Don’t worry. Be(lize) happy.

Last week we disappeared off to paradise. It might not have been everyone’s paradise, but it was ours for a little while.

The view from the deck of our over-the-water hut on Glover’s Reef Atoll.

NOTE: I feel that I should preface this post with a pre-emptive apology if it seems like I’m gloating or overly proud of myself and Garrett about this past week of fabulousness. I don’t mean to be. Ok, I don’t mean to be that much. Please forgive me, and just know that I’m wishing each of you your own little slices of paradise (however that might come into your world).

Since I was planning most of our travels around Guatemala, I was quite happy to let G plan our Belize travels. After setting aside the common tourist spots of Caye Caulker and Ambergris Caye, Garrett stumbled across Glover’s Reef “Resort” which is smack dab in the middle of the second largest barrier reef in the entire world (second only, of course, to the Great Barrier Reef in Aussie Land) off the coast of southern Belize.

We’d read mixed reviews about this mystical island called Glover’s Reef. We’d heard that it’s waters were gorgeous and filled with fabulous fish and sharks and rays (it’s in the middle of a world heritage site and wildlife reserve). We’d heard it was off the beaten path and a bit hard to get to, which was both appealing (in that we’d certainly have a unique experience) and a little worrying (as in, if we hated it, we’d just have to tough it out because there was only one weekly boat that took people to and from the island). We’d heard it was “rustic” at best (no electricity, composting toilets and only one shared faucet of running – but not drinkable – water for all the guests). We’d also heard that the owners happened to be just a little bit crazy.

I had given Garrett carte blanche to pick our destination and was quite excited about a week of snorkeling and Caribbean sunshine, but when Garrett started to say things like, “Well, I hope this doesn’t turn out to be a camel ride**”, I did start to get a little worried.

And, to tell you the truth, our trip started off a bit bumpy. First, we had a 8 hour journey that included one border crossing w/ grumpy customs officials and five different types of transportation (bus, taxi, bus, bus, taxi) to make our way from Flores, Guatemala to the teeny tiny town of Sittee River, Belize where the boat was to depart from the next day. Then, there was the fact that Sittee River was kind of a mosquito infested dump, and the place we stayed the evening prior to our departure (Glover’s Guest House), seemed like the worst-managed place I’ve ever been to in my life. Even after asking, not one of the three employees seemed terribly interested in informing us (or even fully informed themselves) as to whether or not this was in fact the place where the boat left from, or what time the boat might leave, or what we were to pay, or when, or how, or even if there were cabins available on the island. (When we’d called to make a reservation, the phone rang about 12 times and then the message machine came on saying, “We’ve got probably got rooms available. No need to leave a message or send an email, just show up on the boat dock on Sunday morning.” Um. Probably? Ok. This didn’t seem to bode particularly well for Glover’s Resort. But…  Leap of faith… here we go!

Though a good portion of these interactions made my “sketch-tastic” alarm bells start a-ringing, the truth was, we’d already traveled quite a ways to get there, and come hell or high water, we were determined to have a good attitude about our funny little adventure. Rather than being ticked off by the heat, the bugs and the general lack of cleanliness and the complete lack of any sort of order to the place, we decided to find the whole thing sort of hysterically funny. This included smiling at the fact that we were given a 4×10 ft bunk room to stay in for the night and having a silent giggling fit for a good 20 minutes when Garrett broke through the termite-eaten bed in the middle of the night and our butts caved the mattress in almost to the floor. I mean… this place was q-u-a-l-i-t-y).

Our amazing “room” at Glover’s Guest House. Note our use of the mozy net (right). This was it’s maiden voyage after 7 months in G’s backpack, and damn were we glad we had it.

Our good attitudes were bolstered by the fact that soon enough, other fellow island-goers started arriving soon after we did; their general normalness and niceness began to put us somewhat at ease. There was a set of five jovial fly fishermen from B.C. who were both overwhelmingly friendly (those darn Canadians) and had enough food with them to feed a small army, which felt very reassuring. (Did I mention that one needs to bring all their own provisions to the island, including candles, TP and, of course, food and booze?) Then, there was the adventurous Scottish family consisting of mom and dad (Ingrid and Sean) and their precocious and endearing 9-year-old daughter Kate. In the last 8 months, they’d biked from the very northern tip of the Northwest territories (like where the Inuit live) to Belize. Yep, that’s right. I said bicycled. With their 9 year old. And, their plan is to go all the way to Argentina together. Fantastic, no? Then there was the charming older New England couple, Elizabeth from Maine, her gentleman friend Charles, and Elizabeth’s 19-year-old grandson Noah who was born in Oklahoma but has spent the last 10 years living with his parents in England. We were quite the motley crew of folks and everyone seemed to make friends quickly, knowing that we’d all be neighbors for the next week. Or longer… (discussions of Gilligan’s Island and their infamous three hour tour came up repeatedly).

