Author Archives: Tawn

Just a quick update…then Belize. We are still in El Salvador, we wanted to go, but Palarran was against it, so she broke on us. We have had some bad vibrations in the shaft and thought it was a bearing, which I brought back on my last trip to the States. CB installed that and turns out the real culprit is a worn out engine mount. So we are waiting for the tortis to make it’s way down from the states with our parts…which should take 3 weeks. In the mean time we put the boat on a mooring and are gonna rent a car and check out parts unseen in El Salvador. On Sept. 9th I am going back to Chicago to visit the ‘rents and CB is heading back to another pretengineer job in KC MO. We will be back around the end of Sept. And hopefully be getting on our way south. Okay, news brief over…back to Belize…it really was unbelizeable :-)

After Livingston we took the roughest panga ride I have ever been on to Punta Gorda, Belize. Seriously, there were like 5 foot seas and the panga driver didn’t slow down a bit…but I did have to give him daps for some serious driving skills…even though I had to ride on a fender to keep my spine from compressing. Any who, Punts Gorda (PG as the locals call it) is your tipico boarder town. Lots of Government offices and places to take you anywhere but PG. It is unbeliezebly hot here and not really a touristy place…but we were ecstatic to be speaking English, although I couldn’t turn off my Spanish while I was there.

We immediately found a bus to Independencia, a dusty town where you caught a cab to a dock where you took a launcha to Placencia…bus, dusty town, cab, panga…seems to be the jist of this country. Placencia was beautiful…our first vision of the crystal clear Caribbean Sea…just beautiful. Did not do much here but hang on the beach and drink fufu drinks.

First class bus line in Bleize…actually not that bad…there were no chickens!

The fufuiest drinks of all…

Next we were off to the less desirable Belize City…a place so undesirable the government moved the capital from Belize City to Belmopan (also not a great place, but apparently better than Belize City). I actually didn’t think parts of Belize City were that bad…compared to the south side of Chicago or Watts in Cali:-) The whole purpose of going here was to catch a ferry (see the trend) to Caye Caulker…where we would spend the next 5 days falling in love with Belize. Caye Caulker is a tiny Caye inside the beautiful Belizean reef. Belize is extremely protective of their environment and totally committed to keeping their reefs alive. There are very steep penalties for even bumping a reef with your boat…best to anchor in areas marked as anchorages on the charts. This tiny little speck of an island is awesome. Great food, amazing bars and ton of stuff to do. CB took kite surfing lessons…here is some proof!

Waiting for the Ferry to Caye Caulker in the high rent district of Belize City

What the hell am I supposed to do with this???

Ohhhhh….

Easy cheesy….CB is saying “see Tawn…this is easier than you made it look”. I am thinking…damn, this looks easy without the 6 foot breaking seas and 30 knots of wind :-)

The next day we went on a dive charter out to another Caye to dive on the reefs. I can’t even describe how beautiful this was. The water was crystal clear as far as you could see. The reefs were full of color and the fish were out of this world. The highlight had to be the gigantic Leopard ray that gracefully and slowly swam around us on the second dive…he was soooo tame! The first dive was 100 feet, the next 70 and the last only 40…you could not tell a difference in light and clarity between them all. Unfortunately I left my GoPro at the boat…dammit! This was a very good day.

The rest of the time we spent hanging out at the dock bar and eating CB’s new favorite dish…stew meat with beans and coconut rice…it was pretty good…the first 3 or 4 times:-) Oh yeah, and we rented a room from this local guys uncle Tio (tio is Spanish for uncle??? I don’t know) But the room was sweet and overlooked the ocean…and it had cable…in English. CB and I had not seen English TV in some time…we watched a lot of cable too:-)

Dock Bar at the end of Caye Caulker…The island was split in half during a hurricane many years ago. This bar is at the end where it splits and looks across the the now separate island.

The other side only accessible by boat now…or a strong swimmer as the currents rip through this split.

