards the house. At this point the orchids are not blooming so we will have no idea what color they will be, but we know they will be beautiful once they do.

One other thing that almost happened around the property was the addition of some Toucans. There is a wood carver on the highway that does amazing work, and we have been eyeing this one Toucan for quite awhile. One day we were driving by and he had another one out there and they were facing opposite directions. We talked about how great they would look in front of the main house since the house will be called Toucan Hideaway. Anyway we hymed and hawed about do we really need them right now. Then one day we drove by and he had painted them, they are a good four feet tall and carved out of a solid piece of cedar, they were perfect! So we decided to go run our errands and then get them on the way back, after all they had been there for quite awhile. Well guess what, there was another person loading both of them in their truck and taking them to their art gallery. That’s just they way it was, but at least we would never have to see them again and remind us of what we could have had if we would have decided earlier. The art gallery in San Ignacio where they went just happens to be on a road that we drive down all the time. They look really good there, but we still think they would have looked better at our place.

Since the rains have started, the tree frogs have come out and they like to hang out on the porch looking for insects. We are not used to frogs that can climb right up the side of the house and look in the windows, the ones we are use to just hop along the ground or swim. These hop right on the wall and keep climbing, I’ve heard a lot of people here refer to them as sticky frogs. They say if you toss them towards a wall they will stick. I don’t think we will be trying that.

In an earlier post I said that we seem to see new plants or animals daily. The other night we were coming back from dinner and we had to actually stop on the road so we could let this big anteater go by. He was about four or five feet long and just at a slow pace as he crossed the road. Ruben said that if a dog starts to bother them they just roll on their back and will attack with their long claws and that the dog will never bother them again. We have learned to take our camera with us everywhere because you never know what you might see.

Since I named this post wet and wild I thought I’d throw in a couple more wild things. Just outside our bedroom window in the rocks there is a big dog size turd. Now we haven’t seen any dogs around here so your guess is as good as ours at this point.

And then the other day we were driving through the village and a man stopped us, he thought we were somebody else. Anyway, it turns out that he was the local veterinarian and asked us if we had heard about the vampire bat problems they are having with horses and cattle. I told him that yes, I had read something about it about a month ago. He just wanted to make sure we were aware of it in case we had any livestock, and we thanked him for that. Kelley now wears a string of garlic around her neck, as for me, I tend to be awake all night and sleep all day for no reason at all.

Like with anything or anywhere there is the good and the life’s little struggles. Mostly I’ve been telling  you all about  the good stuff and fun we have been having and not some of the little hurdles we have had to overcome. So here is what we have learned in our short time living in Belize.

Buying the cheapest garden hose for now because you know your good ones will be here soon is not a good idea. We have so much water pressure that it blew a hole in the hose soaking our front porch for hours while we were gone. It also just happen to be right after I had painted the door red. It’s a good thing we only pay $5 a month for water.

All our black soil that is so great for growing everything, gets really muddy and sticky when it rains. Which is why we now have gravel around the house.

Just because you bought lumber one time, do not expect them to have it again next time you need it.

And just because your stairs and your front door are 36″ wide, do not expect a 36″ refrigerator to fit through.

Do not assume the varnish you buy for your house is also for external use. Which is why we are staying up the road for a couple of days so they can redo our porch. The good thing is they have internet.

Good thing is that we have seen no snakes, but we have seen lizards, some big spiders, insects and a black scorpion, which by the way takes three hard smacks with a shoe to get through his thick shell.

Having to buy cheap one time use Chinese tools until your good ones arrive. Example… $2.00 hacksaw hopefully good for at least a couple cuts, no… one stroke and the blade breaks in three. I had to laugh.

Driving the 15 miles to town twice a day for supplies is getting old, but it is still a lot cheaper and faster than having things delivered.

And then there is the no cell or Internet at the house, even though it does work a few hundred yards up the road. So for now we load up in the truck and head up the road to use the cell as a hot spot and then check and download stuff. This is getting us by for now and we have a few good leads on how we can solve this problem, it just takes time and finding the right people.

That’s about all the small little stumbles that we are dealing with at this point. And now here are a few of the small things that make us happy.

The drinking water at the house is excellent and now I have it hooked up to the fridge and we are now making cold water and ice. And yes, there is a pressure regulator installed.

The sounds at night are amazing, with all the frogs, crickets, birds and animals moving around. And only once have we got out of bed and said “What the f#*k was that?” Turns out one of the ropes on the big tarp over the construction site came loose and the tarp fell making a very strange sound.

The different beautiful plants and flowers that we see everyday are amazing along with new creatures we see almost daily.

Sleeping with the windows open and waking up and the outside temp is 68-72. Granted during the day it is in the 80’s and a little humid but once the sun goes down, the nights are great.

We really don’t have many flying bugs, in fact we keep the front door open all day untill we go to sleep at night.

There is an ice cream truck that goes up our road playing music. The little bakery in the village that is open three days a week has great stuff and the small store on the corner has fresh chocolate covered bananas or pineapple on a stick. What else would a sweets lover need?

The truck is getting at least 30 mpg which is wonderful in a country where diesel is $5.00 a gallon.

Construction goes very fast and is very reasonable. I ordered block, cement, rebar and called Tony to see if his backhoe was available today. Everything was delivered and the backhoe was going all in about three hours. Then we asked our crew if they could only work five days a week instead of six so that we could have a little more time to ourselves and that was not a problem. I even went to a steel place to get 110 L brackets with holes in them for the roof. They did not have them, but said they would make them, come back in one hour

The amazing friendly people who are always smiling. The other day we were in a store and I was wearing a shirt from Santa Cruz. This elderly gentleman asked me if that is the one in California and I said, but of course. After a long conversation with him we found out he was born in Belize and then moved to Newport Beach and now he is back. He introduced us to his wife and explained that his father was a logger in Belize back in the day.  We told him that we had just moved here and he welcomed us to the Belizean family. This is why life moves slower here in Belize, everyone is willing to talk and share their experiences.

One more good thing is knowing that the house is looking so good that even the tree frogs want to see inside.

Overall everything is going great and pretty much as we expected. Hopefully this week our container and our new truck will arrive and that will change things a little for the better. If not, no worries.

Lots of work happening around the Toucan Hideaway, yes that is what we are calling it. First of all the little casita is coming together very nicely. The walls are getting some paint and a few personal touches going in.

