Glovers is for lovers……

Finally here are the pictures from our adventure on Glvoer’s Atoll Belize. After my bro flew back to Canada and we finished helping my dad with a few projects around Casa Kinkajou, it was time to get back to the coast.

I few years back I remember seeing this hand drawn poster of a tropical island paradise that you could boat to and camp for $100. This poster was burnt into my brain and I often would think about this place and knew we had to check it out.

We made arrangements to head down to Hopkins Village to meet the crew that would catamaran us out to the island. The ride is an exciting three hours out into the open ocean. We passed many other palm tree islands, even a few we had been too in years past, but this island, Glovers would be the most isolated and probably untouched island we have been too as of yet! We passed a sea turtle on our way there and I took that as a good omen.

Old washed up boat from Cuba! U just never know what you are going to find on the beach!

Eagle ray cruisin past the dock

Our little cabana on the beach

We really hit it off with the owner of the island, Becky a French Belizian woman who likes to hang it all out driving her catamaran. Actually she is boarder line nuts but you have too be to survive on an island in the middle of the ocean! lol We watched her bring in a load of lumber from the main land on a stormy day. The waves were crashing over the dock and I was pretty nervous trying to help as Becky screamed out orders. What a gem! The dive instructor Brian is also a legend and took us out Lion fish spearing.

Becky treated us like extended family and offered us a cabin and kayak to volunteer for the following week. And what were we to volunteer doing, you might ask? Oh making palm tree  bon fires! wahahahahaha Mike and I were in our glory! Seriously the easiest job ever and we are both fire bugs. The palm trees lose branches continually and if you don’t burn them eventually the whole island would be covered. The only down side to the burn was watching the poor crabs trying to get out the the inforno before it was too late

Found this beauty one morning out for a kayak in our underwear! We had gone out to catch conch but when I saw this in the shallow water I jumped in to retrieve it.

 

Get your own coconut!

 

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Our first home, hammocks and a tarp! The first week flew by with this open concept living! Imagine watching rays jump out of the water for sunrise !

The island was infested with crabs! lol not those kind of crabs though! The hermit crabs would come out in battalion numbers in the night searching for food. If anything was left out, including open coconuts the crabs would have it devoured by morning. We even found a crab living in a pen lid. lol Silly crabs!

View of neighboring island.

Mike hard at work at the coconut splitter. For two weeks we ate fresh coconut everyday. We tried it all coconut rice, milk, pancakes, fish, potatoes….really you can put coconut in everything and we did!

You don’t need to fly all the way to Fiji or Polynesia to get that over the water tropical paradise feel. Glovers Atoll is the closest thing to perfect we have found on the trail. Check it out!

Davids Adventure Land

We spent our last couple days before Jer had to fly back to Canada out at our long time friend, Davids, jungle ruin hideaway. His property is an ancient mayan pyramid site. You have to use your imagination because all the temples are still covered in thousands of years of dirt but you can clearly see the enormity of the square and imagine how rich the site used to be. This particular site must of been for the rich and powerful because the jungle floor is littered with snail shells from years and years of eating seafood? Overall being that far back in the jungle, by the river, surrounded by temples is always amazing.

Machete man!

David grows all his own chicken and pigs. He does all his own fruit and trades in town at the market for other goods. We really admire this simple yet rewarding life. 

The trees are full of parrots and toucans throughout the day. The best times are at dawn and sunset because the birds go crazy. You can watch them all flying in from the surrounding jungle side.

David harvesting his plantains (similar to bananas). I was surprised to learn that you only get one bunch of plantains or bananas from a tree then they have to cut it down to produce a new tree and bunch! Seriously think about how many banana trees we are talking bout every year……wow.

When the bunches fall they are super heavy. I could only carry one bunch down! David is a pro cutter and has the bunch fall just perfectly to chest height, never hitting the ground.

A little rasta saying “Dreadmen tell no tales”. lol Ain’t that the truth. David is one of the smartest and wisest men in Belize and he only speaks da truth mon! If you are ever in San Ignacio Belize and would like to meet an old school rasta tour guide, David can be found out front the bus terminal at David’s Adventure Tours.

BaCK in the CaYo………

After leaving the cayes we met up with our friend Nigel at his Harley Davidson Black Pearl dealership https://www.facebook.com/pages/Black-Pearl-Harley-Davidson-Belize/160148400693532, and caught a ride into the heart of Belize, to our home away from home, Casa Kinkajou in San Ignacio.

My dad’s backyard is a perfect place to relax in the jungle. We painted some colorful furniture to go with the paradise theme!

Jer made it to the house but he was a little exhausted from the island life.

This little guy came to visit us and ran right into the kitchen. We had to do some rearranging of the furniture to get him out.

Another visitor in the backyard.

