Hi All,
here's a summary of my last trip. I was on island September 20th-24th.

Flight into Cancun (CUN) on the 19th. Took the ADO bus down to Playa del Carmen and goofed off for a few hours, then hopped on the midnight bus to Chetumal, Mexico.

At dawn's early light I proudly hailed a bus from Chetumal to Belize City. Passed through customs and rumbled through Corozal and Orange Walk on the way to the Marine Terminal. The funky old water taxi terminal is being torn down to be rebuilt as a concrete structure. Hope it has airconditioning. Took the 9:00 boat to San Pedro via Caye Caulker.

The water taxi used to tie up to the Tackle Box pier, which is close to Ruby's. Now, however, the boat goes farther north, up by Fido's. My room was at Ruby's, and I dragged my sorry butt down the beach to check in. It was a good time for a siesta.

That afternoon I checked in with a few friends and talked with the staff at Bottom Time Diving to see what was up. The dive shop was unwilling to go out because they didn't have enough divers. I got something to eat and hung out and watched the preparations for the Independence Day shindig scheduled for that evening.

The big fiesta was punctuated by fireworks. I ran into Eddie from the dive shop, who had his family with him. After the crowd thinned out, I went back to my patio to enjoy the tropic night.

Had a few goodies from the French Bakery and a cuppa joe for breakfast. The bread is excellent-a nice change from the generic, soft white rolls that you normally see in Belize.

The next day started with breakfast with Jeff Kivet, who calls himself Captain Jeff. He's in the cruise vacation brokering business. We eventually ended up at the parade with Taco Girl and Mr. Taco. The affair was noisier and more crowded than either of us cared for, but the parade is for Belizeans and they can do whatever floats their boat.

Ran into Island Dog the next day. He was in town to feed a friend's cats, so we rode around on the golf cart looking for pet food. Mike had been at a buddie's birthday party the night before and was feeling a little under the weather, but it was good to see him just the same.

Went to Pedro's Backpacker Inn to try to check some baseball scores during the end of the season's pennant races. They call themselves a sports bar, after all. No luck. There were a few people watching DVDs of some of the worst action flicks I've ever seen. Think about that-how bad can action movies get? Well, they can get pretty bad. I legged it to the Holiday Hotel and watched the Sunday night football game, and some of the scores were displayed during the game.

The next day the dive shop still didn't have enough interested divers, so I went out with Amigos del Mar. Now, folks seem to like Amigos, but I've never dived with them before. My entire experience with the shop is that they've filled my pony bottle. The experience was okay. We dove the sites at the cut, Hol Chan and El Pillar. The divemaster didn't know me and he got nervous when I strayed off from the group or dove down to see something. I'd recommend the shop to newbie divers.

Had supper at Banyan Bay with Doc Fisher. It was good to see him. After dinner I watched the football game at Holiday Hotel's bar.

It was time to pack it up and head to the mainland. I had a meeting "scheduled" with the folks at Travellers Distillery. I went ashore and tried to confirm the meeting, which was delayed until some phone calls could be made. After a few hours the meeting was under way. Nothing was decided, which is not unsual.

Then it was time to head back north to Cancun via la Playa. I had a room booked at the Hotel Aventura. After a couple of cervesas at the hotel bar, the sandman came to visit.

The next day was spent at the beach. La Playa has a great beach. While sitting in the sand you can watch the cruise ships go back and forth, check out the locals netting bait fish, and see the island of Cozumel off on the horizon. My time ran out and I caught a bus to the airport, then back to the USA.

And they all lived happily ever after, The End.

Thanks, Dan! Fun as always.

Do you have any info on if/when Bowen is going to get another distributor in the US?

Leah-Ann,
isn't Mac at Bluefield importing Belikin?

Dan

nice report, Dan. you make inter-continental travel sound so natural.

Dan, I don't think Bluefield has imported Belikin since '06, maybe longer. Last time I talked to my friendly Bev-Mo manager he said Bowen changed distributors on a pretty regular basis and that there seemed to be a fair amount of conflict each time. He said there is no distributor supplying Bev-Mo right now and no product in any of their stores. This is the first time I haven't been able to purchase there.

sweetjane,
sometime I'll tell you about my trip to Irian Jaya, via Bali and Makassar. Kids would stare at me wherever I went, because they had previously only seen white people on TV.

Dan

you got it, Dan. i would be honored. sounds fascinating. i only wish i had a little more balls and a lot more time & money.

sweetjane,
take a look at this site to see a little about my trip to the Raja Ampat regency of Irian Jaya. I'd love to go back someday-the area is unique in all the world. They have glaciers there, on the equator. They have the Dani tribesmen, who are some of the least modern people on the planet. The Bird of Paradise lives there. It's just an amazing place.

Oh, yeah, you have to go through Bali to get there. Bali is a lot like Belize, but everything about it is emphasized. The culture is extra-interesting, the geology is dramatic, the diving is excellent, the surfing is bitchin and it's inexpensive. A delux room at the Tegal Sari in Ubud cost me US$35/night. I shopped around for a high-priced room because I was staying three nights and I wanted to say that I'd spent a million rupiah (US$100).

I had to overnight on Sulawesi, which is also outstanding. Once again, the culture and landmass make you think of the big adventure TV shows of the '60s, like National Geographic, Mutual of Omaha and Jacques Cousteau. The place is just a shock to the senses.

Anyway, I'm migrating the website from an old server and there are some broken links. Under construction, don't you know. However, the Irian Jaya part is complete so take a looksee.

Dan



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Dan,
WOW! I am mesmerized! You are living the life that I can only dream about, and for that I am truly envious! But I enjoy seeing your adventures. Maybe in my next life!
Safe travels to you and please keep posting!

I have to apologise about that sunday night -my new idiot bartender decided that as we had a group staying upstairs that he would personally switch off the music and let them watch movies on the 50 inch flat screen.
I had been a witness at a wedding in Portofino-when I came back I went ballistic as we never show movies -we have a big screen/a 50 inch flat screen and a 34 inch tv set in the bar added to this we are the only bar in SP with satellite as well as cable-only for sports -this just goes to show that when you try to help your friends out with a job and he has been coming to the bar for four years and when I asked him had he ever seen a movie on at Pedro's the answer ofcourse was NO-he is a prat
It was a shame that you did not ask the bartender to put the sport on but there we go -I owe you a drink or two
Pedro