Our March Update.... also WAY late!

Well, hope everyone found some of what happened in February interesting.... it's all just so exciting down here. Believe it or not we actually do a little work down here too! Keri is evaluating all the members of her organization with the intent of creating a base line before they are trained in capacity building. Depending on the needs of the group, this could be financial reporting, strategic planning, record keeping, leadership, or the like. In March, Keri went out and visited some more Co-managers to assess them. Before we go into that, let's first give you a brief schooling on how national parks and protected areas are run here. While there is a National Park service here run by the Government of Belize, it consists of only 4 park rangers and a budget of approximately BZ$50K. Nowhere near the manpower to manage and patrol over 43% of the country that is parks! So the government signs co-management agreements with locally based groups who in turn monitor, maintain, and run the protected area.

Anyway, Keri visited with Mr. Lewis from the Friends of Gra Gra Lagoon in the Stann Creek District in March and learned about the issues they are facing in managing their area. On the same trip, she met with the managers of Mayflower-Bocawina and Billy Baquideer. She actually later worked with all of these groups for a big event on Earth Day in April.... more on that later!

So the other big news was our first visit from a friend while we have been in country. Amy is having a pretty tough time in the states, so she decided to come see Belize (and us) to get her mind off things. We managed to show her a pretty good representation of Belize in the 9 days she was here including the 3 "R's" of Belize.... Ruins, Reefs, and Rain forests! We started out with a trip to the ancient Maya city of Lamanai, then out to Caye Caulker where we snorkeled the reef and swam with sharks, a few nights in Cockscomb Wildlife Sanctuary, and ended up in Placencia to chill on the beach. It was great fun.... even though Amy did get WAY TOO CLOSE (8 inches away) to a Fer de Lance (one of the 10 most deadliest and aggressive snakes in the world!). But really, take a look at the following videos to get a good picture of how things went!

So as you can see, we had a blast! It was great to see Amy and hang out in all those cool places! So really guys.... if you want to come visit, we will make sure you have a good time no matter what your budget is! Next thing you know, we will be back in the USA.... still can't believe we have been here for almost 9 months. Can't wait to hear from you all and read your comments!

February Update that is WAY late!

Ok, we admit it.... we are lame. It has been three months since we updated our blog and that is just inexcusable. While we have been busy, we have not been that busy. But here goes! I'm going to put together some updates, and within 3 or 4 posts, everyone will be current on all the excitement that is PC in Belize!

Since the last you heard from us was the end of January, you're probably wondering what we did for Valentine's day. I managed to find some chocolate playing cards, well really chocolate shaped playing cards, and figured they would be perfect for Keri. Yes, they aren't chocolate dice, but she liked them all the same. Since wine here is ridiculously expensive, we went with the local cashew wine. Let me just say it is totally worth the US$3 we paid and not a penny more. We still have half the bottle that we are trying to give away to anyone that visits!

The following weekend, we decided to go check out Crooked Tree Wildlife Sanctuary about 40 miles north of us. We found a bus heading directly to the village of Crooked Tree and after stumbling around in the dark (we arrived late) and scaring some locals, we found the Crooked Tree Lodge. We pitched our tent and enjoyed a relaxing evening only to discover that we could not have picked a worse spot to camp. You see as it was dark we couldn't see very well. In the morning we discovered we had set the tent right in between the two biggest fire ant mounds in the darn field! Move the tent and then we were off to hike the park. The park is a little strange as it is located in a populated village so you find yourself walking through people's yards at times checking out the wildlife. We saw tons of birds and even spotted a Tayra, a weird weasel-like animal the Belizean refer to as a "bush dog". For the record, it looked nothing like a dog.

After a long, hot day of exploring the park, we were really looking forward to a few beers after dinner. We were expecting the usual choices of Belikin beer or Belikin beer (the national beer) but were very excited to see we had the option of Miller High Life. We have never been more happy to see the champagne of beers! After exceeding our "we'll just have 2 beers" limit and having a great talk with the owner, Mick a retired British Army Air Corps member, we crashed in a non-ant-zone tent and fell asleep to the sounds of the lagoon.

Just as a little back ground, Crooked Tree is called so because of the abundance of cashew trees that grow in the village. And they certainly are crooked! Now if you don't know, cashews are an absolute favorite of Pat's. Too bad they weren't in season.

Pat with a cashew tree

Finally, as part of Keri's assessment of all the members of APAMO, Keri went out to visit the Community Baboon Sanctuary. The sanctuary is a very successful project of a group of villages to co-manage a protected area that has a high population of Howler monkeys.... they call every monkey a baboon in Belize. Anyway, if you want to check them out, here's their link. Keri met with the director, the guides, and of course the monkeys! Just can't get enough of these guys.