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Today marked our last moments in Mexico... It was time to move onto another Central American gem called Belize! We opted for the more direct route... So we woke up in time to pack our bags (literally takes me less than 5 minutes these days haha... Poor Sarah is still taking much longer!!) and have our last yummy fresh breakfast at OM Tulum before heading to the ADO bus station... We got onto the 10:30am bus as planned and had a very pleasant 2,5 hour bus ride to the city of Chetumal.. Quite a funny experience- as soon as the bus started, the end of Transformers popped up onto the tv screen at the front of the bus, blaring out (in Spanish not English!!) and then straight after those 10 minutes came the next featured show called "My name is Khan" which I started watching as it seemed to be in English with Spanish sub titles, but then I realized most of the movie was in Arabic or something so it should have been English sub-titled in its original form... Needless to say I still watched it intently to the end (even shed a tear) and think my Spanish may even have improved in the process haha... We arrived at Chetumal bus terminal and then had to try figure out how to get to the boat we had booked... Taxi seemed to be the only option and I'm confident we were very ripped off with the fare (no meters in Mexico!) but we got there nonetheless... We then had to go through the whole border control checks as we were leaving Mexico and going into Belize! There was a mild moment of panic when my Mexican departure card wasn't in my passport which would have resulted in me paying an extra 295 pesos to leave the country, but thankfully I had kept it safely in my travel folder which was in my bag about to be packed onto the boat - the border man was very friendly and gave me all the time I needed to go get it! Crisis averted.
Before boarding the boat, we had to line up all our bags for the sniffer dog to inspect and see if he smelt anything suspicious.. Was too funny actually! Then for the bags that were picked out, the owners had to go and empty them for the officer (note this was done in front of everyone boarding the boat so it was a weird kind of show!)... I also looked at the number of people wanting to board and looked at the size of the boat and wasn't quite sure how this was all going to work out but we all got on and even had our own seats! It was kind of like an airplane but for water... There was even a movie showing, snacks and drinks... But my best was the host instructing people to move from seat to seat throughout the trip in order to keep the boat balanced! Gotta love it! The boat ride was very bumpy but incredibly pleasant... After 2,5 hours, we arrived at the island of San Pedro (after having driven past the island owned by Leonardo DiCaprio might I add!) where we all had to get off as this was our first port of entry into Belize. We went through border control and customs there - 1 man in small room... Very island style! And then we had to board the boat again with our bags if we were continuing onto Caye Caulker (which we were)! Finally we arrived at the tiny little Caribbean island of Caye Caulker at sunset... There are no cars here (although we've since spotted one bakkie!) so our taxi was a golf cart which first took us to the only ATM on the island (Atlantic Bank) to draw some Belizean dollars - 2:1 to the US Dollar! Who knew!) and then onto our hotel... After trying to check in, we were informed we were at the wrong hotel (there are two for this hotel "chain") so we got back onto our golf cart taxi (Ivan was called back to come get us) and we made our way up the main street called Front Street (sand road with ropes as speed bumps) to our final destination at last! This was our first cross border journey of the trip and we weren't very well prepared having only eaten breakfast that morning (and the biscuit served to us on the boat) so suffice to say we (especially I) were starving to the point of fainting! Haha... So we literally dropped off our bags (simple room but all we need) and proceeded back along Front Street to find a spot to eat... We eventually settled at the sports bar of the island (ten guesses who picked this) where we ate dinner and I got to watch my Boston Bruins beat Toronto Maple Leafs in the final NHL playoffs game... Yay! (Canadian-owned bar so the result was less than pleasing to most)...
We then headed back to our hotel, but bumped into Sarah's friend Amy (who happens to work with Carlo at Norton Rose! Small world!) and her boyfriend Scott at the "Happy Lobster" so we sat and chatted for ages before heading to our room... We did our usual research for our next movement of the trip - decided on 1 extra night here in Caye Caulker and then onto Guatemala- and then it was time to try sleep in this mad heat!! I can't say I was overly successful but who's counting sleeping hours when life's one big holiday ;) Very lucky! Xx
Lesson of the day: Make sure all documents and currency are in order when going between countries in Central America!!
Moment of the day: Bruins scoring the vital winning goal in the playoffs (after being 3-1 down in the third!)... Have had to get into American sport due to lack of exposure to what I'm used to... Haha
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