Away from the mainland

I’m sorry that my blog hasn’t been updated much lately. I expected to get through Belize in just a few days, but I ended up staying with this family for more than a week.

Mostly I’ve stayed in their home, helped cooking and hanging with the kids, reading and swimming in the pool.

But today it was time for an adventure again!

I had no idea that Belize now has the largest living coral reef in the world, since the Australian one died recently. And here I am, at just the right place.

We went on a boat trip to check it out.

First we stopped at the marina grocery to get a sufficient amount of beer and rum. (Alcohol was basically all they had.) It’s the true way of a Belizean sea captain!

We tried fishing, but were not so lucky with catching dinner, just yet.

On the way to the reef far away from the coast, we stopped at several of the many small privately owned islands, mostly owned by rich Americans. Some felt more cozy and authentic though. They get the electricity from solar panels and fresh water pipes from I don’t know where. They all had fancy little bar buildings, reggae playing from the speakers (like always in Belize). True paradise islands!

Finally we arrived at the coral reef. Am I crazy for not being amazed by them? Just like when snorkeling in Mexico, the corals are mostly brown and not too interesting. This time they had some shades of purple and yellow though, so I guess that’s cooler?

I saw some big fish this time though, and even a shark! I followed it a little bit, was maybe 2-3 meters from it when my friend started pulling me away to get back to the boat. But you don’t meet a shark often!

The best part was when the drunken weed-smoking boat driver took out his spear gun and went hunting for lobsters hiding in the reef, and it was awesome to see it happen right in front of my eyes.

I’ve been looking for new experiences and this was surely one of them! We stayed in the sea for many hours, and I improved my free-diving skills, trying to reach the bottom and collect a souvenir.

I did find a cool little shell, but I accidentally crushed it when climbing back into the boat. Was fun though!

On the way home, we went through some narrow river pathways. It was a detour, but probably worth it if I had not been completely exhausted by then. The day ended up being extremely long, tiresome and skin burning.

Then we had tacos with lobster meat for dinner, and I fell asleep at 9pm.

Sittee River Village

Now I’ve been staying for three nights with a crazy little family out in the Belizean countryside. I haven’t been around kids much, so having three of them (aged between 9 months and 7 years) around me at all times has been quite the experience.

It’s occasionally fun, but they never stop talking and following you, and they want to do the same things over and over! But it’s fun. It’s fun.

Bad photo, awesome baby pose.

In this house, I’ve learnt how to make corn tortillas, I’ve tried understanding Creole (a bastardized English that most speak here, sounds a bit like Jamaican), I’ve visited the river and the beach, swum in their backyard pool, eaten a lot of fruits and shakes, and gone slightly crazy from the lackluster internet.

The electricity comes and goes, which was a little tough when the fans stopped working in the middle of the night and I woke up in a pool of sweat. It’s very very hot here.

We visited a beach bar 10 meters from the water, and it was so rustic and simple, just like so many other houses and shops here. Feels like most buildings are made of wood with the paint about to peel off. It’s charming!

Today we decided to go on a 3 km hike up along a 300 meter tall waterfall called the Antelope Waterfall. At first it didn’t seem too demanding, and the three kids were happily walking along.

But it just kept going, steeper and steeper! At first I waited with the others as they took constant breaks, but after a while, me and 7-year old Triston just started walking ahead together.

The pictures don’t show just how demanding the trail really was.

Me walking in jungle.

After probably more than two hours, we finally reached the main swim spot. I was sure that the girls and babies would never be able to reach it.

I was soaked in sweat and was ready to swim! I threw my t-shirt towards the rope, and missed. It landed in the water and floated down the stream.

Crap.

I started climbing downstream, careful not to fall on the slippery rocks that were sometimes above the surface, sometimes below.

And there it was, stuck to a tree branch in the stream! I had been incredibly lucky!

I retrieved it, climbed back up to the swim spot, and hung it properly this time. I could finally have a proper swim.

I spent a bit of time to take a nice picture to go with the story.

A little later, the rest of the gang showed up. I was seriously impressed that they made the whole climb up, with kids in their arms. They were badass women! (They forced me to write this.)

