Exploring Belize 2015

It was the end of April 2015, and time for another adventure!

I had booked my trip back in December after extensive research. I like to give myself something to look forward to to help me through the cold Vermont winters!

I flew out of Boston and down to Belize to begin my tropical getaway...this was my second trip to Central America and I knew to expect the heat and humidity, boy did it feel good to be warm! Although the temps did rise into the 90s and 100s, so a little too warm perhaps;)

I stayed at the Bird's Eye View Lodge 

right on a lagoon...

where there were many birds...

It was the end of the dry season, and I could see signs of this in the scorched landscape along the road, and by the skinny animals trying to get by until the more abundant rainy season...

My room was bright and comfortable...

and my first night I had a little visitor!

The following morning, after a delicious breakfast, I went on an all-day tour to the ancient Mayan ruins of Lamanai (meaning Submerged Crocodile)...

we took an hour and a half boat ride down the New River, and met several inhabitants along the way, including this curious spider monkey!

we pulled up to the boat landing...

and made our way through the jungle to the 1st of several Mayan ruins...the first one we saw was called the Jaguar Temple...

we then continued through the hot, humid jungle to the biggest of the ruins, which we saw peeking through the trees...

 this one we could climb! So we took the 'tourist stairs'...

until we got close to the top, where we were allowed to walk on the ruins themselves...

and when we got to the top, we saw an amazing view over the jungle canopy to the river...

The following day, I took 2 half day tours. The first was to the Community Baboon Sanctuary, where there were Howler monkeys resting up in the trees in the heat of the day...

If I thought the day before was hot at 95 degrees (fahrenheit), I was in for a surprise! It was a burning 105 degrees, and without some kind of sun protection I would've had the worst sunburn ever! But it was still worth it to see what I saw next...

In the afternoon, the hottest part of the day, I put on more sunblock and a bandana, sunglasses and sun protection sleeves on my arms...and headed to another Mayan site, called Altun Ha (meaning Rock Stone Water), when I got there, I was the only visitor! So I had the whole place to myself! It was like a private tour...

I climbed 3 of the 4 temples, including the Sun temple...

After another full day of exploring the past and present of Belize, I headed back to the lodge for one more night. I had met some nice couples there and we spent the evening outside watching a thunderstorm roll in, and with it some well-needed cooler air!

My last morning before heading to the airport I did a last walk-around the lodge and said my goodbyes...

then it was back on the plane to make my way back home...

another amazing journey exploring God's Awesome Creation!


Safe travels,

Rachael


#travel #belize #adventure #jungle #mayanruins

The Trip that Never Was...2014

In Fall 2013, I began planning to join a group trip to China to check out the Great Wall and Terra Cotta Warriors...I had paid the reservation fee and traveler's insurance and it was a week away from when I was going to pay the remainder of the cost, however, I began to have second thoughts.

So I asked God to show me if it was still okay to go or not...

One day, after Thanksgiving, my mom and I went into a local store during their open house weekend. They were having door prizes and a raffle. So we both entered the raffle....and as I entered, I asked God to show me clearly one way or the other if it was okay for me to go to China....if I won the raffle, I should definitely not go...

So, a couple days later, when they had the raffle drawing, I got a phone call telling me I had won 1st prize in the raffle...a bittersweet victory, because I knew I had to cancel my trip:(

Although I did win a nice basket of Vermont-made goodies as a consolation prize!

Basket full of Vermont-made goodies

Since I was forbidden to go to China, I ended up staying in the country in 2014. However, I still ended up having 2 nice family vacations that year! One to Plymouth, Mass. to check out the plantation and Mayflower 2:

Plymouth Plantation 1600s

Mayflower 2

And one to Cape Elizabeth Lighthouse in Maine:

Cape Elizabeth Lighthouse, Maine

Cool little ship

So even though I couldn't go overseas, I still had a great time exploring more of New England! :)

God knows best;)

Happy Travels!

Rachael

#newengland #plymouth #maine #lighthouse #mayflower