Added XX September 2019

24 May 2014, Saturday - Travel day, Tucson to Tranquility Lodge, Toledo District, Belize

Our day started out early, as we were out the door at around 5:15 a.m. to catch our 7 o'clock flight to Belize. Our Tucson to Dallas leg went smoothly, but we didn't have a lot of time to make our connecting flight to Belize City, so we really had to hustle. We had planned to eat lunch between flights, but we didn't have time to get anything. Fortunately we had brought enough food with us to get us through. After we got on the plane, we were informed that there was a problem with an auxiliary fuel pump and our flight would be delayed. I was really concerned at that because we also didn't have a huge amount of connection time between our arrival in Belize City to our Tropic Air flight down to Punta Gorda. What was worse, our Punta Gorda flight was the last one of the day, so if we missed it, we were going to have problems. Fortunately, they were able to fix the problem by offloading the fuel needed for the return flight (they carry enough to go both ways because of fuel costs in Belize), and transfer fuel around to avoid having to use the auxiliary fuel pump. After a 45+ minute delay, we were on our way, and I was really eyeing the time.

We arrived in Belize City at around 4:15 p.m., which only gave us about 45 minutes to disembark from the plane (exiting down a set of stairs at the back of the plane), get our luggage, get through customs and immigration, and get to our Tropic Air flight. As people slowly got their baggage and exited the plane, I kept looking at my watch. Once we got off the plane, Shan and I raced around everyone for the fairly lengthy walk to customs and immigration. By having one of our forms already completed, and by completing the other form while standing in line, our race to the line allowed us to move through pretty quickly. After clearing immigration, there were guys with luggage carts that basically grabbed our bags and put them on the cart to take them to our connection. Since we were really pressed for time and I didn't know where to go or how far it was to check in to our Tropic Air flight, I didn't argue. We then proceeded 20 feet to a door, through the door, and 100 feet to the Tropic Air ticket counter. A sign in the previous room indicated the charge was $2 US per bag for the porter service. I was a little put off by paying $10 to carry our bags 120 feet, but we still needed to move quickly, so I just paid and got on with it. We got to the gate for our flight to Punta Gorda with less than 10 minutes to spare, but it turned out that the flight was late too, so Shan had enough time to buy our first bar of Belizean dark chocolate. We did not, however, have time to get dinner, as we had planned. I'm not sure how, but Shan managed the lack of food really well, though she confided later that she wasn't feeling well but just didn't say anything. I'm not sure how she managed that either. Ha!

The Tropic Air flight was on a 15 seat single engine Caravan. Shan and I were the first to board, so we got seats on the single side, with me right behind the pilot and Shan right behind me. It was nice because it allowed us to see our landings really well over the pilot's shoulder. It was cool to fly down the coast line at a low enough altitude to see the countryside well, and the flight was surprisingly smooth for such a small plane on a day that appeared to have a fair amount of updrafts.

The flight made a brief stop in Placencia, the runway of which had one end at a swamp and the other at the sea. It made for an interesting landing. While stopped at Placencia, we took turns using the restroom so we could keep an eye on our bags. A bit of paranoia on our part, I guess. While I was out, Shan struck up a conversation with Pete, the guy sitting across the aisle from me. When I returned, we all talked for a bit. Pete was a Belizean travelling south for the weekend. We was an extremely friendly guy who gave us some advice on Belize and showed us some pictures of some of the places we were going. It was a good introduction to the Belizean people. The second hop from Placencia to Punta Gorda was shorter than the first. When we got off the plane, we weren't quite sure what to expect. The airport is basically just one small building. We walked in to see if we were just supposed to grab our bags or if we needed to wait until they were put someplace special. When we stepped inside we were greeted by Lee, the owner of Tranquility Lodge. We grabbed our bags and he took us to the Lodge where, thankfully, he had a wonderful meal prepared for us. I had forgotten that we had arranged for him to feed us tonight. Since we hadn't had time to grab a real meal all day, it was very welcome. It was pretty late by the time we ate, though, and Shan's blood sugar was really low so she ws pretty uncomfortable.

On the drive to the lodge, Lee told us that the tour operator had a surprise for us for tomorrow. He didn't want to spoil the surprise, so we were left in suspense.

It was well after dark by the time we got to Tranquility Lodge, but even at night, it looked really cool. Our room was nice and it had air conditioning, which helped ease us into the tropical humidity. We tried to use it sparingly, as I knew that power is very expensive in Belize, much of it being imported from Mexico. Lee is a transplant from Canada who, like other folks in the lodging business that we met, seemed to end up running a lodge in Belize in an out-of-the-blue kind of fashion, having had no previous experience with running such a place. We were the only guests tonight, so it was nice and quiet. We did wake up in the middle of the night due to the humidity though, and ended up kicking the air conditioning on for a spell to make sleeping easier.

Species list for the day: