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Caracol is a Mya city located in the Chiquibul Forest Reserve. The trip inland takes you three hours to San Ignacio in the Cayo district and then down South about 25 miles passing through San Antonio, which equated to about 2 and a half hours (surprise!). The roads were so rough, you couldn’t go more than 15 miles per hour. Hence, a high clearance vehicle is required to get to Caracol.  Expect to sign in at the ranger station halfway from San Antonio to sign-in and receive a military escort to this ruin. The last escort out is 11:00 a.m. so make sure you are there before then. Otherwise you will need to go alone. Also, you can expect to cross over drawbridge. You have to stop and wait for the barricade to be raised and while waiting we were asked by the guard to make a donation for a sick family member. We are not sure if it was legit or not, but it almost seemed like a toll in a way. It’s hard to say no when you are sitting there waiting. There is no set limit for what is owed to get through this toll.

Take the “Mountain Pine Ridge Road” southward from Santa Elena, or Georgeville; both on the Western Highway in the Cayo District. The route is well marked.

The Caracol ruin consists of three plaza groups, surrounding a reservoirs, central acropolis, dozens of structures, and two ball courts. The largest structure of Caracol is the Caana pyramid, which reaches a height of almost 140 feet, and remains one of the tallest man-made buildings in Belize. It lies at the foothills of the Maya Mountains at an elevation of 1500 feet above sea level. At around AD 250, during the Classic Era, Caracol was an urban epicenter with a population of over 140,000, which is a greater population than modern-day Belize City. To support this many people, the city architects of Caracol built an immense agricultural field system and laid out numerous living and work structures in a radial pattern over 65 square miles. Caracol was considered to be one of the most powerful lowland Mayan cities because they were constantly engaged – and successful – in war. Over 200 burials have been excavated here. It has often been said that Caracol once conquered Tikal, but this has not truly been verified.

You can either go alone to these ruins or go with a local tour guide company- ranging around $85 USD per person. We opted to go alone and used the help Belize books and information panels to guide us. Little did we know, the military escorts will also get out of their car and escort you around the ruins on foot, making sure you see every nook and cranny of the ruin. Courtney though will argue that they only escorted us around on foot because they are not used to seeing pretty blonde girls in Belize. I think they were just bored and wanted some entertainment. The two military men were quite charming and gave us some good laughs.

Why do you need to be escorted by the military might you ask? We were told that a couple of years ago (2004) a few tourists at Caracol had been mugged and robbed by Hondurans while visiting the ruin. (which you can see into Honduras from the tallest ruin in Caracol, the Caana pyramid.) Since then, the Belize government and Tourism board have spent millions of dollars trying to upgrade the roads, facilities for visitors and the site itself. They are hoping to make Caracol the main point of interest for Belize’s Maya sites. They hope to keep travelers who are presently going on to Tikal in Guatemala in Belize, as well as to attract Guatemala visitors.

The ruins were breathtaking, the views astounding. The experience was unforgettable. The pictures- incredible. I got to hold a M-16 and felt safe and secure traveling to Caracol. We didn’t experience any robbers and in fact Caracol has not had any bandit incidents since then . The ruins themselves were sparsley populated with other visitors that day. I believe there were seven other tourists there that day, all of whom were with a tour guide. It was almost like we had the place to ourselves!

One unique thing to see is the gas station in San Antonio. See if you can find it there (and in our photos below!) Make sure you have plenty of gas before going to Caracol. Courtney and I had about a half tank and we were not aware it would take about 2 and a half hours each way, so we were freaking out and worried we would run out of gas. Luckily, we filled up in Antonio just in time.

The last photo in the gallery was the sunset when we were pulling up to Table Rock Jungle Lodge at the end of our trip.

We arrived at the Belcove hotel after a rather frightening drive back from San Antonio. We were dodging people, animals and cars left and right all the while trying to stay on our side of the road. It was dark, it was hard to see. There are no lights along the way and no lines on the roads. There are people on bikes on the highway and people crossing the streets. You need to keep your eyes PEALED when driving at night in Belize.

We had to drive through Belize city- which was also an intimidating encounter. We were lost and so we got stopped by Belizean police because we pulled over the side of the road in the city. They told us to keep moving. We weren’t allowed to stop. There were police on most corners of the city, keeping watch.

We finally made it to Belcove. We were exhausted and hungry. We were greeted by the son of the owner,  Jules, who checked us in. We told Jules we really wanted a quiet room because of the lack of sleep the past few nights. Jules took that into consideration and offered us their “quietest” room. Which indeed, was. We had a great conversation with the sons (we didn’t catch the other brothers name) of the owner. Jules was a gentleman and carried our bags up the stairs to our room and would not accept a tip. This goes back to Courtney’s post where he said,

“This challenge and frustration hit its peak when we were at the Belcove restaurant on our last night in Belize. Jules is the son of the owner of Belcove. He was visiting at he time of our stay. He welcomed us and was very friendly and declared that he would help us with our bags. He clarified “this is my family’s hotel. It won’t cost you anything.” But I was so distressed and programmed at that point, that I didn’t know what to do. So I tried to tip him.

He refused and repeated his connection to the hotel. I never felt more like an ugly American than at that point. Granted, I might not have looked like it, but I felt that way. We were so razzled by the tipping that we no longer knew what to do.”

Belcove is situated right downtown in Belize in view of the swing bridge- where most water taxi’s are located. This is also where the bus terminal is located. The rates were great and the service was exceptional. The room was good too. It’s not too large but we simply needed a place to sleep for the night. The hotel also sits right on the waterfront with a back dock on the water.

Belcove’s offers rooms with and without air conditioning. I guarantee you will need the air conditioning unit. Go ahead and pay the extra $15-$20 for it. It will be worth it.

We did get word that Belcove is opening a second location on an island right outside Belize city. So keep an eye out for that!

Check it out! September 2009

When we went on our night dive in Ambergris Caye, we ran into a scuba diver who was tied down under a boat with a flashlight just sitting there. Curiosity got to us and our leaders (Ted)  called up to the boat about what was going on. We simply got the response “trying to break the world record.” Ok, so putting it together we figured he was trying to break the world record for staying underwater the longest? I remember snorkeling directly above him and thinking to myself: How does he eat? How does he use the bathroom? Man that must be boring down there?

Will Goodman from the UK spent 48 hours and 9 minutes and 17 seconds under water – setting the world record for the Longest Open Saltwater Scuba Dive.

It is really cool that we got to experience someone breaking a world record. I think we got some of this on video. I’ll see if I can motivate Courtney to do some work on this topic and the video.