Placencia

We went to Placencia this weekend. It was a 6 hour bus ride, but well worth it. Just the ice cream alone was worth the trip. For those of you who have spent time in Central America, you are probably as surprised as we were to find great ice cream. An Italian couple opened a gelato shop in Placencia with the best ice cream we have had in a long time. Our group went twice a day and they soon began to recognize us due to our frequent trips. Honestly, I think it was the highlight of our trip even though we saw a dolphin jump.

We also really liked swimming by the pier on the North Beach. That's where we saw a dolphin jump on our last day there. One of the volunteers found a star fish as well. Of course we all took turns posing with it.

We loved sitting on the dock and watching the sunset. You can see the progression with these two photos.

One last view of the beach by the pier. This one was from one of the restaurants. 

If only we could go to Cuba. We have heard the best way to get there is through Merida, Mexico, but I don't think we want to take the risk. Some day we'll go to Cuba.

Tikal

We went to Tikal, Guatemala this week. We were waiting until we had all the volunteers here so we could all go together. Tikal has several of the tallest pyramids in all of Mesoamerica and one of the largest Maya sites.  The views were absolutely amazing.  We were calling it Mayan Disneyland. Here's our group on the bus ride there.

Below are some of the crossing signs we passed on the way in. The first one is for jaguars and the second one is for snakes.

This is the only picture we have of the our group. For one week, all the volunteers were together before some starting going home.

Here is the view from Star Wars Episode IV.  

My sister Carolyn is here for a month to work with HELP International :)

Fourth of July

Our cook, Mama Kay made us hamburgers, hot dogs, and french fries for the Fourth. Adam and I spent several hours looking  around for A & W Rootbeer. The rootbeer floats were really worth it. Mama Kay made a flag cake complete with 50 stars as well.  Unfortunately, fireworks are illegal here (and we didn't dare try to sneak some across the border from Guatemala) so we didn't have fireworks.

The last two weeks we have been working on painting murals over the graffiti in the Victor Galvez Stadium by our house. So far, we have painted 20 murals. The best part has been how many community members have commented on the murals. People often stop to compliment our work. Some offer to help paint and one woman went out and bought us more paint because she liked the murals so much. It's been great working on a project that's so appreciated by the community. The volunteers were featured in yesterday's paper.

Hazel stopped to help us paint the other day. She and her little brother were very helpful.

Guatemala

We were in Guatemala this week to teach entrepreneurship. The city government arranged for Adam and I to announce the workshops on three local radio stations. I was really glad Adam did most of the radio interviews. I have the hardest time speaking Spanish when I get nervous. Adam gave all the information and at the end I invited them again to the workshop. Below are pictures from one of the radio stations.

Quite a few people heard about the workshop from the radio announcement. We also had activities for the children while their parents attended the workshop. Over thirty kids--several left and came back with cousins and friends to do the activities. The kids loved getting to use the crayons, yarn, and Popsicle sticks. They were so excited to have craft supplies. The little boy below couldn't believe that he got to keep the box that he made. His cowboy boots were so cute.

We also met a guy who had a private collection of Mayan artifacts. Apparently there are so many Mayan burial sites in Guatemala, that it's pretty easy to buy artifacts. He hopes to open a museum in a few months. He had such a great collection. He even had a Mayan ocarina that he let us play. I am pretty sure Adam wants to be him haha. Adam has already started his own collection of artifacts. Below are pictures of some of the collection.

Caye Caulker

We went to the island of Caye Caulker this weekend. It was so beautiful and relaxing. The water was a perfect clear turquoise. Adam took a picture from our hotel room.

We celebrated our 3 month anniversary in Caye Caulker.

Every restaurant had so many seafood choices--but no lobster. We missed lobster season by one week. Adam was quite disappointed. We went to Olas del Mar, they had a great view as well as food.

Belize has the world's second largest barrier reef. We went to the reef to snorkel around with barracudas, nurse sharks, sting rays, parrot fish, and angel fish. Our guide showed us a trained moray eel. He clapped and it swam up and ate some fish from his hand. I was in the way of the eel so he swam right into me since he was so focused on the fish. The coral gardens were quite impressive as well. One of the volunteers had an underwater camera. We will have to get some of the pictures from her.

Indian Jones Adventure

On Saturday we went to the ATM Caves, or Actun Tunichil Muknal (Mayan for Maiden of the Stone Tomb).  It was amazing and felt like something out of an Indian Jones movie.  Our guide, Manuel, looked like a stockier, lighter-skinned Denzel Washington and sounded exactly like Antonio Banderas.  He picked us up and we drove about 45 minutes to the site.  From there we hiked about a mile and crossing the river three times before getting to the entrance of the caves.

The adventure began by swimming into the mouth of the cave and climbing onto a little ledge where we paused to receive instructions from Manuel.  Throughout most of the cave it was shallow enough to wade through, but there were several spots that required us to swim.  There were lots of amazing rock formations, bats, fresh water crabs, and plenty of small fish.  As we reached the end of the cave (well actually only about a mile in out of 5) we climbed up the "Mayan Ladder" that opened up into a big chamber.  In the new chamber there were pots everywhere.  It was so cool.  Most of them were still in the place that the Mayans had abandoned them. 

(Not our group since cameras are not allowed, but this is how close you can get to the artifacts. We used the photos from the ATM website)

 As we continued climbing through the new chamber there were even the skeletal remains of several sacrificial victims.  The tour goes all the way until you find the "Maiden of the Stone Tomb" (who is actually believed to be a man now).

We chose to take the "adventure way" out instead of the "tourist way."  It was a few pretty tight fits and sliding down a couple of rocks into pools of dark water, but it was definitely more fun than whatever the tourist way was I'm sure. It was worth it to see Adam try to squeeze into the small spaces.

The Belize Zoo

We went on a field trip with the school where the volunteers work to the Belize Zoo. The zoo only houses animals that are native to Belize. The animals are rescued, removed from homes that aren't licensed to have exotic pets, and donated by other zoos. We loved the excitement of the elementary school students as they ran around the zoo. These boys didn't want to leave the bush dog exhibit.

The zoo has 14 jaguars and a black jaguar that they rescued from a resort in Mexico. When they first got him, he was only 100 pounds and was close to starvation. To earn money for his food, they taught him to high five tourists. The money earned by his trick goes towards more food and improvements to his habitat.

Several times at the zoo we found ourselves saying, "this would never be allowed in the United States." The tapir exhibit was one such instance. The animals come right up to the fence so you can pet and feed them. They are very friendly, but they do have large teeth.

Another favorite: an albino coatimundi or gato feo as they are called in Panama.