First off I gave you all the wrong area code for Belize. It’s 501 and not 502. So my cell number is 011-501-651-3091.
Well Kismet has lost 3 of the nicest people I’ve ever met. Bruce left for his home in Maine on Friday 2/26 and Brent and Jan were safely home in Edmonton late Thursday night (2/25). Boy is Fatboy In Belize ever lonely now! While Tricia will always be here, and there will be guests checking in and out, and Ron and Peter dropping by almost every day, that will keep me occupied. It’s just not the same without the 3 of them because we all became such fast friends. I claimed Bruce as my 4th brother. We poked fun at each other constantly and had an even better time when happy hour rolled around and Brent and Jan joined in. This place rocked with laughter! And, the 2 times that we forced Brent to drag over his borrowed guitar, we had the air resounding with all kinds of half remembered songs. Actually Brent knew the songs but none of us could remember all the lyrics. In any case we had a great, great time. All 3 left with promises to come back. Bruce maybe at Christmas (he was here for the 1st time last Christmas) and the Canucks about this same time next year. Kismet is so quiet now…
We all (Tricia, Brent & Jan, Ron, Bruce, and I) went on a snorkeling and fishing trip on Tuesday 2/24. On our way out to the reef a pod of dolphin played around the boat and one made a beautiful 6 foot jump into the air as if he was performing at Sea World. Our 1st stop was to Bread & Butter Caye which is right on the reef and home to a single small resort owned by a guy named King. It’s a really nice place, rustic as many of them are around here, but a nice place to stay none the less. King met us at the dock, and of course, when we heard his name, several of us introduced ourselves as royalty too. Bruce was 1st with Prince and me last with Emperor. King busted out laughing over it so we knew he was our kind of guy. Some sat and had a beer, or beers, and talked and some of us snorkeled and fished. Snorkeling was great as the water was calm and warm and the sun bright. After snorkeling I caught an inedible garbage fish, but a nice fight, and had a few small hits. We left King after about an hour and headed out in the direction of the more populated Cayes and began our fishing day in earnest. Brent was the big kahoona with a double catch of barracuda. The 1st was about 4 feet long and the 2nd a 3 footer. Both gave up the fight very unwillingly and had Brent sort of roaming the bow of the boat while he fought them. Bruce had a couple of fish on, including a barracuda, but failed to boat them and I had a couple of good strikes, one a barracuda that danced across the water before throwing the hook, but brought nothing to the boat. So our dinner was provided by Brent 2 nights in a row. Needless to say we all came home redder than we left. Tricia fed us wonderful egg salad and salsa with chips (she forgot the bread). Rum and OJ filled many a glass along with cold Belikan Beer. We actually had beer left when we got back to the dock. That was a shocker. But it didn’t last long as we went from partying on the boat to partying on the Kismet deck.
I’m planning a trip next week to Chetumal MX to reclaim my tourist vehicle tax of US$450. I’ll probably spend a few days there doing some major grocery shopping for Tricia and me, getting things that aren’t readily available here in Hopkins or Dangriga. My buddy Ron will take the ride up but will stay in Belize at Corozal and visit friends. One of the reasons for my trip to MX is to restart the clock on paying the duty on my car. It may amount to about US$4,000 because of its value. I want to put that off for a long as possible but not sure how long I can keep doing that. It’s the price of living in paradise though I guess.
Ron came over Thursday afternoon to shoot the breeze and asked if I’d be interested in a 3 day canoe outing from San Ignacio, which is in the Mayan Mountains near the Guatemalan coast, to Belize City which is right on the coast. He thinks it’s a daytime race but we sure as shootin’ wouldn’t be involved in that. It would just be a nice couple of days on the water. He wasn’t sure what the sleeping arrangements would be, hotels or tents or something, so he’ll check into it. If we decide to do it we’ll lock the canoe to the top on my car before we head north to MX and take the detour to San Ignacio on the way back. I’ll keep you informed of our plans…
For Bruce’s last meal request Tricia made him a wonderful rosemary roasted chicken and baked an Italian bread. Dinner was attended by Bruce, Elvis (Tricia’s helper), Tricia and me. And, since Saturday 2/27 is Bruce’s 61st birthday, I couldn’t let it go by without some sort of celebration. So, while I was in Dangriga Thursday I stopped at Norman’s Bakery and bought 3 delicious carrot cupcakes for his birthday. Sadly Bruce said it would be the only birthday cake he’d have. But having one here made him feel special and us so glad that we could celebrate it with him. Tricia had also booked a couple of the local girls to come and perform some Belizean dances at 7pm but for some reason they didn’t show. A nice time was had by all anyway.
Fishing in the lagoon has been a challenge. Bruce and I went out twice in my canoe but Tricia’s 5 Labrador Retrievers swam along, around, and sometimes almost over us both times and chased the fish away. They can swim for hours. Wednesday morning Bruce locked the dogs on the porch so that I could try to venture out without them and possibly catch some fish. No such luck though because, about 10 minutes after I left, Bruce went down to get the dog bowls to feed them and 4 of them charged off in my direction. So I came home with no fish once again. Even Peter has been complaining about how bad the fishing has been so I didn’t feel so bad coming home empty handed. At least the exercise that I get paddling is a good thing. I was forced to buy some filleted fish in the Dangriga fish market on Thursday to fill my freezer. I split a box of shrimp with Ron so I have 4 shrimp dinners reserved too. I’m looking forward to eating seafood gumbo, a shrimp boil, shrimp Jambalaya, and shrimp and Caribbean rice. If nothing else I’ve been eating well here. Plus I’ve been eating healthier with lots of fresh veggies and fruit. (Bobbie Jean I’m not sure if you remember the email that you sent several months ago about eating fruit on an empty stomach to get all the nutritional value from the fruit but I’ve been doing that and it helps with my weight loss. Thanks for that!) I’ve dropped about 10 pounds already. One of my missions in life is to drop some tonnage (gee will I have to change my name to “normal size guy in Belize” when I’ve dropped the weight?) and be more healthy and get off my blood pressure medicine.
Till later!