If you are going to swim for it…drink one of these Green LIzard drinks…I would tell you what is in it…but it is a secret of the bar tender’s. I can tell you that one is all that is needed!

After that it was back on the Ferry to Belize City to catch another bus to another dusty town in the mountains. San Ingnacio\Santa Elena is just outside of Noj Kaax H’Men Elijio Panti Forest Reserve. Here you can take a tour of the famous caves via float tube or do hikes and caving in the famous Actun Tunichil Muknal (ATM) caves. We didn’t know about the ATM tour until we got to one of the many tour office in Santa Elena. The tour guy was telling us about the cave tubing but said if we really wanted an adventure to try the ATM tour which involved hiking, caving and swimming???? Whaaaaaaat! This sounded right up our alley. So the next morning we woke up early as hell and took off on a bus, down a dusty road to the park entrance. Only a handful of companies have permission to do tours of these highly religious caves…but they were all there that day. The guides are all Mayan and really do a good job at spacing out the group to make this an amazing experience. These caves were where the Mayans would go to meet with their underworld and pray to their Gods for health, good crops and prosperity. It was considered a very brave thing to enter these caves and often human sacrifices were made. When this particularly extensive cave system was found not so long ago, archaeologists dated the pottery and skeletons to range from 900 BC to 800 AD. Which was about the time frame of the Mayan reign. This tours was probably the coolest thing either of us has ever done….and that is saying a lot. They no longer allow cameras in the caves due to an unfortunate incident where a tourist dropped a camera on one of the skulls an crushed it…bad mojo for that guy….so I had to use photos off the interwebs…but like I said…the coolest experience I have ever had.

The cave entrance which is reached by a 45 minute hike through the jungle forging two rivers

Jump in an swim on into the mouth…

Most of the water was armpit high…as you go deeper you are actually climbing down into the earth. This water is from an underground river that is full of minerals and good stuff for your skin. When we got out we had lost our tan….damn Mayan Gods…do you know how long it took this Gringo to get that brown???

Stalagmites and Stalactites throughout the cave system. Many were shimmery shades of purple and green from the minerals in the water…apparently in rainy season the water rises anywhere from 3-10 feet up.

It took about an hour to get to this area. You had to climb about 20 feet straight up out of the river up onto this plateau where there is a path leading to where the offerings and sacrifices were made. Imagine doing this back when the Mayans were going in here with only a torch or sometimes in the pitch dark…

Food and other offerings were brought in here in clay pots and left for the Gods.

There were numerous partial skeletons and bones throughout the area…but this is the most famous. A whole skeleton unearthed by archaeologists. The bones have actually disintegrated and what you are seeing here is the fossil left by the crystallized minerals.

On the way out we took a different route and did a lot of squeezing through tight crevices…or you could swim under them.

See! That was cool as hell right!!! Now you all probably want to go to the ATM caves…if you ever get the chance…DO IT…no matter what the price. It is an experience you will never forget.

The next stop was back to Guatemala to go to the ruins in Tikal….yep, you guessed it…cab, dusty road, walk across border and about 5 more buses….next post Tikal!!! Here is a little preview.

In this episode CB and Tawn take a panga down the Rio Dulce to Livingston…I’ll let the pictures do all the rambling.

The Rio Dulce goes way up into Guatemala and serves as transport to numerous villages. The lower portion where we stayed is a one hour launcha ride out to the Caribbean.

The river goes through straight up jungla…the sides go straight up into the jungle canopy. There are numerous rustic villages along the way that are accessible only by launcha.

?Numerous resorts and floating homes are found along the flatter areas of the river. Some are on posts up above the water. The birds are thick in here and roost in all the trees.

This little guy was captured with my new telephoto lens that CB got me on his last trip to the States!

It’s kinda sad to see the deforestation along the way…the hard woods are cut down for housing and cooking sticks forcing people to go higher and higher up into the jungle every year.

Some local flora that reminds me of back home in Michigan…this is for you Mom

As we got closer to Livingston (which is only accessible by boat) we saw more launchas transporting people and more stuff around….what? How else you gonna get your motor cycle to town?

