Family outting....in the jungle!
My family is here! yahoo! Finally, familiar faces. :) and they brought a couple of treats!! They came in on saturday. It's been pretty cool since they got here. I had to make my way to the airport...and I had to do that by taking the bus (as always) to Belize city. Then a driver from crystal auto rent a car, picked me up to bring me to the airport. The owner of the auto car place is filipina..and so they invited me and my parents to drop by the main office for a graduation party for one of the kids! They would have lechon (roasted pig) and everything. So we dropped by with the intention to just say hi. The celebrant wasn't here yet..so we were waiting awhile. We were about to go home..but then they insisted that we have an eggroll and pancit first. Then some filipino scuba divers came to the rental car parking lot to drop off some seafood that they had caught that day! My eyes bugged out from all the fresh seafood....I think that was the reason why they offered me some fish. I was embarrassed to take it ..but then they just went ahead and filled a cooler with some ice...some yellow-tailed snapper..and 3 lobsters! (WHAT!?) dang...seriously...today was a good-day. My parents shared some "shio-pao" and "buchi-buchi" (chinese/filipino food/desserts) with them..and they were excited because they haven't had that kind of food in a while too :) yaye!
So we were finally off to Belmopan in our Chevy-Tracker SUV! The next day (sunday), I took my parents to Our Lady of Guadelupe church and they met some of friends from Belmopan. We went home to eat lobster for breakfast! (nice)Then we were off to Placencia for "Lobsterfest". It was about a 2 hour drive south through Belize. We finally got to Indepence (a town) and took a water taxi to Placencia. The lobsterfest was kind of a let down, though. The festivities looked small..and the lobster was soo expensive ($25 for grilled lobster). I suppose we were spoiled because we just had free lobster earlier that morning. :)
anyway, the next day (today)...we left Independence Town to head back up north. We were not sure where we would be going. our schedule was relaxed enough to just stop where we felt like stopping. so we visited a butterfly farm near the Maya Center, then headed up to Hopkins Village. Some of the filipino community lives in Hopkins so Ollie (one of the prominent filipinos in the group) showed us around. We looked at property around Hopkins ...incase my parents were interested in settling here. :) Then we went to Cockscomb Basin National Park ( aka "jaguar reserve"). My dad wanted to hike through the Belizean jungle. So we did. We were there for about 20 mins when dark clouds loomed over us. It was going to rain....and it was going to rain HARD! we were going to take cover...but then our guide (and girlfriend of Ollie) broke off a wide leaf off of a plant..and she used it as an umbrella! the rain didn't let up..so we each broke a leaf off! :)
it was cool.
anywya, we are staying at a bed and breakfast here in Hopkins tonight. Then tomorrow we'll be heading off to the Mountain Pine Ridge to "Five Sisters Lodge" and hopefully, Caracol (a Mayan Ruin). :)
till then.......cherry
So we were finally off to Belmopan in our Chevy-Tracker SUV! The next day (sunday), I took my parents to Our Lady of Guadelupe church and they met some of friends from Belmopan. We went home to eat lobster for breakfast! (nice)Then we were off to Placencia for "Lobsterfest". It was about a 2 hour drive south through Belize. We finally got to Indepence (a town) and took a water taxi to Placencia. The lobsterfest was kind of a let down, though. The festivities looked small..and the lobster was soo expensive ($25 for grilled lobster). I suppose we were spoiled because we just had free lobster earlier that morning. :)
anyway, the next day (today)...we left Independence Town to head back up north. We were not sure where we would be going. our schedule was relaxed enough to just stop where we felt like stopping. so we visited a butterfly farm near the Maya Center, then headed up to Hopkins Village. Some of the filipino community lives in Hopkins so Ollie (one of the prominent filipinos in the group) showed us around. We looked at property around Hopkins ...incase my parents were interested in settling here. :) Then we went to Cockscomb Basin National Park ( aka "jaguar reserve"). My dad wanted to hike through the Belizean jungle. So we did. We were there for about 20 mins when dark clouds loomed over us. It was going to rain....and it was going to rain HARD! we were going to take cover...but then our guide (and girlfriend of Ollie) broke off a wide leaf off of a plant..and she used it as an umbrella! the rain didn't let up..so we each broke a leaf off! :)
it was cool.
anywya, we are staying at a bed and breakfast here in Hopkins tonight. Then tomorrow we'll be heading off to the Mountain Pine Ridge to "Five Sisters Lodge" and hopefully, Caracol (a Mayan Ruin). :)
till then.......cherry