When we had been swimming for a while, we noticed that the t-shirt was gone. It had fallen off the rope and floated down the waterfall once again!

I went down to look for it, but this time I wasn’t so lucky. I was doomed to go shirtless for the rest of the day.

I came to the conclusion that I need to shop for some new shirts soon. (I’ve kept losing them on my trip.)

Then I jumped off a cliff.

 

Orange Walk – Burrell Boom

I said good bye to the house and the dogs early in the morning (not to the humans though, as they were still asleep), and started biking the longest distance in a good while.

Home of some of the nicest couchsurfing hosts ever.

Despite the bad road, it was a pleasant ride, full of nice views and variation. After an hour, I was met by rain for the first time these weeks. Luckily just a drizzle, and it was incredibly refreshing and cooling. I realized how lucky I’ve been with the weather so far. Rain storms can appear at any moment, but none so far.

The rain stopped again after only a few minutes, and I shouted “More! More! …but not too much!”

The rain gods would grant my request later, but only the first half of it.

After 51 km, there’s a cute little gas station, seemingly owned by a family that lives there. I took a break and ate a couple of sandwiches. I had been convinced to buy a mush of beans for 1.50 Belizeans, to put on the bread. Surely more rich in protein, but it gets so messy to get it out of the bag and unto the bread! No, banana sandwich remains the king.

In Belize, the most affordable way to buy water is in small water bags. Although not as affordable as the 2 liter bottles in Mexico, you get four bags for 1 Belizean, and together they seem to contain a little over 1.5 liters. (The amount is not actually mentioned on the bags…)

Then suddenly. Dark dark clouds.

Luckily I had prepared long ago for stormy weather, having my backpack always wrapped in a big trash bag or laundry bag, and all I had to do was stop and hide my towel inside the plastic, and adjust the bag in my basket to make sure no content would get ruined.
I was ready to meet the storm.

And boom! I biked right into it, the rain drops hurt my arms, the wind could have made me fall over if I had not been prepared.

It was amazing.

The only thing I was worried about was my headphones, which were unprotected on my head. Next time, I guess I will have to pause my audio book and also protect the headphones from the rain.

After 10 seconds, I was as soaked as if I had swum in the sea. After 10 minutes, I saw a small bus hut, and decided to wait out the worst of it under cover.

Within half an hour, the storm had passed, and I went back on the road again, cooled and clean.

I arrived to the lovely little village Burrell Boom before noon. It’s not so much a village as a few houses built along the river.

I stopped at a small supermarket, bought more water, and asked if I could use the water hose outside to cool down. With a smile, the woman said I could.

I took a shower in the open, changed shirt, and waited for my next hosts to pick me up by car. Life was good!

(Well, until this American veteran showed up and bragged about his guns and how good of a shot he is, how big alligators he’s seen, and he told me about ambushes in Vietnam and Iraq. Most typical American you’ll ever see. I couldn’t wait to get away from there, but I kept being polite.)

Then finally they showed up. Three sisters in their early 20’s and three kids aged 9 months to 9 years, living in a house together. It’s been quite an experience, which I may or may not tell about in another update!

I found this police station quite funny. Bob Marley tunes were played loudly from the building. I bet they’re veeery busy.

A day of rest

Sometimes you just have to relax.

Corozal – Orange Walk

Going from Corozal to Orange Walk, there are three routes that are all around 50 km long. It’s hard to tell which one is the best bet, but Google Maps says that the most western route, the Northern Highway, is easily the fastest by car, so I took my chance with that one. At least it would be unlikely that I’d end up on dirt roads and break my tire again.

The first third was probably the nicest route I’ve biked so far. Constant change of scenery, many houses and civilization along the way, and wind at my back.
I found this house interesting.

When I got to the “highway” (which was just as narrow and uneven as the other roads in Belize so far), I got the wind against me again, and it was a little less fun. Still, with all the small buildings and people hanging by the road, it never got as monotonous as in Mexico.

The Queen Elizabeth Park; center of Orange Walk.

I arrived in Orange Walk after a little more than two hours, and it was easily the least exhausting distance so far. The town’s main road is quite busy and city-like, which is contrasted heavily by the country-side feel just a block away in either direction.

Pictures above and below are also Orange Walk.

