Steph and I went down to Cupertino to a Paint Nite of a diving scene. I did a side view, with most people and the original being a bottom up view. Steph had a lot of really well done fish, I went a little overboard with things to include in the painting. In my painting there is an otter, a turtle, a jellyfish, a trigger fish, a kelp forrest, and a diver looking at an octopus. Stephs is much more elegant, with the turtle being prettier and all the little fish and corals around the outside being more detailed. She also had a lot more contrast between the background and the silhouette, which I think is also nice.
Steph and I went to Karaoke with Leyan, Kevin, Lindsay, Andrew, and Debby. We had a great time, and got to sing all the songs we wanted. There were a lot of Christmas classics going around. I really enjoyed singing “Chestnuts Roasting” as well as “Baby, it’s Cold Outside.” The “Baby, it’s Cold Outside” song is so creepy, but I really love the way the harmony and counterpoint in the duet, despite the words to the song. Steph got really into a few of the songs, and I thought it was adorable. I did a few of my classic karaoke songs like one of LMFAO’s, one from Billy Joel, and American Pie. Lindsay brought an interesting drink that was purple with sparkles and it had a decent amount of alcohol in it. It wasn’t all that tasty but it still hit the spot. I had a really good time and would love to do it again.
The night dive was my favorite dive in Belize. We went to the protected area Hol Chan, and saw a lot of things. There were a ton of rays, an eel, a massive hermit crab in a conch shell, an octopus, and a lot of fish following us for food. The red snapper was eating other fish that we shined our lights on. There were a bunch of fish following us that were interested in the worms congregating around the lights. I stayed behind and played with the group of smaller fish by trying to stay really still and watch them eat the worms. I got one worm in my ear, and it wriggled around for about 15 seconds before leaving, it felt really strange.
We took a day trip to the Lighthouse reefs, which includes the Blue Hole. We did one dive in the Blue hole and two dives on the reefs nearby. There was a nice break for lunch at one of the nearby islands, which was a habitat for the red footed boobies. The video below is a summary of the three dives, about 2 hours, taken down to about 6 minutes. The dives on the lighthouse reef were nicer than the dives close to San Pedro, with more fish, and more interesting formations.
The island for lunch with the red footed boobies had a few giant iguanas, frigate birds, and massive hermit crabs. The hermit crabs weren’t as big as the one we saw on the night dive, but still about the size of a baseball.
We had a great time diving near San Pedro. Steph did a total of 7 dives around the reefs there for day dives that are compiled into the video below. We picked out all the good parts, so from the 7 45 minute dives we have about 10 minutes of video. I didn’t do all the dives because I had headaches for one, and ear issues for another.
We took a night in Belize city and had dinner at the Best Western there since everything was closed on Sundays. The food wasn’t that great but the little bed and breakfast we stayed at, D’Nest Inn, was really nice. The furniture was old but decent, and the patio next to the river was nice. We played with all the catfish that were in the river. Supposedly there were manatees living in the river, but they didn’t come by while we were there. We caught a flight to San Pedro out of the international airport, and the pilot had to stop by the Belize City Municipal Airport, which was the shortest flight I’ve ever been on.
The island of Ambergris Caye was nice, and the City of San Pedro was cute. I was surprised that there wasn’t more of a city center, but that made for many more places that you could find restaurants. The nicest place we found was a breakfast and lunch place called Mesa Cafe. It was run by an adorable Australian couple, and we had a great time chatting with them and eating their delicious food. The Mesa Cafe was also one of the few places that we found with a decent vegetarian selection.
We were staying at the resort called Ramon’s Village. The place was very nice, and they upgraded us to one of the nicest rooms. We had a wonderful time at the resort, and the breakfasts were delicious. There was a delicious pastry called fry jacks, which we had with most breakfasts, and I enjoyed opening them up and stuffing them with the omelettes. We didn’t spend much time on the beach, as I was avoiding getting burned at all costs, but we did spend a good bit of time in the shaded beach chairs. We also got a couples massage, which worked great for me, but they didn’t go deep enough for Steph.