As you come around the last bend of the jungle you are welcomed by the sights of Livingston, a rough and tumble little frontera town…from here you can take launchas into Belize, Honduras or back to Guatemala.

We stayed at Hostel de La Iguana this cool little hostel with a small bar and great happy hour and amazing owners from England and Ireland…they also can hook you up with all kinds of tours and tickets for the launch a ride to Belize.

This is a cool little wash center for the locals providing clean water to hand scrub your clothes…as it was hot as an armpit, I kinda wanted to jump in, but figured that would be frowned upon…

This is the staging area where boats wait to go over the sandbar and up into the river Dulce. A pilot boat will attach a line to the boats halyard which is raised to the top of the mast. The pilot boat pulls his boat to the side to heel the boat so the keel passes over the bar. I tried to get a photo of the actual event but it was too far away.

Our next post will be about our time in Belize…you’ll have to wait for it Papa Miller:-)

One of our main reasons for staying in El Salvador for so long was so we could provide Palarran with a safe home while we traveled around Central America. We have never been here before and wanted to really have time to check it out. On May 22 CB and I took off from the marina and jumped on a chicken bus to San Salvador where we would catch a First Class bus to Guatemala City (King Quality Premium bus line). These buses are as nice as first class on a plane. When we got to Guat City we took a less than a first class bus (damn near chicken quality) an unexpected 8 Hours (uffdah) to Northeastern Guatemala to a place called Rio Dulce. Rio Dulce is where all the boats on the Caribbean side hole up for Hurricane season. We met several cruisers from “that side” and enjoyed comparing notes. The area itself is beautiful. All the hostels and hotels are outside of a small, but really loud town. Most are only accessible by launch (panga) or if you had a vehicle to travel the little jungle roads. I’ll let the photos tell the rest of the story.

Rio Dulce is a river that comes off Lago Izabal and makes it’s way through to the Caribbean side of Guatemala. Due to this fact, a lot of sailboats make this their hurricane hole against the Atlantic hurricane season. Most transport on the lake is via launcha (pangas) to various marinas and hotels around the river and lake area.

We stayed across the river at the Tortugal Inn and Marina. This place was quite nice with a tree-house like setting.

We had the room on the right with the open bamboo window…

The Hotel had kayaks that were free to use to check out the lake and the nearby Spanish Fort…this place was awesome.

This is Castillo de San Felipe de Lara, a fort the Spanish built in 1644 to keep out the pirates from the Caribbean.

The fort was restored in 1955 and later became a World Heritage Site. For a very small fee you can go and explore every nook and cranny of this place….including pitch black tunnels where ammunition boys ran cannon balls up to the gunners to fight off pirate ships.

The obligatory brig selfie…help!

The next day we took a panga over to another lodge called Hacienda Tijax. This place was amazing. A local guy had bought about 600 acres of land along the river for conservation and ecotourism in mind. When he bought it there was a working rubber tree plantation. Over the years he has built a resort and restaurant and built numerous nature trails. You can only hike the trail with their guide, Lucy. She is a kick in the pants and very knowledgeable about the flora and fauna. Along the hike you stop at a jungle pool fed by fresh spring water….it was cold and refreshing after the jungle hike.

Spring fed pool perfect for skinny dippin’. Usually the pool is crystal clear, but due to the heavy rains it was cloudy.

This double suspension bridge crossed over a deep ravine with giant ferns growing up 50 feet or more. Straight up King Kong territory!

The hike peaked at this observatory. From the top you can see all the surrounding mountain ranges, river valley and volcanoes…we tried to get a panorama of it, but it was too hazy to turn out

This is the rubber tree plantation. It is still in operation, but since rubber is no longer in as great of demand due to synthetics, only a small portion of the land is still worked.

A special tool is used to slice and peel a small area of bark where the rubber seeps out into this tiny cup. After a few hours the rubber hardens and stops flowing. Apparently this does not harm the tree and this scar can continuously be reopened to get more rubber. That little white ball is pure rubber and smells like absolute shit!

