Belize would fit almost twice into Vancouver Island. It is 100km wide and 300 km long, and has seven traffic lights in the entire country - six of them don't work.
Expensive utility items are gasoline, electricity, water, telephone - but at least the cheapest one keeps the residents entertained: cable TV with over 100 channels. One gets one's priorities right.
A melting pot of people and races: Maya, Mestize, Spanish, Chinese, East Indian, Dutch, Amish and Mennonites. The latter are called Moneynnites here, as they garnered most of the wealth arising from agriculture, forestry and car dealerships.
Local tenders with names like 'Big Mama' took us from the ship through reef strewn shallows to the shore and Belize City at least eight miles away. Belize is proud of having the second largest Barrier Reef in the world just off-shore, and thus offers superb diving and snorkling to coral fish afficionados.
The city's buildings appear worn and somewhat decrepit, with a faint trace of once upon a time attractive wooden edifices. Driving out into the country (Savanna, Pine Plateaus, Coastal Swamps, Jungle and Rainforest cover segments of the country) dwellings become somewhat imaginative. Many are quite impressive, many of their yards clean and without garbage, some with trimmed lawns, even when the living quarters had seen better times. Most houses are built on stilts, as flooding during heavy rainfalls and hurricanes presents a constant risk. Stilts provide a comforting distance from snakes, tarantulas and scorpions - who LOVE these airy spaces underneath. A side benefit of stilted homes. They also lend themselves to laundry rooms, garages, and in a pinch - an extra bedroom. Laundry flutters in almost all the yards.
Almost every house has, depending on the number of mutts, one or more doghouses, which range in design from rough corrugated tin shacks to constructions made from coloufully painted picket fence poles (spaced apart for a fresh breeze) and neat little boxes with pitched roofs. There are even doggie-condos where three dog houses are joined together to make row houses. All have water tight roofs, and some are on stilts as well. Some homes had paddocks for horses with shade providing shacks, and some has open air lean-tos, which looked newer and better than the residence of the owners.
Belize is trying to attract tourist and cruise ship business. The tender piers in town are lined with the usual Diamond International stores amongst a whole selection of souvenir shops, interspersed with bars and restaurants (Belkin is the local brew - untried by your's truly). Tourist police keeps people safe from local 'annoyances', at least on the main drags of Belize City, and outlying island have luxury diving resorts.
Local craftsmen and women produce colouful paintings, mostly of local flora and fauna. Mahogany is carved into bowls, vases, furniture and almost anything else imaginable. Pottery, produced the Mayan way, some very attractive, is another tempting take-home souvenir.
More about the Mayans later.....