The wolf pack headed out to the Belize/ Guatemala border to check out the Mayan ruins of Xunantunich. You have to drive onto a hand crank bridge that floats you across the river to the temples. We got super lucky and found a pack of howler monkeys at the first temple! They where chillin in the trees watching us and even showed us their white testicles! How rude! We got an epic scene when we were on top the temple and the whole troop started moving across the jungle in the trees. It was a birds eye shot of monkey life!

bus, boat and another boat to Belize

 For a change we took a ferry from the boarder town of Chutemal into Belize via the island of Ambergris. We then hopped on another ferry which took us to Caye Caulker. Once again Michael and I would enjoy the sweet island life..for the forth time. But seriously I never mind going back to a great place and it was Jer’s first time.

The boat ride was way better then taking the bus and for a bonus we got to watch an epic sunset as we were arriving. Caye Caulker seemed much busier then I had remembered it from the moment we got there. High season is a buzz kill.

 

Luckily we were able to check into a little place around the back of the island that has cheap rooms and unforgettable sunsets from your hammock view. We settled right into paradise and started enjoying all the island had to offer….

 Snorkeling with starfish and tarpon!   The sorry replacement for a beach, lol. What remains of a cement wall after a hurricane is now the popular sunbathing spot on the island.

 

These are the tarpon we decided to snorkel with one day. They are alot bigger in the water face to fish face! A local had let us on to some knowledge about there being a secret cenote that has a cave entrance that is guarded by large aggressive fish (tarpon), not far from our casita. The three of us being fearless and foolish insisted on checking it out. Jer got stung by jellyfish in the stroll through the weeds on he way to. The water ended up being too murky to see the entrance to the cave but we did manage to be completely surrounded by massive fish with sharp protruding teeth. At one point I got so spooked by one “checking me out” that I put up my fist in an attempt to fight him off! We all got out of the water with all of our digits still intact. I vowed never to do it again, and the guys thought it would be cool to have some bait for next time!

 

 Gotta love free coconuts in your front yard!  Hermit We made really good friends with the local guy, George who helped the owner maintain, clean and fill his guesthouse. He turned out to be a major highlight of the four days on the island. We shared alot of laughs, insights, fish and a couple drinks. He took us out fishing on two mornings and we were able to catch our own lunch, Red and yellow snapper! George hooked us up with whatever we needed and even cooked for us, legendary guy.

 

 Michael and George, sunrise  Oops, throw him back.

On our last day there we were lucky enough to make friends with two travelers on the boat ride, who through a string of events invited us out sailing with their new friend. Michael and I were totally excited to get off the island and check it out from the water. This would be the first time we came out to the island but didn’t go out to the reef. Turns out we got something much better. Jer hung back to embark on an epic and painful hand tattoo at the local Belizan shop while we learnt to sail.

Our captain Tuvious, (very cool Germain guy who had just sailed from Utila) took us out around the island and taught us the ins and outs of sailing. He was calling out orders to each of us and it felt like we were really sailing the boat. The captain took us out to another smaller island where another group was making a bbq. The day flew by as we enjoyed coconut rum, fresh lobster and conch. The crew helped sail back to Caye Caulker as the sun was setting. This day was so unforgettable. When great people, spontaneity and paradise mix you always have a epic time! Needless to say Jer was a little bummed when we rolled back in at night and he had been finished his tattoo for hours.

This is not the sail boat we took out. One day there may be some deleted scenes pics of our epic day out on the water once I clean out the over used and abused GoPro memory, but for now you can just imagine the cutest little sailboat and crew eva ~  Down side to tourism……….more garbage Time to hop to the main land…….

 

Guat’s up

So lets recap on Glovers Atoll…….We had an incredible time on the island and ended up extending our stay to two weeks! The staff were amazing and let us volunteer for a free cabin and kayak. How can you beat that deal? The reef is incredible and still pristine. We only did one dive but with world class snorkeling right outside your door, who needs to dive! We saw sharks, turtles, rays, lobster, lion fish, etc etc….. From our hammock we saw a eagle ray jump right out of the water. Another highlight was swimming with a school of hundreds of bonefish. Turns out it is worth boating  two hours out into the ocean to find this coral reef paradise.

These two months blew by and now we are getting set to start our yoga program. We head out from Belize on Sunday for Guatemala. I can’t wait to get to the lake and do some yoggs! We are going to check out the farm a few days before we start to practice their asanas and get to know the staff. We have been warming up the bod and practicing a lot but I am still anxious to see if we can hack the strenuous routine. I doubt that I will have very much excess time or energy in the next few weeks so I bid you adieu until after the course. I will update the blog with full pictures and details in May. xox

Gilligan’s Island

The blue lagoon and treasure island were always movies that I loved as a kid and I often wished I could get trapped on a tropical island too. Well we aren’t shipped wrecked but we are choosing to head out to the isolated Glovers Atoll reef. It is one of only four atolls in this hemisphere! The ancient island dissapeared into the sea leaving only a ring of beautiful coral reef and a few tiny cocout islands.

