To Placencia

Another bus ride out of Dangriga to the town of Independence.  Ali takes Shane on her lap and hopes that he falls asleep, I sit with Logan.  We generally sit in different rows of the bus.  When you sit on the same one, the kids get poking each other and squirm around.  Add in two carry-on bags and a water, then sit it on your full bladder and you are getting the feeling.  Remember that there is another local passenger sitting next to you.

Since Placencia is at the bottom of a peninsula, it is faster to get dropped off on the highway and take a water taxi across the lagoon.  The $5 we paid for this river boat through mangrove swamp would be worth it on its own as a tour.  On the way in we passed some seriously big sailboats and catamarans.  Lots of expats have set up here.  Good location with Guatemala and Honduras just a couple of hours sail away - plus all the cayes offshore where you can just fish to your heart's content.

Very nice calm beach here in Placencia.  Good for kids.  The kind of sand that is so hot at midday that you have to run to get in the water.  A couple of jellyfish at this time of the year - but the shore is basically empty, as are all of the houses along the beach.  Locals tell us that the busier tourist season in Belize starts to pick up in November.





We know that half the enjoyment in travelling for us is how cheap we can pull it off for.  Like if you spend thousands on your holiday then it is expected that you should be totally gratified by the experience and people should have served you grapes while fanning you.  If not you got ripped off. 

We are very pleased with our current view from the porch of our 2 bedroom house with hammock for 50 bucks a night.   The lot across is empty - so we are basically beachfront.  Did I mention that we have cable TV - in English? This was not an easy find as we walked up and down the sidewalk with many wrong turns carting children both at their wit's end.
We have to do this since we need to spend several days to a week at each spot and there is no point in settling for dumps if you are staying for a while.  Dumps are only good when we are trying to complete a big leg to the next spot.

We would be achieving our goal of 100 bucks a day, but by putting down a little bit more coin in Belize, we can get some really, really good Creole seafood.  I plan on making up the deficit by bargaining hard and squabbling over pennies in Guatemala.  Even if we are already under budget.