Punta Gorda (10/02/09 - 13/02/09)
We arrived at our very nice (not for backpackers) hotel which had a large area of jungle as a back garden. We soon realised that we had some very noisy neighbours and for once the weren´t Americans.
There were lots of interesting plants around the garden including this very undeveloped pineapple.
Liz took this very dramatic picture of a palm tree whilst Adam went for some "camera time" in the jungle.
Another interesting jungle plant although apparently this is another escapee from somebodies garden.
Even in the ant world two females with babies have to stop and have a gossip for half an hour.
Jungle fungus.
Adam´s first, but hopefully not last, tarantula. This is a red rumped tarantula who rather inconveniently would not show anything apart from her red rump.
We went to a Belizean greasy spoon for breakfast with Julie and Pat a lovely pair also staying in our hotel.
We were advised to visit the local hardware shop and to have a seaweed shake. This one was rum and raisin flavoured, we don´t want to know what else went in it but it didn´t taste of seaweed and was actually quite nice.
Market day in Punta Gorda.
We hopped on a local chicken bus to visit some nearby Mayan ruins.
Lubantuun ruins - nothing spectacular but we had the whole place to ourselves for a couple of hours and it was very peaceful.
The name of the site means fallen rocks and they were not exaggerating.
We visited a butterfly farm on top of one of the highest hills in the area.
The farm was owned by a Welshman who lived on Alma Road in Windsor for 30 years. The butterflies were all for export to Stratford-Upon-Avon butterfly farm. It is a small world.
It was a commercial butterfly farm and so was largely fairly unattractive. This one looked more natural than most.
We also visited a local Cacao farm. These pods are ready for harvesting and making into chocolate.
The chocolate was only made on a small scale using traditional methods. The seeds were extraced from the cacao pod, dried for a number of days and then crushed into a chocolate paste using the above stone grinder.
One of our very young but knowledgeable tour guides with a broken cacao pod.
Family friends and owners of Hickatee Cottages, our base in Punta Gorda, Ian and Kate. Great homemade food, thanks Kate!
No comments:
Post a Comment