Out of all the adventures at Caves Branch this one was the most lack-luster. The hike was pretty tough, with it being steep and muddy. We made decent time, with only a few stops, and got to the rim of the sink hole. I was the first one to get strapped in, and I got a good 5-10 minutes to look down into the hole from half hanging off the edge before they had Steph ready to go. It was a great view of a fascinating cave system. I wish we had time to go through the caves a bit more, although we were a little caved out at this point. Steph and I were followed by two couples and a group of two guys that were on the hike with us. A large group of people were behind them, but luckily we were in a separate group and could hike out without waiting. The lunch was the typical tortillas, veggies, cheese, and meat. The other women were concerned about doing the drop, but everyone enjoyed it when they were done. The first video is Steph and I doing it, with the other videos being the other people in our group and some interesting things we saw at the bottom of the sink hole.
Steph and I did a day trip to Tikal, getting up at 5:30. The night before we had been allowed to stay in one of the nicer rooms. The main thing I liked about it was the standard outlets for power. The rooms were surprisingly nice, as they could easily sleep 6 people, and had balconies viewing the river.
We had a long drive to Tikal, in Guatamala, with a pass through the border checkpoint and switching cars. The two people we went with weren’t particularly pleasant, and we were glad that they left us mostly alone. I got the feeling that Edgar, the guide, didn’t care for them either. The man of the couple was a know it all who kept trying to tell Edgar about Mayan ruins and what things meant. Edgar was a good sport about it, but handled it by being quite. I would much rather have listened to Edgar giving the tour than the other guy, and we did get some great stories from Edgar when the other couple was off exploring on their own. I was amazed at the temples, but the most amazing construction was the man-made mesa that the entire complex sat on, with water reservoirs in between the mesas. We got a good number of pictures of the wildlife as well and it was amazing to see the temples, housing, and construction. I would have liked more time at Tikal just to wander around and explore everything, since the complex was so expansive we had time to just walk through everything before having to leave.
The wildlife around Tikal was amazing, and we got to see toucans, spider monkeys, howler monkeys, a red breasted falcon, turkeys, humming birds, the ‘royal rat’, and a quadimundi.
The food on the way there and back was decent, with the hot chocolate being amazing for breakfast. I really enjoyed the trip, despite the other couple there.
The third day at Caves Branch we went to the Waterfall Caves, which were by far the most impressive caves based on the activity and the cave formations. There were also apparently some leftovers of the Mayans, but they didn’t go up to that part of the cave anymore. We were joined by April and Luke, who had both gone tubing with us and to the ATM caves over the previous two days. They were a fun couple from NYC, and matched us quite well.
We had a decently long drive to the trail that then went through about 30 minutes of jungle to get to the caves. The hike was very slippery and muddy, but we got to the caves quickly enough.
We went into the entrance of the cave and got to see lots of bats and spiders sitting there at the entrance. There were both fruit bats and insect bats at the entrance to the Waterfalls Cave, with the insect bats being the small ones.
The start of the hike was really nice, as the formations were amazing. I especially liked the overflowing pools formations. They were beautiful, and I couldn’t get a good enough video of them since the GoPro didn’t do too well in the low light settings. There was a large crayfish in one of the ponds, and a few fish in the cave as well. I borrowed an image of the pools, and one video of them is ok.
Getting through the Waterfalls Cave wasn’t as bad as getting through the ATM cave since we were only knee deep for most of the time. I really enjoyed the hiking through the cave.
Once we got to the waterfalls we had a great time climbing up them. The climbing wasn’t hard by itself, but some parts were hard due to the amount of water pushing against you. One of the climbs was particularly bad due to the handholds being directly inside the waterfall.
Going down the waterfalls was fun as well. The last one was the scariest, as it was the highest jump and the smallest area that you could land in. You could get seriously hurt if you jumped too short, too far right, or too far left. Everyone made it down just fine.
After jumping down the waterfalls we had a great lunch. The guides set up lunch on a big flat rock, that was perfect as a picnic table. Next to the place we had lunch there was also a larger formation of the cascading pools; about 40 feet wide and 30 feet tall. I couldn’t get a good video of it, but it was gorgeous. I felt bad about hiking across it.
After getting back Steph and I cleaned up, then went to play some Hanabi with Luke and April. We did decently well, with few mistakes, but the cards just weren’t with us enough to have a perfect game. We did a good bit of table talk but it was all in having fun.
It's an Exciting World 