As for the outside we ordered a truck load of white gravel to put around the house to keep the mud down. Eventually the grass will grow through the rocks and it will be a good solid grass yard. Ruben, Kelley and I spent most of last weekend landscaping around the house, moving rocks, spreading gravel and putting in plants. I know what you’re thinking, don’t you already have enough plants? I guess I should say that we mostly went hunting around the property and found plants that we thought would look better in a different spot.

We found a nice Philodendron that we re-positioned on a tree next to the house, we also found an orchid that we moved to a stump next to the  house and some tropical bird of paradise. We also discovered that right next to the porch is a passion fruit vine.

We also are starting to get a few plants in the garden, the herbs patch is doing well with lots of basil, oregano and some new dill seeds.

Ruben also brought over some red and pink torch ginger that we put on each side of the stairs. He said that it grows fast and before we know it we will be giving it away. He also told us that the red one is for the men and when he passes one on the right he is the boss, but if a woman passes a pink one on her right then she is the boss. So we planted one color on each side of the stairs so that when one of us goes into the house that person is the boss, but when you come out of the house the other person is the boss.

Now that the back yard was level and mudless, it was a great place to put the bbq. Our first official dinner guests were Rob & Carol from Cholla. It was a wonderful night with great friends, good food and a little of Darren’s left behind Big Titty rum.

And if you were wondering about all the bugs, well I guess they did not get the invite… because there weren’t any.

As for the main house, all the footers are set and the septic is done. Judging by the size of the septic I assume he must think we are really full of shit.

So all the cement work is done and now it is time to order all the lumber for the house. Off to the lumber yard where we got all our other lumber only to find out that there is no more of the Nargusta wood available. Not too much of a problem there is a lot more lumber yards around. Yes that was a problem, no one had any. Our original lumber company said that had some uncut logs but they weren’t cutting or selling any now. I guess after they saw the size of the order and our sad faces they finally agreed to cut some. That was a big relief, until we asked when we could expect it. It turns out that the mill is shut down for two weeks for maintenance and after they open back up it will take a couple more weeks to cut it and then it has to dry. Since the contractor would then be without work for awhile and we were afraid that he might take on another job, we decided to have him start on the garage. Since the garage will be built out of all cinder block he will be able to stop at any time and get back on the house as soon as the wood is ready.

While Carol and Rob were here we did manage to head up to a small spot on the river where we could cool off and have a few cold beers. After that we took a cruise up to Rio Pools so that they could check it out.

They had also brought back a dozen lobster tails from lobsterfest and some Sonoran beef from Mexico, along with some of Carol’s potatoes stuffed with cheese and crab. This was all taken over to our friends Julie and Gary’s place above the river where we used to stay and we all enjoyed our own little lobsterfest. Sorry Darren.

Just more good times in Belize….

Our vacation down to Hopkins and Placencia for lobsterfest has come to an end. We have had a great time seeing our good friends, Darren, Lalani, Marguerite, Carol, Rob, and Rob’s son Andy from Cholla down here in Belize, but now it is time for us to get back down to business. The first thing we need to do is to get all the wood ordered for the house. They should have the septic and all the cement post done and be ready to start on the framing this week. And of course, our quest for internet will continue until we figure out our best options.

At this point we will not be posting very much until we can get the internet all figured out, so please bear with us. Have fun wherever your travels take you this summer and remember, Life is a journey, enjoy the ride!

After an exciting night of bowling and a good nights sleep we were ready for lobster. As we got close to the festivities you could hear the drums and the music playing. There were the Garifuna playing their traditional drums as well as a big band playing the steel drums.

There were lots of booths set up selling everything from jewelry to new boats. We did meet our neighbor there who was selling her line of Caribbean spices as well as our salesman for our new truck, but we weren’t there for any of that stuff we were there for the lobster.

Every vendor had a different way to serve lobster, the only problem was how much could we really eat? There was lobster grilled whole, curry, empanadas, tacos, sausage, kabobs, ceviche and just about anything else you could think of. We tried to eat as much as we could, but you combine that with all the beer and the hot sun and you fill up pretty quickly.

After we had our fill of lobster, it was getting very hot there with all the people and all those grills going, so we decided to head down the street to find a place to get a cold beer and some shade. We ended up at the Tipsy Tuna Bar and Grill right on the water. It was a brightly painted building with lots of people and good Caribbean music playing.

We thought we were done with lobster for the day until we saw the one item on the menu that we were all attracted to. The lobster grilled cheese sandwich. We definitely did not need any more lobster, but what the hell, it is called lobsterfest. Now picture this, what looked like four Hawaiian type rolls together as the bread and a  whole lobster tail diced up with a bunch of cheddar cheese inside and then buttered heavily and grilled. In the words of Darren OMG!

We all agreed that this could possibly be the best thing we have ever eaten or ever will. Darren has already requested this for his last breakfast before he leaves, and why not, at breakfast they top it with an egg.

Being the practical people we are we thought we should leave the bar before we couldn’t move anymore. As we were walking we pass a guy with a few coconuts in a wheelbarrow and I asked him if they were for sale. Within a couple of minutes, we were all sipping on fresh coco water.

Now that we have walked at least 100 yards down the beach and rehydrated, up pops another beach bar. After a few more drinks we thought it was time we should leave before we saw another lobster special on the menu that we just couldn’t pass up.

All day we had been looking for a painting for the new house. There was one that we liked so before we left we went back and made an offer. It was accepted and now we have a beautiful painting of a toucan. We were actually looking for a painting of an iguana, but we did see some that the same artist had painted before so it looks like we might commission him to paint one. And besides that, he actually lives right up by us.

Overall Lobsterfest was good, but not like the big one they have over in San Pedro with the big parades and competitions, but then again we did not stay up until 4:00 am when it ended. Next year I think we will have to make the trip out to the island to get the full experience of lobsterfest.

After a long day like that what better way to cool off and relax than to sit in a pool overlooking the Caribbean.

Oh, and I almost forgot about our nightcap. Darren had sampled a bunch of locally made rums and had bought a bottle to take home. It is very good rum, but sometimes I think it’s the name that sells it.

The first day when we arrived in Placencia we went in search of the great celebration and culinary experience called Lobsterfest. It turns out that they were pretty much just getting set up when we were there. I guess the big party is the next day where they will be going till 4:00 am. I know we will all be in bed way before that. Even though they were not all set up, we did manage to get to try some lobster fritters that were quite tasty.