For the first time on this trip, I had found a couchsurfing host! It’s the family daughter that handles the profile and requests, but she’s currently in the US. Her mother, Juanita, still accepts all guests, so it’s an amazing way to stay a night or three in the area. Good company, cultural exchange, local food and bed, everything for free. That’s my kind of traveling!

Today has been full of socializing with the mother, her boyfriend, two young teenage girls who live permanently in the house, as well as a traveling couple from Puerto Rico and USA.

The girl has been making jewelry made out of stones and other trinkets she’s collected during her travels, and she told me about her idea to try to sell them online, in order to support her travels. She didn’t have a camera though, so I volunteered to help out!

The sun was setting fast though, so we rushed it and the results weren’t great. But hopefully it’s enough to get her online shop started! I may update this post with a link later on.

It was a fun new experience to photograph jewelry.

I had only planned to stay here one night and continue to Belize City the next day, but they say that they will cook amazing food tomorrow, so I guess I’ll stay just a little longer…

Corozal and the Sea Breeze

The road from the Mexican border to the closest Belizean town, Corozal, is narrower than the ones I had biked on in Mexico. There was barely any room for me if cars met, so I felt a bit in the way when cars occasionally had to slow down.

It was a windy but short ride, and I arrived within 30 minutes.

It’s hard to pinpoint what it is, but coming to Belize feels like being in a completely new country! That might sound silly, because it obviously is a new country, but normally when crossing borders by land, the difference doesn’t feel as big, at least in Latin America.
But here, they speak funny English, they look different and have darker skin, and the prices are twice compared to the Mexican east coast, even though it’s at least as simple and dirty, at least in this village. Worse roads too.

The daily broken tire update:
I had to stop and pump the tire on the ride to Corazal, so something is definitely fishy. As I was biking through the town, I saw a bike shop and asked if they could pump my tire, and the friendly and chill dude (I imagine Jamaicans to be like this, though I haven’t been there, yet) said no prob!
When I explained the situation, he said “must be a tiiiny little hole!” and the way he said it was just hilarious! He said he’d fix it for 2 Belizeans (≈1 USD), so I’ll definitely go back later. He didn’t want money for pumping my tire.

Money problem update:
Since my credit card is gone, I had checked online to see that three stores in Corozal deals with Western Union, and as I arrived, I immediately saw “Fry Store” along the road, which was one of them. “This was easy,” I thought.

But of course it wouldn’t be easy. They had stopped offering WU services.

Two more places to try… Would I have to stay the night hungry on a park bench?

The locations map on Western Union’s own website turned out to be very inaccurate, so I kept asking people and biked around the entire town, also looking for the cheapest hostel.

Then suddenly I found Doony’s Instant Loan, far from where I had pinned the address on my phone. And success, they are still WU certified!

Would it be that easy? Well no. Just showing my passport wasn’t enough; I also needed a long MTCN code, and I didn’t have it. The lady said I could get free WiFi in the park nearby, so I went biking once again.

The park turned out to have great WiFi, but only for 1 hour per day! Luckily it was enough for me to find the code, and I returned and got my very first 117.5 Belizean Dollars! I’m rich!

Turns out there are no hostels here, only private rooms in hotels. By now, I had asked around for prices, and for 45 Belizean dollars per night, The Sea Breeze Hotel was the cheapest option.

It’s a nice place right next to the Caribbean Sea. Good showers, free drinking water, air-conditioning if you pay extra. The next morning I asked for a place to buy groceries, but the owner said she’ll make breakfast for me!

I can only assume this is a typical Belizean dish. Tortillas, beans, fried eggs with tomato and cheese on top. It was pretty good! Fresh papaya juice too!

Food in Corozal:
In the evening I went out to find something affordable to eat, but was surprised by the costs. A pizza seems to go for 20-30 Belizean dollars!! A small burger for 10. Are people actually rich here, but just dress and live very simple?! I’m confused by this country.

The supermarkets are similarly expensive, with a bag of potato chips being sold for 12-14 Belizeans, a tiny bag of nuts for 6. The only affordable thing I could find were bananas, sold by a woman on the street. 8 bananas for 1 Belizean is nuts!

