When we arrived in Belize, we  took a 20 minute break and then hopped on a flight at the International airport to San Pedro, Ambergris Caye. The 20 minute break led to an interesting rum punch from Jet’s, a bar in the airport. That is a post in itself.

The Mayan Air flights turned out to be the exact price we thought- as long as you pay in cash. It was reliable and left on time.

In this post I want to focus on the great photos we got from our 20 minute flight from the Goldson International Airport to the San Pedro Airstrip. The excitement was extreme as we boarded a small, 8 passenger plane, with two other couples venturing to the Ambergris Cayes. The photos are spectacular and the video as well. The videos we are still working on and will eventually add them to the site.

While I prepared properly with shots and pills to avoid sickness while in Belize, I can say that both Courtney and I did not come down with anything significant. Whether we were just lucky or just over-concerned, all that matters is that we were fortunate not to have any accidents with broken bones, sickness, hurricanes or anything of the sort.

When we purchased travel insurance we weren’t entirely thrilled about spending the money on it.  In the end- it turned out to be worth the money invested for the peace of mind. I do still recommend it. Especially with how crazy it is driving on the roads in Belize. That is a post in itself. Oh MY!

I would just like to point out two of the most inconvenient parts of our trip.

#1. The Car Rental (Dun Dun Dun!) We knew from the beginning with the car rentals giving us problems and canceling the week before to saying that all car rentals in Belize were sold out of the “high clearance” vehicles when we needed them that it could possibly be a problem when we arrived. When we hopped in the taxi cab in Belize City Wednesday morning at the swing bridge we told the taxi cab driver to, “Please take us to the International Airport. We need to be dropped off at Belize Car Rentals.” The taxi cab driver took us to the airport directly (with a very interesting story) and dropped us off where all the car rentals are. Now this could be partly our fault and/or partly the cabbies fault. We walked around and could not find “Belize Car Rentals.” Courtney runs into Crystal Car Rental and for thought that was who we booked through. (this is our fault, we forgot to write/print out our confirmation and address) and we just assumed Crystal Car Rental was the one. After being there for a few minutes they say we do not have a reservation with them and that they are unsure of where Belize Car Rental is. Then, after some more convo, we learn that Belize car rental is located about half a mile from all the rest of the car rental places, but still at the International airport. They then proceed to call Belize Car Rental to come pick us up. We waited there for about 30 minutes for the ride and I sat there giving Courtney the “Stank eye.” Not because I was mad at him but more frustrated at the situation and that the cab didn’t take us to where we asked him to. And the fact that all this time was draining out. After almost giving in to Crystal Rentals sweet talk and renting a car with them, the Belize Car Rental driver showed up and was actually VERY nice. We went back, signed away on the vehicle and we were on our way about 45 minutes later. The car at first was the biggest “hoop-tie” car with over 115,000 miles on it. But it got us through our trip and since it was already quite the beater, we didn’t feel bad taking it on the “worst road in Belize.” The pot hole haven road.

#2. The Time Share. We got conned into going to a timeshare after Courtney pulled a “1 week vacation for you and 5 other friends” from a white envelope if promising to give 90 minutes of his time to a time share salesperson. After biking there and paying the toll for the bridge in San Pedro (yes, Beware! a toll to go North of San Pedro, we did not know this!) we spent about 45 minutes before I started giving Courtney the stank eye and attitude for wasting our time on our trip.We talked about it briefly when the salesperson walked away that Courtney wouldn’t even get the timeshare and the person probably won’t let him walk away or give him the prize unless he purchased a timeshare and this could definitely last longer than the 90 minutes he was obliged for. I then turned and stripped down to my bathing suit and jumped in the pool while the sales person walked off with Courtney.After I jumped in the pool and waded around (jump, psh- it was a measley 3 foot deep bath tub) Courtney returned about 10 minutes later after using me as an excuse as the decision maker and that I obviously wasn’t interested (which is totally cool, I just wanted to enjoy our Sunday morning!) we then proceeded to move along to pick up groceries and head off for snorkeling.

I was more so just frustrated because these two time sucks were a waste of our time. They con you into doing timeshares so easily so BEWARE! And as I said in previous posts, time is money. Both these things were a waste of time that could have been avoided if approached correctly.

Here is our itinerary. We likely won’t be able to post on any of these exciting activities while we’re gone, but you can follow along with what we are doing each day anyway. Hopefully we can post here and there, but for now, this is what we have.

We forgot to mention over the weekend some bad news we received about the trip and the plans (we were way too busy with John and Jamie’s wedding, congrats!) but our car rental company, Rental Car Group.com, cancelled our reservation. We weren’t too happy to find that out. Of course, this left us in a scramble to find another car rental and most of the companies being sold out already. And on top of the added stress from all the wedding plans these past few days and family being in town, it was hard to find time to book a new reservation. Not cool at all for that to happen. Very unreliable car rental company. Stay away!

Luckily, Courtney was able to book us a rental with Belize Auto Rental. The downside about going with them is they only have one location and that is at the International airport. So we will take the water taxi in from Ambergris Caye (San Pedro) and hop in a cab to the International Airport and then grab the car rental and trek to San Ignacio for our jungle fun.

The car rental came in at a hefty $195 for the three days. That’s average $100 per person. I’m not too happy about that but I do think time is money in Belize and we don’t want to waste it traveling on a hot long bus ride. Luckily, the total also includes auto insurance. It’s smart to have that with theft and the road ways not being patrolled, etc. This whole car rental thing has been a slight nightmare. I hope it’s not too much more of a nightmare when we show up there. Hopefully it will pay off with the ease of being able to go anywhere we want at the drop of a hat.