After deciding that it would be best to wait till the next day for Lobsterfest when it all kicks in big time, it was time to find other things to do. So off to do a little sightseeing. Besides all the beautiful beachfront homes and resorts there are also some amazing lagoon side homes.

After picking out the perfect home we wish we could afford it was off to find the perfect beach bar with atmosphere and maybe some good lobster or conch dishes.  Now, this might sound easy in a place where the bars have names such as the Pickled Parrot, Tipsy Tuna, Flying Pig or the Bonefish Grill, but not so. We tried quite a few different ones for a single beer just to see if they were worthy of our quest. Some had atmosphere but not near the beach, others were perfect right on the beach but way too fancy for us, one was having bingo night and let’s just say we were the youngest ones in there.

We finally gave up our quest and decided to go for one that we were all comfortable with, a bowling alley and pizza joint. I know this is not what you think of when you are on the shores of the Caribbean, but Placencia has the only bowling alley in the entire country of Belize and so far also the best pizza.

We had no intention of bowling when we went in there but after a few beers, it was time to give this four-lane landmark a go. And in case anyone is wondering, yes it is a real alley with pin set ball return and even shoe rental, the only thing it didn’t have was automatic scoring. Darren, Kelley and I decided that maybe we should do this again before we leave, and as for who won, I think we all did because no one injured themselves. On the other hand, maybe we should not push our luck and just go with that one good experience.

Tomorrow we will hit Lobsterfest and hopefully get our fill of lobster delights.

Sorry for the delay but we are still working on very minimal internet connections. Anyway, let me back up to how our first week went.

It turns out that the red Mahindra we ordered will not be there for a couple more weeks, but they did have a silver one we could take now if we wanted. In the meantime, if we hold out for the red one they will give us a loaner at no charge. You can’t beat that deal….or can you? I guess the next shipment in a couple of weeks will be the 2019 models instead of the 2018 we ordered. All we could think was, oh great what is the price difference on the new model? Turns out that there is no difference in price. So if we wait for two weeks we get a free loaner and a year model upgrade all at no extra cost. Sounds like we will be holding out for the red one.

Once we had the truck it was time to head towards San Ignacio to get a bed so that we would not have to spend our first night sleeping on the floor of the new casita. After that was all taken care of it was off to meet our friends Rob & Carol from Cholla, who have been on a multi-month road trip through Mexico. After a lot of catching up and a few beers, it was off to the property to wait for our new bed to arrive. Rob & Carol followed us out to check it out and see just how crazy we really are. It was great hanging with them and catching up and sharing all the adventures we have all had in the last few months. I think they will be hanging around for awhile to see what Belize is all about, plus it is lobsterfest starting next week, and who wouldn’t want to go to that?

The new king bed arrived and got all set up so we were good for our first nights sleep in our new place. First of all, it is very dark out here at night, I mean very dark. It rained all night which made for an excellent nights sleep with all the windows open.

Other things needed to make this work for the next three months was a fridge-freezer, bbq plus a clothes washer. At this point the only practical place for the washer was on the porch, after all that’s how most of the houses around here have them. As for the dryer it is one of those fancy solar powered ones, which is just rope between two trees. Whatever works for now.

After a big run around we finally got a fridge with water and ice on the door, which is very uncommon down here. Our water here is very good so once we hook it up to the fridge we will have great ice and cold water. Of course the fridge would not fit through the door so off come the handles and then the front door to the house.  This will all happen again once the other house is done and it gets moved over there. In the meantime it is stocked with all the essentials. Oh and did I mention that the stairs were also too narrow, so it had to come over the rail.

Rob and Carol headed over to San Pedro for Lobsterfest, we will catch up with them next week in Placencia for their lobsterfest.

Darren arrived the other day to check out his property and to head to Lobsterfest this weekend with us. After a coupe of days of dragging Darren around getting stuff and arranging for stuff to happen we thought it was time for some fun.  So off to Rio On Pools where we could sit in the cool water and chill out for a bit.

They have started on the big house, and jumped in at full speed. We arranged for the backhoe to dig our septic and spread out some more gravel around the house. Lots of block has been delivered for the septic along with two dump trucks of gravel, a bunch of rebar and a ton of cement. All the footers for the house are dug and come next week we will be ordering all the lumber. Overall it has been a very busy first week here.

After all that work we decided that we should head towards Placencia a day early and spend the night in Hopkins. Of course we would have to stop at Bertha’s Tamales  on the way for the best tamales in Belize. After that we need to stop at the Marie Sharp’s factory in Hopkins for some tasting and to stock up on sauces. Of course we had to gather up a bunch just to fill up the new fridge.

After checking into Jungle Jeanie’s it was time for a few cold beers and a dip in the warm Caribbean ocean, then we needed to find something to eat.

Since lobster season had just started… we had lobster on our minds. We found a little spot that offered grilled and stuffed lobster, so we had to give them both a try. The grilled lobster was great as well as the shrimp stuffed lobster. We are all very full right now ,but we are all still looking forward to tomorrow when Lobsterfest starts in Placencia.

Still working on getting internet so won’t be posting much until later. Looks like we need to put up a tower for an antenna  on the property, so off tomorrow to get that started.   Everything is going great settling into our new surroundings. Been out buying all the necessary things to make us comfortable till the big house is done, which they are starting on tomorrow. Lots of things to post about, but no time at this point. Hopefully soon we’ll be sitting on our own porch writing this.

Happy Father’s Day to all you great fathers.

The container was delivered just about ten days ago to the kids house in Arizona. After walking in and out of it many times and analyzing how we could possibly fit everything in there it was time to get to work. First thing to get done was to weld in some new tie down points. Randy jumped right on that and welded in about 20′ of rebar on each side about halfway up to give us more options for securing the load.

We had about 50 good matching bins that stacked perfectly along the outside walls, which left just enough room for the two quads to fit right up the middle. Of course the quads had to be drained of fuel and the batteries disconnected so that they could be shipped, but that was no big deal. Ratcheting tie down straps was the best way to go to get everything tight and secure. We had a bunch of straps to start with and even bought some more just in case, but we still ended up making a couple more trips to the store for more straps. We might just end up being the bin and strap people of Belize.