I asked around, and apparently Chinese food is the only thing that’s affordable. (And there are tons of Chinese restaurants and takeouts here, and most supermarkets seem to be run by Chinese as well.)

At Perfecto Restaurant near the park, the most affordable meal was chicken sweet & sour for 10 Belizeans. It was alright, and definitely filling!

The final broken tire update (I hope):
Before leaving Corozal, I went back to the bike repair shop (also near the park) to fix my tire once and for all. Turns out it had four tiny holes!
He said that in this heat, patching so many holes will not work, and that I’ll get a new tube for 5 Belizeans. I agreed. 7 Belizeans (≈3.5 USD) for the whole reparation would have to be worth it.

The bike repair guy was a cool dude.

Now I was ready to continue my journey!

Bacalar – Corozal

As usual, the conditions for the next long distance were less than ideal. I woke up at 5am, realizing immediately that the aircon in the dorm had died. It was a sauna. And it seemed like no one else had enough energy to go and fix it, so I put on some clothes and walked to the reception.

No one there, and it was locked. My rescue mission had failed.

I’m not sure if I managed to sleep anymore, but I got up at 8am, had breakfast, packed my things, chilled a little, and then left Bacalar at 9:40am.

It was a really nice ride until 50 minutes later, when I reached the road split where left goes towards Chetumal and right goes to Escarcega. Here, the Caribbean wind started working against me again.

I frikkin’ hate the wind!

After 50 minutes of biking on a lower gear, I reached the second road split, where right would take me to the Belizean border. Now the wind was at my back again, and it was joyous!

Footnote:
There are two entrances to Belize in this area; one on the highway and one through the town Santa Elena. I tried the highway first, but a guard told me I have to take the other way.

I arrived to the border after less than two hours of biking. Except for my tire once again being very soft (I really have to do something about it), the day had started perfectly!


There are lots of stores and eateries in the town by the border. I bought two liters of water for my final 17 coins (the price was actually 18 pesos, but the lady was nice) and I decided to just have another banana sandwich in a park as lunch, to get to Corozal as soon as possible.

Let me tell you more about banana sandwiches! For me, they’re among the best and cheapest food you can get. Buying a loaf of bread (preferably something whole-grain or just not the basic white one) is cheap, and bananas are amazing to put as filling; you just peel it, put between two slices of bread, and squeeze the banana mush evenly.

Written while eating my lunch:

Why the banana is the best fruit?
1. It has a natural cover, so you don’t have to clean it and it doesn’t make a mess.
2. You can have dirty fingers and still eat without touching the food part.
3. It’s soft and juicy, and can even get a little warm or mushy and be just as great with bread.
4. It’s generally cheap everywhere.
5. It’s tasty. I suppose this is a matter of opinion though. For me, banana works with everything. It goes with cereal, in yogurt, on pizza (especially with some curry powder sprinkled on), oatmeal, ice cream, fruit salads, or just by themselves.

Alright, I’m glad to finally tell the world about this magical creation of nature.

After my lunch, it was time to cross the border.

This is a banana sandwich.

Crossing the Mexican-Belizean border:
Sometimes you have to pay 500 pesos to exit Mexico. It’s quite a large sum, but I had read online that if you’re insistent, you can say that the cost was included in the flight ticket. I tried, hehe, but the guard’s mind was very set. I had to pay 500.

Now, I had thought a few days ago that I’d better have 500 pesos left at this point, just to make sure I could enter. But because of my credit card accident, I now had exactly 170 pesos left.

I was stranded!

I started thinking about how I could get money. There’s no free WiFi in the town, but I found a “cyber” (a place where you can pay to use computers), and they let me borrow one, so that I could see if there was a Western Union nearby.

No such luck.

I sold the 6 USD I had left from my USA trip earlier in the year, and got 90 pesos for them. But I was still 240 pesos short!

The other thing that came to mind was a pawnshop. I could sell a few unnecessary things, like my jacket or my shoes, neither of which I ever use in this weather, and frankly I’d be glad to get rid of them.

I asked around, but there is no pawnshop in Santa Elena.

I could only laugh at the situation. Would I really have to beg people on the street to buy my things, to save up for the exit fee?