As you might imagine, the next morning dissolved into utter chaos rather quickly. Most of the guests were ready to go with our bags on the dock by 8:30am, because we’d heard through the grapevine that the boat left promptly at 9am. However, the owner didn’t arrive until about 10am with all the supplies, which we then had load. This doesn’t really sound like such a big deal, but with now almost 30 guests all trying to be helpful and no one really telling us what to do (the owner mysteriously disappeared during this time), we packed, unpacked and repacked the boat at least twice with probably a few thousand pounds of gear, luggage, food and water. (Insert enormous eye roll here, but then delete enormous eye roll, because remember, I’m having a good attitude here, and I’m telling myself “Don’t worry. Be happy. You’re on island time now.”)

Anyway, at some time that morning, we got under way. We had a three hour journey on a catamaran to get to the island, and by this time, everyone was getting antsy. We had the opposite of island fever. Rather than getting off the island… we just wanted to get on it! When we finally arrived at Glover’s (which was teeny, just 9 acres in total), we unpacked the previously mentioned thousand pounds of stuff fire-brigade style, took a quick tour with Becky (the “eccentric” owner I’d mentioned before) and then that was pretty much that last social activity that Garrett and I engaged in for the next six days.

 

Our new home for the week was Cabin 2 Moray, aka – PARADISE! There were 14 other cabins and about thirty other guests on the island, but sort of by happenstance, this became a week of delightful solitude for us in our little hut over the water. (G sprung for the “nice” digs, and it might easily be the best decision he’s ever made… other than marrying me. Seriously.)

Our time on Glover’s Reef was a six day break from our “normal” lives of constant logistical decision-making, of watch-checking, of asking when things will open, when things will close, of trying to figure out what we wanted to eat, where we want to eat, and when we want to eat, where we will sleep, what we want to do, how we’ll get to where we want to go and, of course, the constant negotiation of how much all of the above will cost. This was a week without commitments, without time (we took the watch off for the week and only used it to time our rice – hence it became known as the Rice Timer, with no illegal uses of the Rice Timer allowed), without worrying about where we’ll go to next or about how life will be when we get home, without the need to be active or “culturally engaged”, and even without the need be engaged in making new friends.

We had planned to do some diving, but we couldn’t be bothered to make it to the dive boat (100 yards from our hut) at any appointed time (beside, that would have required illegal use of the Rice Timer). We’d planned to eat a communal meal or two at the “restaurant” with the other guests, but we just couldn’t be bothered to walk over there a few times a day, and it seemed like too big an effort to imagine engaging in witty conversation long into the evening. We’d planned to hang out at least a few nights around the campfire with our friendly and fun fellow island goers, but we really couldn’t be bothered with that either, as that would mean missing out on sunsets, and watching moonlit sharks swim under our dock, and going to bed within an hour of sunset (we approximated this to around 7:30pm).

Sure, it was rustic. In fact, I’d go ahead and call it primitive. Yes, there were bugs. Yes, the composting toilet was ripe. Yes, the showers were cold and brackish. Yes, the humidity was so intense that I didn’t dry out for an entire week. And yes, our days were selfish and indulgent and simple.

And it was perfect. A truly perfect week. We were happy hermits for six lovely days. We did exactly what we wanted to do, whenever we wanted to do it. A true vacation.

Well done Garrett. No camel ride here, my friend.**

 
Sort of over-exposed interior shots of our hut. (Left) The main bed. (Right) The “kitchen” area, which was a desk, with a single burner propane stove on it and some dishes and utensils. To the right of the hut was a bunk bed, which became our armoire, bookshelf and pantry for the week.

So what did we do for a week on Glover’s?

Well… we enjoyed the sea breeze.      
This is our first morning. We had a huge windstorm all of the previous night and the wind continued most of the next day. My bouffant hairdo is the work of the wind. We ate al fresco every day… however, this day proved challenging because our eggs kept flying off our forks, hence, the introduction of the tortillas.

We cherished tranquil moments.
Our “living room”. The view off our front deck.
 
Gorgeous sunrise on the water.

Happy, with a toes dangling over the Caribbean blue and a cup of tea.

We took naps and read.

We swam.

We ate.
 

We swam some more. And snorkeled. A lot.
  
(Left) Garrett looking stellar in his snorkel outfit (which is hard to look stellar in, but he manages quite well). (Right) Me being very happy because we’ve just seen five (5!!!) nurse sharks on our afternoon snorkel as well as my favorite marine creature, a spotted eagle ray.

We snorkeled so much that we got really pruney.
But we figured pruney-ness was a sign of happiness.

We experimented with creative snacking options.

We efficiently and happily managed our “chores” for the day.  
Our two “chores” of the day consisted of (left) washing our dishes in the sea and (right) watching the sharks come in to the dock area while folks were cleaning the fish they’d caught for dinner. Above is a blurry pic of a 5-6ft nurse shark mowing down on a snapper carcass. We also saw lemon sharks and a bull shark during the evening “feedings”. 

We hung out together and talked.

We watched sunrises…

… and sunsets.

———————————-

** Camel ride: Noun. Tenuver slang for “doing something that sounds adventurous that ends up being a horrible disaster that your partner can lord over you for years.” Comes from a certain mishap in India when I may have gently persuaded Garrett to go out on an evening camel ride through the desert, that ended up including an almost mugging, a very uncomfortable saddle rash, an inedible dinner, bug bites from being forced to sit on mite-filled camel blankets during a pathetic attempt at “traditional” entertainment, and about $150 dollars down the toilet.

Advertisement