Anyway, the container looked so professionally packed with all the matching bins and two matching quads, then came all the rest of the oddball stuff that wouldn’t fit anywhere else.  By the time it was fully packed it looked more like the Beverly Hillbilly’s were moving to Belize.  In the end we did manage to get everything in there plus some stuff for a few other people. At this point the container is all sealed and waiting for a crane and a truck in the morning.

The truck and the crane showed up on time (actually a little early) so everything was a go. After moving all the personal vehicles out of the driveway it was time for the big boys to move in. The crane backed up in position and then the semi backed in right next to him. All the rigging went on (with the help of Randy) then it was time to make this container fly.

Under the watchful eye of our grandson Luke and the two neighbor girls, the crane lifted all of our belongings up and over the house. Once it got past the house, the container came to a nice soft landing on the bed of the truck where it was strapped down tight. Finished up some paperwork, wished the driver safe travels and said goodbye to all our stuff.

The truck is now on it’s way to a port in Houston where it will be loaded onto a freighter and shipped to the port in Belize. Once in Belize it will have to be opened, inspected and charged the appropriate duty for all the items. We have a very detailed list of items and their value, so hopefully they will just charge duty based on the list. If they do have to unpack the container, all I can say is… good luck getting it all back in there! Once it clears customs it will be on it’s way to our property, where it will become our temporary garage untill we get the real one built.

All in all it should be to our place in about three weeks. We will be heading down in about ten day to really get this adventure started.

Last Saturday, our son Randy and his beautiful wife Stacy hosted a going away party for us at their home in Gilbert, AZ. It was a great  chance to see friends and family that we haven’t seen in quite awhile. Randy had smoked up a bunch of pork for sliders, there was green chili bacon mac & cheese, lots of sides and snacks and enough beer to keep everyone happy, plus there was even a three bin margarita machine making good frozen slushy drinks. A great time was had seeing everyone and telling our story about our adventures in Belize. We can’t wait to finish up the next house so we can start having friends come down to see this wonderful place that we will be calling home. Thank you again Randy and Stacy and everyone else who stopped by to wish us well on our next journey. I’m sure we will see a lot of you down in Belize at some point.

Yesterday our shipping container arrived, a twenty footer that we now own. In order for us to be able to ship this by boat from Houston to Belize it had to be ocean certified. From what I understand, none of the containers in AZ are certified so we had to get one from Long Beach, CA. So now it is time to get down to some serious packing and get this thing on a truck next week and headed towards Houston and ready for it’s Caribbean cruise to Belize. I’m sure the kids will be happy to get their garage space back and actually be able to walk through it again. So that will be our Memorial Day plans, packing up all our stuff and getting it ready to ship.

We checked the trail cameras again and found not quite as many animals as before, but I think that might be because there were people there every day during the construction of the house. There were still some pictures of coatimundis, jaguarundis, lizards and one big black bird on the camera that we had never seen before. After a little research, we decided that the bird was a Great Curassow that grows up to 10lbs. and reaches a length of 39″. The male has black feathers with a yellow beak and is common throughout Central America. The species is threatened due to loss of habitat and overhunting, so this is great to see one roaming around on our property.

We also saw a gray-necked wood-rail walking along the road at the property. Of course we didn’t know what it was until we got out our handy bird guide. We just thought it was an interesting bird that we have never seen before, turns out it is very common in Belize. I assume we will be seeing more of these at some point.

Sometimes we see lots of iguanas, geckos or other small lizards, but this time it was all about the Jesus Christ lizard. They were everywhere, from the place we stayed in town to all over the property. In case you are not familiar with this lizard, it is the one that stands up on its hind legs and runs when frightened. It can even run on water, hence the name.

One last thing before I close this out, I’ve got to show another picture of a plant. We don’t know what it is, but it is big, green and right at the entrance to the driveway. The rainy season is just getting ready to start so I’m sure I will be posting lots more pictures of interesting plants.

There should only be a few days left before the first casita is done, unfortunately we have to leave before that happens. The handrail on the front porch, shower stall and a few other things need to get done. But, our next trip here in a few weeks we should be ready to move in. So far this trip we have spent the whole time running around getting last minute supplies and materials, most of them being correct and others… not so much. Doors and fans not on the delivery truck when it arrives, selling us the wrong wire size and a few other things, but nothing we couldn’t handle. The house is looking great and the quality of the workmanship is beyond what we expected, so Antonio will definitely be the builder for the main house.

The septic is dug and the blocks are going in, but not without the removal of a couple big rocks. The workers are wonderful, very personable, always smiling, great craftsmen and willing to talk, what more could you ask for from a construction crew?

Ruben cleared another spot where we will be putting a garage/shop where we can store vehicles tools and other stuff. We were all ready to have them start while we were gone, but the builder said that it could take up to three months to finish it. After thinking about it overnight we decided that the main house was more important since we will not have a kitchen or a place to do laundry for a while. So when we get back down here the main house will get started and should take about three months. After that, we can concentrate on the garage, and besides we will have a container here with stuff that mostly just needs to go in the house anyway.

We did spend one day test driving the Mahindra PikUp. We must have tested it about an hour or so, a lot of off-road testing the high and low range and how it handled. Then it was off down the highway to see how the turbo diesel matched with a 6 speed would do. Even pulling uphill in 6th gear it still did great. We couldn’t really find anything we didn’t like about it, except that there are no drink holders up front. Also that the blinker handle is on the right and the wipers are on the left of the column. I only washed the windshield twice when making a turn, but we’ll get used to that. Back at the dealer we put down our deposit and placed an order for a red one. It should be these in a couple of weeks once we return.

Last trip down we talked to Ruben about getting some coffee plants started for us. He jumped on that and got them going and now we have about 50 plants going and another 50 or so that are just sprouting. Once they are big enough we will find a place under the canopy where they will thrive and produce some of the best shade-grown coffee you’ve ever tasted, hopefully.

Well here we are back in Belize for one last time before the big move next month. Our main goals this trip are to check on the house, get a garage started, run power to the house and to pay our workers. We got in on Saturday but decided to wait until Sunday to head out to see the progress on the house. I think this turned out to be one of the best Mother’s Day gifts Kelley could ever want. The house is beautiful, what it lacks in size it definenty makes up for in beauty, especially against the green jungle setting.

Antonio (the builder) says there is still about a weeks worth of work left before it will be done. Mostly it is installing the bathroom fixtures, finishing the drywall, finishing the floor,  baseboards and other small detail stuff.