I went to a supermarket, trying to ask for help. They were quite interested as I showed my shoes, jacket and Kindle. Together, they’re probably worth 2000 pesos (new at least), and I hoped someone would pay 240 for it all. A guy joked about how I could sell my body to the girls, but that was the best offer I got. (And it was probably a joke anyway!)

After standing there for a while, lost and out of ideas, I started walking, thinking that maybe I’ll be lucky if I keep telling my story to people.

At the next shop, the cashier and a big man were talking, and I explained that it costs 500 to enter Belize, I’ve only got 260 and my credit card is lost. And that I have a few things to sell if needed.

This guy turned out to be my hero! He reached for the cash machine and fished up 250 for me! I thanked him dearly, and asked what things he wanted, but he just shook his head.

I thanked again and asked if I could take a selfie with him! They laughed and I took the picture.

I returned triumphantly to the emigration booth. The guard was nice this time, and as a young teenage girl came to ask if he wanted to buy a Jamaica (some kind of fruit juice, tastes like Swedish lingonsaft) for 15 pesos, he said he’ll buy one, but for the young gentleman. Me, that is. Then he asked her if she had a boyfriend, and tried to put us together…
I thanked for the drink and crossed into the neutral zone.

Normally, the emigration and immigration are within 20-100 meters at country borders, but here, I had to bike for a while to even find where I could get a stamp in my passport. It was confusing, so be prepared for that!

The Belizean border control was nice and relaxed, and since there were no other people there at all, I got through very quickly.

I had made it to Belize!

Bacalar Lagoon

Bacalar is a moderately small town right next to the Bacalar Lagoon, also known as the lagoon of seven colors. Right next to my hostel, there’s a fort called Fuerte de San Felipe. It was built in 1733 to protect Bacalar from pirates! Now I understand why my hostel is called Mesón del Pirata!

Unlike the Mexican sea coast, where it’s always free to swim anywhere, this lagoon is chopped up by different owners. This means that in order to fully appreciate what Bacalar has to offer, one either has to take a boat tour on the lake, or pay for the entrance at decent spots to swim.

There are supposedly free spots too, and I went by bike to find them.

All along the road that goes parallel with the coast, there are people trying to sell tours. I said I wanted to find a place to swim for free, and they told me I could go down here. Nope, not the best place to swim….

My second attempt was even worse. How did this floor even break?!

At least this part looked nice, but it was just a pier for boats. Some kids jumped into the water from there, but it just didn’t seem appealing at all.

I was about to give up. “Should I just go back to the hostel to take a shower instead?” I wondered.

Seven colors? Maybe three..

But no, couldn’t give up! I kept biking along the side of the lagoon and eventually left the village. This was the most hilly road I’ve encountered so far, and thought it was probably good practice. I can imagine that Guatemala and Honduras will be crazy.

Found quite a nice beach that charged 25 pesos for the entrance, but along the way, I had seen signs of a “cenote” (sweet water holes) not far away. I asked the teenage girls (who happened to be in charge of the entrance) which place was best to swim. They said both, so I decided to just continue to the cenote, which is called Cenote Azul.

It ended up being 5.3 kilometers from central Bacalar. It’s a nice little trip if you have a bike, but too far to walk.

And it’s a nice place! Using life vests is apparently obligatory, because it’s so very deep. No one stopped me when I got into the water without one though. Breaking the law, once again!

There’s an overpriced restaurant in the area as well, and WiFi! With a friend, this could have been a nice place to chill for many hours, but since I went alone, I was done after an hour and biked back home again.

This view over the lagoon was quite pretty!

Food in Bacalar:
At calle 7/calle 18-20, there’s a very authentic restaurant called Tacos El Socio, and there were only locals eating there. And me.
I ordered a torta (a sandwich basically) for 22 pesos, and it’s a lot more filling than two tacos, which is what you get for the same price. Everything else was cheap too, so it’s definitely a go-to place if you’re staying for a while.

There are no supermarkets in the town, only small privately owned stores. I bought a 5 liter water container for 23 pesos and bananas for 12 pesos/kg, to be eaten on my trip tomorrow.