We are being picked up on a catermaran and taking the two hour ride out into the ocean to reach the atoll. We are camping for a week in our hammocks with little more then a few plantans, a fishing line and some reading material. The snorkeling and diving are supposed to be world class and I am sure we will not be dissapointed!

I am so excited to relax with no distractions and catch up on some Qtime with Michael. Its been go go go since we got down here since we were trying to see and do as much as possible while Jer was down. He made it home safely on Thursday with only some minor detainment at customs, lol. Hopefully his bum is feeling better soon. jk

Check out these beautiful arial shots of the atoll that I obviously stole from the internet. This is where we will be spending an isolated week in paradise. That is going to be me in that kayak! We will talk to you when we get rescued.

Road Warriors

I know, I know, it’s been two weeks and no blog post! Its proving to be difficult to update the blog now that we are not traveling with our own computer. It is liberating to no have expensive gear to take care of but using the antique computers at the interenet cafes sucks. This one already almost got a punch to the screen for its slow prosessing speeds! l0l

The trip is going amazing. We spent the first week tooling around Mexico calling ourselves Tres Lobos (three wolves aka wolf pack). Some highlights are the drunken all nighter in Playa Del Carmen dancing on the beach with the aussies and the magical 7 colors of the lake of Bacalar. Jer got to do his first snorkeling in the Carribean with sea turltes! Unfortunaley I will not be spending the day uploading one picture to show you, so for now your imagination will have to do.

Our adventures are continuing in Belize and there is lots to see and do. With only a week to go before Jer leaves, we will be racing to do as much cool shiz as possible. So far we have seen the island of caye caulker and did some ocean fishing. I caught two snappers and a dog on the dock that ate my bait! lol Pot lickers! Our local friend George was a legendary host and took us fishing and shared his cooking with us.  While Jeremy descided to spend the day getting a tattoo, Michael and I got asked abord a small sail boat with some new friends we had met. We spent the day sailing around the islands with me stearing and Mike as a deck hand. Our new friend Tuvious, the captain is sailing around the world but headed back to Utila in the mean time. It was an amazing FREE experience with the cream of the crop of cool international peeps. A stop at a deserted paradise island and sunset cruise home finished off the best day on the island, or should I say on the water!

So I will do my best to keep up with the exciting info to get you through the cold winter days at the office, hehehe, sorry that was cruel. Hasta Luego

Back n Belize

After a short 30 hour travel day, we were back in Belize. Lol. Unfortunately for us we had to fly from the coast of Colombia to the capital, then to Miami, then to Belize. Luckily we were very motivated to get back to our truck, so it flew by. Three months of taking buses made us realize how lucky we were to have Elvis! 

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Arriving back in San Ignacio was great. Warm welcome from friends, sweet wheels waiting for us and an empty house for us to stay in! What more could one ask for? My dad had closed up his house for his trip back to Canada so we had it all to ourselves. The place was a mess because he had locked it down it like a fortress before he left. All the furniture and appliances were moved into the living room, the doors to the bedrooms and the kitchen were boarded up and there was ant powder and bug traps everywhere. It turned out to be fun to sleep in the living room and cook right beside our bed.

We ended up spending a week visiting friends and prepping the Cruiser for the long haul back. We also wasted a few afternoons sitting by the river and watching the animals. We kept saying it would be so easy to stay for a month. We promised to many people we would be home this summer so we had to stick to the plan. A quick drive through the Gulf of Mexico, up the east coast of the states and into east coast Canada. First things first, making it through crazy Mexico! Wish us luck.

Bowlizean Pleasean

Combine seven crazy canucks, rum and a bowl together and what do you get? Bowlizean Pleasean. Mike, Rob, Nikki, Chad, Mel, Joey and I had a blast and many a laughs drinking from our rum bowl concoction. We spent three days together, mostly on their patio, over looking the beautiful blue waters of Ambergris Caye, Belize.

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The stars aligned so we could all be in Belize at the same time and go diving together! We had a great dive out on the local reef and saw many sharks, eels and huge groupers. Mike and I touched our first nurse shark! Nikki finished her open water certificate and Chad blew chunks off the boat because of a wicked hangover. Of coarse the guys ran out of air early and had to surface first. Don’t forget your safety stop, Joey and Mike! lol Hot showers and airplane rides for you guys!

We threw a golf cart into the mix on our last day together. Turns out it is really fun to cruise around in a golf cart with seven people, but watch out for speed bumps! We were lucky to have Chad do his speedo Aladdin song/dance for our entertainment.

What a great way to finish up an incredible trip to Belize!

tarpon

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