Stay tuned for parte dos, where we travel down the Rio Dulce by launch a to Livingston, Guatemala.

Me, Santos and Josh at one of the many palapa stops..CB too (he’s taking the photo)

The best part about traveling is meeting local people. However, this is often difficult due to language barriers. When we arrived in El Salvador, Santos (owner of Santo’s Marina, who speaks very good English) came out to our boat while anchored in the estuary to see if we needed anything…at the time, we did not. When our friend Josh (s/v La Gitana) arrived Santos offered him the same assistance. Josh ended up taking his dinghy up into the jungle (jungla) with Santos to see parts often untraveled by cruisers. Santos is starting up a Jungla tour where he takes tourists up into the estuaries of the Rio Lempa on his sailboat. Josh got to see the route. At one of the stops there was a tree that hung over the river and Santos told Josh that was where people climbed up and jumped from the tree. This looked like a perfect place for a rope swing. So a few days later we took two dinghys up into the jungle to construct the rope swing.

The rope swing injection team…boat #1: Sachi (on the bow), Santos and Josh (el capitan)…we are in boat #2

It is currently Semana Santa, the week before Easter when the Latin Americans head to the beach for the week. This means rural little beach towns like Bahia Sur are swamped with city folks, jet skis and boats. Lots of celebrations are going on and the jungle estuaries and its little palapa restaurants are packed. We first stopped at a floating palapa at the head of the river…this was pretty cool.

This bar was just built…and packed to the gills

We didn’t stay long…just long enough to get some coldies to go. The next stop was a palapa bar on a fairly large island. There was a small village here. The lots here are long and skinny. If you have waterfront property often there is a palapa bar on the water and the family owning it lives further back on the land. The bars become gathering places for family, friends and during this week tourists. They have some of the coldest beer I have ever tasted.

Seriously COLD beers await us!!!

The next stop was where we would incorporate rope swinging into El Salvadorian life style. The palapa bar here was very rustic with wood burning stoves and board walks everywhere. It was built over the mangrove roots and I’m pretty sure an Ewok or two were hiding out somewhere nearby.

Look closely…I think you can see the Ewok…this was, by the way, the best damn grilled fish I have ever had. Served to you whole (but gutted) with salad, rice and homemade tortillas.

We got more coldies and chose our fish that they would grill for us. In the mean time the rope swing was tied up on the overhanging tree. Everyone got into it and we had locals and tourists helping and giving much advice. Josh had some extra poly-pro line and Santos had an old water skiing handle.

This dude was trying to help untangle the mess of poly-pro while muttering under his breath about what a waste it was to tie it to a tree…here, this stuff is like gold for fishing.

Propper knot tying etiquette was practiced…as for the stability of the tree…eeeeaaahhhh

The initial idea was to make it so you could swing out from the dock on the rope. The problem was, the tree was a farther distance away from the dock than the height where the rope was tied….

Many plans were hatched, but in the end, you simply had to climb the tree and roll out over the water.

We continued on from there to a hostel in a small river village. They had a bar and kitchen and served the most amazing crab soup. We continued on up the river letting Josh push through branches and estuary muck….then CB and I realized we were running out of gas. So instead of making it to the mouth of Rio Lempa to check out the surfing situation….we took a shortcut back that would hopefully get us back to the boat without having to row :-) I should say without CB having to row.

In the end we made it back just past dark with lightening striking in the distance. It was a great day with amazing sights and fun times!

Free range horse having a gallop on one of the side tributary islets

River Lempa sunset on the way back….you really can’t capture the beauty of this place….but I gave it a try:-)

While we were at the restaurant several of the local kids attempted the rope swing but always chickened out in the end. On our way back we were rewarded by this little dude hootin’ and hollerin’ at us as we past giving us a big thumbs up as he swung back and forth over the water…we later heard that the rope was stolen…probably the guy mumbling about how good a fishing line it would make…oh well, hope he catches a lot of fish:-)