Visa card update:
So my bank requires that I make a phone call when ordering a new Visa card. And it’s been impossible to find a place that does international phone calls! Maybe I’ll just have to survive without one. So far it’s been fine.

Flat tire update:
I went to a bike/motorbike shop at calle 7/calle 28-30, to see if I really had a flat tire or not. Nope! It would be super flat if there was a hole, they said. They pumped my tire nice and hard and charged 2 pesos for it. Problem solved!

Day update:
When the sun was already down, I talked to a Spanish backpacker who said that there is a pretty nice place to swim nearby for free. We took a stroll there, but by then it was already closed.

We then continued to one you normally pay for, and she just walked confidently right past the guards (who were looking in the other direction at the moment), and we got in.
She was such a master thief! I’ve got a lot to learn, I thought.

The place was nothing special. Water, quite warm, nice to swim.

The end.

 

Mahahual – Bacalar

First I want to tell about apparently the only laundry place in Mahahual. It can be found next to the restaurant The Krazy Lobster; they charge 20 pesos per kilo, so it’s not too bad if you don’t have much to be washed.
They said it would be done by 1pm the next day though, but when I came at 2:30pm, it was still not finished. “Only two minutes left!” they told me, so I walked around a little bit and came back five minutes later. “Only five minutes left!”

And so it kept going on, and I didn’t get them until past 3pm. Normally this wouldn’t be a problem, because everything is slow in small villages like these, including the restaurant service. Just take a deep breath and you’ll be fine. But this time, my bike trip was delayed by an hour, which would turn out to have dire consequences.

So, on to the biking of the day!

Because of the late laundry, I didn’t start biking until 3:30pm. I was not sure yet what my plan would be, if I’d find a hostel in Pedro Antonio Santos, 65 km ahead, or if I would have to go all the way to Bacalar, 104 km away. But that could wait until later, I was optimistic and looked forward to get back on the road!

And everything started so well. The wind was at my back and I thought that maybe I’ll make this return distance at half the time compared to the other way around!

Half-way there, I suddenly felt that something was wrong. It was heavier and unbalanced. I stopped by the road, fearing the worst. And for good reason:
The tire was flat.

Crap.

I unwrapped my newly bought pump and wondered how the heck one fixes a flat tire.

I started by simply pumping, to see if the air would stay. Once the tire was hard, it was a bit tricky to remove the pump without leaking out air. But I did it okay. And bounced a little on the bike to see the results.

The air was already almost gone again.

“This is bad!” I thought, as I looked for the repair kit I had also bought. Then I started unhinging the outer part of the tire, as I recall grandpa did so many years ago. It seemed to go well! But where was the leak?!
I kept pressing on the rubber tube, keeping my ear close to one spot at a time. Not a damn sound. I turned the bike upside down in an attempt to hear it better, but no such luck.

After I don’t know how long, and my attempt to stop a car or bus had failed too many times, I decided to just wrap it up and bike little by little, stopping regularly to refill air as to not break the wheel.

I got started. And kept going. And kept going. I wondered when I would hear metal from below me or something, but. It never happened! Was my tire not broken after all?! I don’t understand bikes, but I kept on biking with no more breaks.

(Picture showing how I successfully managed to put back the tire to its original state again.)

I arrived on the highway around 7pm. Despite a long reparation break, I had made the same distance in 3:30 hours, 90 minutes less than it took to go the other direction. So I definitely recommend bus to get to Mahahual, biking back!

I saw a bus stop and wondered if I should just continue biking the last 46 km, or hope that a bus or colectivo (a cheap white van/bus) would pick up both me and the bike.
I decided for the latter, sat down and made a banana sandwich. (It’s my special recipe; peel a banana and put between two slices of bread. Squeeze. It’s quite juicy!)

One colectivo actually stopped for me! But it was full. The driver said something about how the next one would be emptier, and something that was either “veinte y uno” (21:00) or “veinte hay uno” (20:00 there’s one).
I wished with all my powers that it was the latter, or something even better, because it was already getting dark, and the mosquitoes were getting annoying.

It was a frustrating waiting game. I wondered if I should just bike the final 2 hours to Bacalar instead of finding a bus, but once the time passed 8pm, I realized that this would not be possible; it was already pitch-black outside, and I have no lights on my bike.