This week we will be buying things like ceiling fans, lights, outlets and a new front door. The hardware store sent over a front door that opens the wrong way and it got installed. No problem, we will just get the right one and save this one to be used on the other house.

Ruben has started digging the ditch that the power will be run in from the pole to a distribution panel that will the go to the houses, garage, etc. Tomorrow it is off to purchase all the wire, panels, breakers, pvc and anything else the electrician thinks he will need to get this accomplished.

We will also get Ruben started on the next clearing where the garage will go. Unlike the houses, the garage will be built out of cinder blocks and have a cement floor. There should be plenty of room in the garage to park the vehicle, quads and even have a good size shop.

It’s hard to believe that just a few years ago it was just a raw jungle lot and a dream. Now there is a good road into the property along with power, fresh water and now a nice little casita for us to stay in. Once we are here next month we will get started on the main house and this casita will be for family and friends.

Now it is off to get Kelley some Mother’s Day lunch and some ice cold Belikins. Happy Mother’s Day to all of you wonderful mothers out there!

The day has finally come when we turn over the keys to our Mexican home  (Bedrock) that we have had for 24 years to the day. We bought this house on Cinco de Mayo, 1994 and now we are out of there on Cinco de Mayo, 2018. We have  met so many wonderful people and had so many good times here with friends and family and done so many unbelievable things that it would boggle your mind. Thank you everyone who has made this part of our lives so very special and unbelievable. Hopefully we will see you all on the next leg of our life’s adventure.

A lot of people ask us how we can leave a place that we have called home for so long. Well we have reached the point in our lives where we want more out of life before it is too late. Mexico was a wonderful chapter in our lives and we will never forget all the friends and adventures we had there, but now it is time for the next chapter.

The jungle home is moving along quite nicely and should be ready for us by the time we make the move there in about a month. We will be  down there next Saturday for a few days for one last visit to tie up loose ends before our big adventure really starts.

It has only been one month since the build started and WOW is it coming along fast. This week the siding, ceiling and drywall went up. The vaulted ceiling is looking awesome and we can not wait to see it up close next weekend.

Now that the first casita is in place we can start planting some trees. The hard part will be trying to decide what kind to plant. Riverwalk Nursery has been posting some of their trees and plants that they have in stock.  Besides all the common tropical plants and flowers, they have some others that caught our interest. Macadamia trees, Pistachio trees, grafted citrus  trees that produce orange, grapefruit and limes, peach trees, grafted avocado that are ready to produce, plus grapes, raspberries, figs and more. We might have to clear a little more land just to plant all the fruits and veggies that we will be growing.

The Haliconia is also known as the Lobster Claw because of the way the flowers look. I wish they tasted like lobster, can you imagine growing lobster in your garden?

This is the village where we are building our home. It should be a fun day where we will be able to taste some more of the local foods, learn more about the culture, and get to know some of our new neighbors. We are looking forward to being there.

Approximately 9 miles away from San Ignacio is San Antonio Village. On your way, rolling hills and countryside dotted with farms, homes and friendly dogs and chickens will greet you. There is even a coconut water stand right outside of Cristo Rey Village.
Nestled beautifully in a valley, the village greets you below as you enter the village with colourful homes, clothes strung to sun dry, farm produce and friendly smiles and waves. According to Local Historian Mr. Alfonso Tzul, the village is said to have been established more than 100 years ago and is populated primarily by Yucatec Mayas. The village is known throughout the country and globally for its artists and healers.

The Garcia Sisters, Cayo’s famous slate carvers are established there and their Tanah Mayan Art Museum is worth the visit. San Antonio is also the home of the late Don Elijio Panti; Shaman Guide, Spiritual and Herbal Healer and renown globally. Infact, there is National Park established in his honor which is located where the village ends and also borders neighbouring Cristo Rey and El Progresso Villages. The recently established San Antonio Women’s Group draws visitors to the village as they showcase local tradition and customs. Additionally, Pacbitun Maya Archeological site sits on the outskirts of the village and becomes alive in the summer as study abroad groups conduct research and excavation.

With the steady growth of tourism in the area over the past few decades and with growing threats to biodiversity and culture, there is the obvious need for mitigation and local intervention to help protect and raise awareness among locals and visitors. It is then the Vision of The San Antonio Sustainability Committee to help achieve this through education, sports and local inclusion. We invite you to follow and help us as we engage in our first ever event with the aim of reviving culture, instil appreciation to nature and our surroundings and to engage local families to become involved in our quest to bring San Antonio back to life in a sustainable and safe manner.
Thank you!

Building is moving right along on the first casita. The framing is all up, the floor is laid and the roof is going on. Next week the siding goes on and then all the interior work will begin. Ruben says that everything is going great, is on schedule and we will be very happy when we see it.

Speaking of seeing it, we will get our first actual look at it in two weeks when we head back down. This short trip is mostly to check on the progress of the house and to buy things such as ceiling fans, lights and anything else we need to make it comfortable. We will also be getting all the materials needed to run the power from the pole to the house (which is about 200′ away).

With the help of our son Randy, we did manage to round up another identical quad.  Same year, same size, same low hours, even the same color. So with two Polaris 800 4×4’s we should have no problem going anywhere and have fun while doing it.

The trailer is packed with everything we think we will need and it will leave Cholla Bay, Mexico this Sunday headed to Arizona. Randy and Stacy will be here this weekend to tow it up and store it at their house for a couple weeks until we get the container arranged and ready to ship. We will be in Cholla for one more week before we say goodbye and start this new chapter in our lives. And seriously, we are both sooooo excited to start this new adventure!

With only a little over three weeks left before we need to turn the keys over for Bedrock, we are in fast forward. The boathouse is just about all packed up and next week we will concentrate on the house. We sold the house semi-furnished, but there is still a lot of personal items that we will be taking with us.

Last week we made a quick trip up to AZ to look for a couple of quads that we plan to take with us. We did find one really nice one that will soon be cruising around the jungles of Belize. It is a Polaris Sportsman 800 4×4 with winch and all, along with very low hours. We are still looking for another one, hopefully the same model, so if anyone has any leads please let us know.

