Belize - an unexpected piece of the Caribbean

The houses are colorful, made of wood, not perfectly arranged, but the gardens have a green, well-maintained lawn like in England. The people are never in a hurry, very happy, sometimes a bit lost (probably due to smoking), like to walk barefoot, often have dreadlocks, don't care much about having a slim figure and speak English (or something that vaguely resembles English among themselves). Situated between Guatemala, Mexico, and a beautiful blue sea, Belize embodies the best of Caribbean feeling.

Coming from Guatemala, we made our first stop at the Belize Zoo, which is quite famous here. Its origin story is curious: in the early 1980s, Richard Foster, a British director, made a documentary about wildlife in Belize. After the filming ended, some of the animals were so tame that they couldn't be released back into the wild. This gave birth to the zoo, which still exclusively houses animals native to the country. It has now become an important institution, as it takes in, for example, wild animals that were kept as pets despite not being suitable for it, as well as animals with injuries or those threatened by hunting, like certain jaguars that have learned to snatch pets and therefore became targets for farmers. The zoo is really nice, and the animals have spacious, modern enclosures. We actually wanted to stay with Foster, who ran a guesthouse with his wife. But then we saw how much Belize also embodies the bad (i.e., dangerous) side of the Caribbean. In August, Foster, who had lived here for more than 40 years, was abducted and brutally murdered in a robbery at his house (fortunately, we only found out the details from the internet days after visiting the zoo).

Then we went to the island of the barefoot people: Caye Caulker, which was not as alternative as we thought. We were afraid that we would be too old and out of place for all the young people on vacation there. In fact, there were just as many mature visitors as young ones. The latter were less interested in the grass, which is apparently easily available there, but more in grilled lobster, shrimp skewers, and fish curry with coconut rice. That's how young people are today ;-) We had a lot of fun: me swimming, Roby walking barefoot, and both of us enjoying the food, ranging from Fryjacks (a kind of filled Langos) to Lionfish filled with shrimp and served with crab claws.