By 8:30, I gave up in frustration, got on my bike and started riding despite the darkness. Pedro Antonio Santos was only 6 km away, and I figured that I might have better luck there.

I biked. It was actually easier with no traffic around, because the moon lit up the road well enough for me to avoid the holes. Traffic coming from behind was also nice, I could see well for a long distance ahead. Meeting traffic was horrible, as I only saw their lights and the road in front of me was completely black.

Yes, this was dangerous. Not recommended.

But I made it to a bus stop in the tiny village Pedro Antonio Santos in one piece! An old man kept talking to me about how he’s always wanted to visit Europe, and I believe he also said that there’s a big house further ahead, where I can ask to stay the night, so I can continue biking the next morning.
I considered it for a little, but then finally, a bus came and stopped! RESCUED.

We put the bike in the spare tire trunk, and arrived in Bacalar 40 minutes later. Only 30 pesos for the ride!

Here, I biked around until I saw a sign that said “hostal”. It’s called El mesón del pirata, on calle 20 / ave 5, and it costs 200 pesos per bed in a dorm. Not the cheapest, but not bad either.

This was the most adventurous day so far! I’m kind of relieved that it all went well.

Mahahual day 2

Today I biked to the neighboring village Costa Maya to withdraw money with my friend’s credit card, because Mahahual has no ATM.
(It was for her, and also an additional loan for my last days in Mexico. I have successfully transferred money via Western Union, to be picked up in Belize, but I’ll tell more about that further down in this post.)

It was a short but sweet ride. The best news is that I had the wind at my back, and it was so much nicer to bike this way! Tomorrow I’m biking back from the coast, and I’m hopeful that it will be a much more pleasant ride without constantly struggling against the wind.

Costa Maya was an odd experience. I’m pretty sure someone thought “hey, let’s make this the next super tourist resort!”, but something has gone wrong. All the buildings had “for sale” signs, and it was like a complete ghost town.

You could wonder why this of all places had an ATM, but there is ONE place that is alive; a big 4 star hotel named Costa Maya Inn that seems completely out of place.

It was a nice little trip, and I got to add 6 km to my totals.

Except for just relaxing on the beach, reading, writing, one may also do some snorkeling! For 250 pesos, you’re taken out to sea, you get fins, snorkel and mask and get to swim a certain distance with a guide.

In this case, he was a super enthusiastic Mexican-American hotel manager named Marcelo, who needed a change and was now swimming with tourists instead. I think either you’d love him, or you’d find him to be “too much”. Whatever your preference is, he’s certainly a character.

I had not done much snorkeling before, but it was alright! A little grey at times, but very clear sight, as I saw the bottom at a 20 meter depth. Occasionally there were corals with lots of fish of all sizes, which was cool, and the highlight was swimming right next to a huge green turtle (one meter long surely), and it felt like something right out of Finding Nemo.

My two favorite restaurants in Mahahual are Loncheria El Primo  and  El Salsero Mayor, both on the main street, Huauchinango.
The former has this super tasty burrito (left food pic) for 45 pesos, tacos for only 10 pesos, and a whole liter of fruit juice for 30 pesos.
The latter has a lot of variation, and it’s all less than 70 pesos per meal. In the middle, we have chilaquiles; some kind of nachos covered by sauces and more. On the right, gringas; wheat tortillas with a bunch of ingredients. You could say they are like tacos, but bigger and more filling.
I’ve also tried enchiladas (almost pancakey tortilla rolls covered by sauces) and burgers there.

Money update:
Now I have enough Mexican pesos for my last few days here, but I will need a good amount of Belizean dollars upon arrival in the new country. So I tried using Western Union, sending 500 SEK + the fee of 25 SEK (a total of around 65 USD). For this, I get to withdraw 117 Belizean dollars at any shop that deals with Western Union. There are three in Corazal; the city closest to the Mexican border.

I compared the currency conversion at XE.com, and learnt that 525 SEK is currently worth 129 BZD, so it’s not too bad! I lose 6 USD on a 65 USD transfer, which seems similar to the fees and conversion fees when using regular ATM’s.

I’ll tell you next week if I managed to withdraw those Belizean dollars or not!