Last week Randy and Stacy hauled their big trailer down to Mexico so we could load it up with all the stuff we think we need to take with us. Packing is going good and at this point, all still looks good for our May 5th departure from Mexico. When we leave we will head up to Gilbert to the kid’s house for a week, then down to Belize to check on the progress of the house. We will only be in Belize for a week then we will head back to Gilbert to line up a shipping container and get everything ready to ship.

Our plan is to not be back in Gilbert for more than a few weeks before we make the permanent move to Belize, but that all depends on how the first little casita is going. Ruben sent some pictures the other day and said that everything is on schedule for us to be in by early June. Ruben said that by the end of this week they should have all the framing up and he will send more pictures. I’ll keep everyone posted.

This will be the first small casita where we will live while they are building our main house. Once we move into the main house then this will become a guest house.

Easter is quite festive in Belize due to it’s large Christian population. One local tradition is the sawdust carpets that are made on the roadways for Good Friday. The carpets are made by faithful parishioners near their own church’s for the other parishioners to see on their way to the services. These are beautiful carpets made from colored sawdust, flower pedals, ash and even sea shells. Each carpet takes weeks to come up with a design and to color all the materials. These carpets are true master pieces that bring the community together for this long standing religious tradition.

Hopefully next year we will be able to see these amazing sawdust carpets in person.

Ruben has been cutting a border pathway around the property that is next to ours. Since there was never a trail there before and there is now, we thought we should explore it. Ruben led the way with machete in hand chopping as we go. Once we got to the inside corner of the property, there was a good size pond with a couple of long-legged white birds standing on the edge. It was all nice and quiet until a huge iguana jumped from the tree and into the water, that sorta startled us. Ruben said that it is a spring fed pond and is always full and attracts lots of animals.

After checking out the pond Ruben started cutting a trail to the mound (Yes there is a Mayan Ruin on that property). We hiked up the 50′ tall mound to the top where it was flat. Keep in mind that this is an undisturbed site that is covered in growth. Ruben was telling us that he could clear off the top and it would be a great place to bring some chairs and sit. We’re not sure how we feel about sitting on top of a Mayan ruin, so we said it should just be left the way it is for now.

On the way back we decided to cut down the trail that goes between the lots. Halfway down the trail, there was a good size tree that had recently fallen. A couple days later we went down that trail again and Ruben had already removed the tree from the trail. Ruben is always on top of things.

One of the evenings our neighbors up the road invited us to a bbq. Dan and Brandy just had their house built last year and are the first ones to take advantage of the new power poles. It was a great time as they invited other people in the area which gave us a chance to meet and get to know them. Dan cooked up some great chicken, hamburgers and hot dogs, plus with all the other stuff people brought there was no shortage of food. And of course, you know there were some ice cold beers flowing. Thank you Dan and Brandy for a great time, we can’t wait to start hosting at our place once we get settled in.

One day after we were done with our running around we headed down to Da Malfunction Junction for a cold beer where we met a nice couple, Ryan and Theresa . They have a piece of property about 2 miles from us towards the village where they will eventually build some day. Sounds like they are on the same page as we are, planting all kinds of fruit trees and other edible plants. Eventually I can see a few of us neighbors heading down to the Junction at the end of the day for a cold one and listen to some of Brian’s fine jokes from his new book.

Just a couple other tidbits I’d like to share from the last trip. On our last day of the trip, we decided to do laundry at Gary and Julie’s place where we were staying. Out of the washer, all the clothes are nice and clean and wet. Wouldn’t you know that is the same time the dryer decides to quit working. Not a problem, Gary rigs up a clothesline and everything is good, they should be dry by morning so we can pack and catch a plane. About 2:00 am that morning we were awakened by the sound of rain. So get dressed, go out and gather everything up before it gets too wet.  As we were gathering up the clothes we noticed that Gary had put a sign that read shirts 50% off. Clothes did end up drying by morning, and none were sold, so all was good.

Oh and speaking of shirts, we always stop at a little restaurant called “Cheers, with a Tropical Twist” about 30 miles from the airport for a meal, or to stay overnight when there is not enough daylight to make it all the way to San Ignacio.

Anyway, at the restaurant they have t-shirts hanging from the rafters from all over the world.  Before our last trip down with Darren, I suggested for him to bring a shirt because I was going to bring a Big Wave Dave shirt to hang. So now if you ever happen to stop by Cheers keep your eye out for a Big Wave Dave shirt and a Dodd Diesel shirt.

One more little thing, it always intrigues me is how they do construction in other countries. This is a fine example of using trees to hold up the forms for a cement roof. I guess you just have to use what is available, and there are a lot of trees in Belize.

Well, now it’s time to get serious about packing up our house in Mexico which we have had for 24 years and get ready to start this new chapter in our lives in Belize.

I’ve mentioned before that Belize offers a wide variety of culinary options, mostly because of the variety of different cultures and the recipes that they brought with them. Just about any food you can imagine you will find in Belize. Then again there are always the seasonal local favorites that will seem a little strange to some. We being adventurous eaters, always have to try something we’ve never had before. Below are a couple pictures of some local favorites that we just had to try. Any guess what they are?

It is not iguana, we have not tried iguana yet, but I’m sure one day we will. Speaking of iguanas, the place we stay in San Ignacio always has a lot of iguanas hanging around.

This time we were lucky enough to be up close and personal for a territorial fight between two big iguanas. This went on for quite awhile until there was one that claimed victory. After seeing these iguanas fight, you do not want to be around them, especially when they start whipping their tails. I’ve talked to a few people whose dogs have gotten a little too close and ended up with a nice cut from an iguana tail whip.

On the road heading into our property one of the lot owners is letting some of the locals farm it until they are ready to be there and build. In the past we have seen corn and peanuts being grown there. This time when we drove by there were a few farmers out there with a tarp and a pile of dried plants on it that they were beating with sticks. Of course curiosity got the best of us, so we had to stop and introduce ourselves and inquire about what they were doing. Turns out that is how they release beans from their pods.  This method seemed to be working well as there was a big pile of red beans on the tarp. I’m sure this is how they have done this for generations.

Now that we are getting ready to build, it is time to start thinking about some plants. Ruben said that he can get us some banana and plantain plants from some of the ones he has growing around his place. So along the entrance to the property we will put some on each side of the driveway as you enter. I guess bananas grow fast and will keep reproducing new plants as they grow, so we should have a good supply once they get going.

A while back Ruben had planted some coffee and some cocoa plants on his farm and he said that they are doing well. So we have commissioned him to start growing some for us in bags. Once they are about a foot tall we will plant them somewhere on our property. I have asked him to grow me 100 of each, so hopefully coffee and chocolate are in our future.

We are always amazed at all the plants we find on and around the property. This time we found some bird of paradise growing near the road by the property. This is not the Mexican or Spanish bird of paradise that you find growing in the desert, but rather the tall big leaf tropical looking one with orange and blue flowers. They just happen to be seeding so we picked about 150 seeds and planted them around some pathways that we have cut in. They should be growing everywhere soon.

I almost forgot, are you still wondering what those delicious looking dishes are? Okay… we were driving down the Western Highway and we saw a sign for Shena’s Bistro with a board out front advertising the daily specials.  Since we love stopping in little places like this we thought we’d give it a try.

The first plate of food is ox tail and the second one is armadillo. If the locals like it, then it is definitely worth trying.

Every time we head down to Belize we always try to have some type of new adventure, whether it’s cave tubing, fishing, hiking to waterfalls or just trying new foods. Well… this time we did not do any of your typical tourist stuff, but this was still one of our biggest adventures yet. We were up every morning at 6 and hit the ground running only to slow down for lunch and then again at happy hour to reflect on what we had done.

Our big adventure this time was to figure out and purchase all the materials needed to build our first guest casita. After a lot of research and quotes over the last year we were ready to start building, of course we might have been pushed just a little since our house in Mexico had sold.

First things first, off to the bank again to see about getting our account open (which we have been working on for two years now). This time finally everything was in order and we had been accepted and should receive everything this week.

Then off to the power company to get our meter installed and get our account activated so that the contractor can get started. All went well there and it actually ended up costing less than we thought because we already had an account open from when we bought the poles.

In Belize there are small hardware stores that carry a little of everything in every little town and village, but the biggest and cheapest ones are in Spanish Lookout, a Mennonite community. There you will find specialty glass shops, electrical shops, lumber yards, metal shops, plus big general hardware stores.

After a couple of days seeing what they had to offer and meeting with our contractor we were ready to set up accounts and start purchasing the materials. At the glass shop we ordered custom  windows that will be louvered tinted glass, with bars built in and of course screens. Then it was off to the sheet metal company to ordered the red zinc roofing. After that it was time to place the big order, all the lumber for the house. We went with Nargusta which is a hardwood that is common in Central America and will not be bothered by termites. It is a lighter colored wood with some red veins in it. It should be very nice.

Next, the hardware store, to gather up all the other stuff. From hurricane ties and toilets to door knobs and showers. We think we got all the basics to get this casita livable for now. There will be other stuff such as ceiling fans and light fixtures, but we can take care of that once we are there.

In case you are wondering, this first casita will be 16′ x 18′ with a 6′ x 16′ porch. It will be like a studio with a bed in the main area and a full enclosed bathroom. We will live in this while they build our main house. Once in the main house this small one will be a casita for family, friends and possibly rentals. In the end we hope to have at least two small casitas plus the main house.

This is going to be a wild, exciting and adventurous ride, but we are both more than ready for it!

We finally got some time to sit down and reflect on what we have accomplished this trip, I’ll explain all that later. For now I’m sitting on the porch with a cup of coffee overlooking the river watching parrots fly by and seeing some really big tarpon jumping in the river below.

When we booked this trip we had no idea the situation we would be in, but the main reason we chose this time of year for a trip to Belize is to see the La Ruta Maya river race. We are staying at Gary & Julie’s Wish Willie’s River Cabanas, which just happen to be a short distance from the starting line for the big race.

The La Ruta Maya is an annual 4 day canoe race down the river from San Ignacio to the Caribbean Sea. The La Ruta Maya is the biggest annual sporting event in Belize, drawing thousands of spectators. The race covers over 180 mile of river racing and is considered 40th out of the toughest 100 races in the world. Each evening the racers stop at village checkpoints to rest, refuel their bodies and to mingle with their fans. Each checkpoint is like a family reunion with Belikin beer tents, all kinds of fires cooking up delicious food, music and families just having fun.

Gary and Julie hosted an early morning party on their patio to cheer on all the racers for their 7:00am start.  The morning was a little foggy so the pictures didn’t come out all that great. Being it was the beginning of the 4 day race all the participants were giving it their all, some so much that they flipped their canoe right in front of us.

We would love to follow the race all 4 days down the river to the finish line, but this trip we have a lot of loose ends to tie up. We are lucky enough to be here for the start of the race this time and maybe next year we will be able to follow the whole race and partake in all the fun it has to offer, except for the actual racing of course. Or who knows, maybe once we are here we will get into canoe racing. Come to think about it, I think we’d be better spectators.

Got up at 4am in Arizona to catch our flight to Belize. Southwest has changed their flights so we had to go to San Diego first before we head to Houston. That makes a lot of sense, fly an hour west before turning around and going east, but at this point that was our only option. We didn’t have to change planes in San Diego, but we were allowed to get off and walk around the airport. Once in Houston we only had 45 minutes to catch the next flight. At least the flight to Belize had 45 vacant seats so we had room to stretch out. We finally get into Belize, we got the rental car and we are now at Cheers where we are staying for the night.

….And finally we are enjoying some long awaited cold beers.

We are heading back to Belize early Monday morning for 10 days. Lots and lots of business and loose ends to tie up. Wednesday we are meeting with the home builder to get started on the first small casita. He is from the local village and comes highly recommended by quite a few people we talked to. He will be able to build on site and hopefully have it done in a few months. The good thing is that Ruben will be able to check on it every day and maybe even help. This is good because we have talked to Ruben about what we expect plus he can give us updates as it happens. We will also be meeting with the window shop, lumber mills, hardware store, electric company, water company, internet company  and of course the bank.

The good thing is that most businesses close at 5 and that just happen to be when happy hour starts. So we will work hard all day, but come 5 o’clock I guarantee we will be sitting in front of a cold bucket of Belikin beer somewhere.

Like I mentioned, there is a lot of loose ends to tie up and not just in Belize but in the states and Mexico. Reason being is that there is an offer on our house in Cholla that we have accepted. Just going through the procedure now, but if all goes well, we will be on our way very soon.

Listening to Kelly McGuire (he sings a lot of songs about Belize) and this is one verse that struck me. “Reality’s fine, but I ain’t got the time”. Sounds good to us!

After spending some time in Belize we’ve gotten to know quite a few of the people. After mentioning  them in quite a few different postings in the blog, I thought we should put a picture with their names.  So here are just a few of the great people of Belize, enjoy.

Edwin, best river guide in Belize.

The happiest people in the world are not the ones with lots of money or all the possessions, but rather the ones that really appreciate the things they do have. Many of the people we have met have very little, but they always have a big smile and are very grateful for the things they do have. Such as the peace of mind they enjoy, their love of life, family, friends and all the ordinary things that most of us often take for granted. So when in Belize smile and be happy, everyone else is.

This fun filled trip is about to come to an end, but we won’t let it come to an end without one more stop. We pack up our stuff, say goodbye to our hosts and head towards the airport. Our one last stop was the Belize Zoo. It is great little zoo that is settled on 29 acres of natural jungle habitat. The zoo keeps only animals that are native to Belize and were either orphaned, injured, need to be rehabilitated or born at the zoo. The environment is as natural as possible,  and each animal lives in its own shady caged-in or moated jungle area.

We have been to the zoo a few times in the past and it’s always worth stopping there on your way back to the airport. It’s a great chance to get very up close to the animals of Belize.

The weather this time was a little on the cool side, which meant all the animals were active and moving around. The monkeys were swinging through the trees, the cats were roaming around and the Coati’s we all very active. They did have a new jaguar there that was in for killing cattle. I guess he will be there until he can be relocated to the deep jungle. You could tell he was not happy to be there, all you had to do was look at him and he would give you a big snarl.  On the other hand there was a big Tapir that really enjoyed having his head scratched. Probably not suppose to do that, but he was hard to resist.

After we left the zoo we just had to stop for a picture at the entrance to a plant nursery where they were using an old car for a planter. We assume that someone probably just ran out of gas and when they got back the plants had taken over. Plants do grow fast in Belize.

On the road we also came upon an old VW van doing about 45mph. As we pulled up to pass we noticed a ton of stickers in his rear window from different places and his license plate was from Argentina. As we passed we honked and waved and they did the same.  I thought we’ve been on a pretty good adventure, but driving a VW van from South America and still heading north, now that’s an adventure!

That’s about it for this trip, hope everyone is enjoying following us on our Belizean adventures.

WISHING EVERYONE A MERRY CHRISTMAS

This is one element of the season in Belize that you can enjoy anywhere in the world. Here’s how to make Rum Popo (Belizean eggnog)

Ingredients:

8 Eggs
4 Nutmegs
1 Ounce of Cinnamon Sticks
1 Pint White Rum
4 Tins Evaporated Milk
4 Tins Condensed Milk
Half-pound Raisins

Directions:

1. Soak the cinnamon sticks and raisins in rum for 48 to 72 hours.
2. Beat eggs well until all lumps are removed from the texture.
3. Add evaporated milk and beat again.
4. Add half of the condensed milk, check for sweetness, then continue to add to taste.
5. Add grated nutmeg.
6. Remove the cinnamon sticks and raisins from the rum that was used for soaking, then add the rum to the mix.
7. Blend well and store in bottles.
8. Enjoy!

We made a batch of this the other the other day and it turned out great! Then only thing we changed was that we only added 3 cans of the condensed milk. At that point we thought it was already sweet enough. We also did the rum soak for 3 days.

Up early and hit the road for a day of adventure, exploring the Mayan underworld. Actually we were just heading over to Jaguar Paw for a day of cave tubing.

Once we arrived we picked up a guide, got all the necessary equipment and started our 45 minute hike through the tropical jungle which included wading across the river a few times. Along the way Edwin (our guide) cracked open cohune nuts for us to taste, grabbed leaves from an allspice tree for us to smell and told us all about the Mayan’s and the underworld.

The vapor and clouds at the entrance to the caves suggested to the Mayans that this is the place where the wind and clouds are born. Here dwelled the gods of nature and the caves were the portal between the human world and the invisible world of the gods. This place was called Xibalba a place where the most sacred rituals were performed.

Once we got to our spot it was time to get in the water, it was a little chilly at first but much better after the initial shock. As Darren makes his graceful entrance into the tube we all hear a loud sheeeeeee sound from his tube. Could we be loosing Darren before we even get started? Turns out that the plug on the pillow part of his tube was not connected and had popped out, so Edwin shoves some small twigs into it to slow it down while he looked for the plug. The plug is back in and all is good until I get in and my foot knocks the plug out again. Now I’m sitting behind Darren with my finger on the hole trying not to laugh and trying not to let Darren sink. Plug is recovered, all is good and we are on our way.

We had planned this trip on one of the days when we knew there wasn’t a cruise ship in port, so we were pretty much the only ones on the river. The float immediately starts off into a dark cave where eventually you can not see each other without the help of your headlamp.

The sights inside the cave were spectacular, something that you couldn’t even imagine. These are living caves loaded with stalagmites and stalactites all still dripping and forming right before your eyes. Many of these formations resemble different things such as turtles, sharks, lions and even a woman holding a baby.

Part way into one of the caves our guide suggested that we beach ourselves and climb up to an ancient Mayan site, where we saw broken pottery that was more than 2000 years old. Climbing up in total darkness with sandals and only your headlamp was not the easiest, but it was definitely worth the hike.

Once out of the caves we floated lazily along the river through the jungle, spotting all kinds of birds and iguanas along the way.  The river was deep but in places where it did get shallow our guide Edwin would holler “Butts up! Nuts up!”. If you didn’t get a little higher on your tube guess what parts of you would be hitting the rocks on the bottom of the river.

Edwin took us on a little longer trip down the river past where we had gotten in. I guess this way he could show us the the new zip line they recently put in that goes right over the river. All in all it was about a 7 mile float down one of the most amazing rivers in Belize. This is a must do if you are ever in Belize.

On the way back to our place we stopped for a little lunch at a small roadside restaurant. Kelley and I ordered the cow foot soup while Darren and Bonnie ordered meatballs and chicken over rice. Everyone who serves a cow foot soup in Belize makes it a little different from the next. Some are definitely better than others, and this was one of the better ones. It was so good that Darren even gave it a try, and we think he liked it.

After a great day of learning all about the Mayan’s and their gods of the underworld we thought it was time to head down to Burns Ave for happy hour and sacrifice a few beers ourselves.