(Sorry for the delay- wifi hasn’t been the greatest)

We woke up earlier than usual this morning, we had to get completely packed and take our backpacks with us when we went diving. We knew we wouldn’t have time to eat at the hotel so we set off in the golf cart to find breakfast. We ended up at a little local restaurant, completely open air and it had no name that we could see. They have a lunch menu on a board out front but we were unclear if they served breakfast, but since they were there we asked (the town is barely awake at 6:45 so there were no customers anywhere and not many places open). He said he was open so we came in and sat at one of the 8 small tables. There we no menus, but the owner came up to the table and said “I’ll tell you what I’ve got”. He named about 3 different things that we had come to expect from a Belizean breakfast so we ordered. 2 of us had burritos and 2 had the full breakfast. This may have been our best breakfast yet! And when I paid I knew it was by far the cheapest. We are learning more and more the value of doing things locally instead of in the tourists haunts. We went back and gathered our luggage (backpacks) and shoved everything into our golf cart with us and made our way through town to the dive shop. There were large lockers available at the pier/dive shop where we stowed our luggage while we dove. We found we were on the same boat as before with Turiano (aka Terentino)- this time with 2 other couples. One couple in their 60’s from Sweden who had been traveling the world for many years going to every well known dive spot. And the other couple were surfers in their 40’s from California who had just spent time in Costa Rica surfing. (We’ve definitely found that everyone has an interesting story to tell.) Mallory and Olivia were, once again, with Adolfo. Today’s dives would complete their certification. The dives were fabulous! We dove in coral canyons this time, outside the reef and deeper than yesterday. It was like floating in air between the 2 walls of a narrow, deep ravine. Except instead of rock the walls were made completely of coral and instead of a river of water there was a river of sand at the bottom. Above the canyon there were literally fields of coral, not just a single row of it as I had thought of a reef before (and as I had seen before). The fish were spectacular. There were many large sharks and an eel right out in the open, which were a little disconcerting to me, but the braver among us (Christian included) rubbed the Sharks backs and felt their dorsal fins. Of course these were nurse sharks, had they been a more menacing variety I could not have stayed so calm I think. We returned to the pier for our surface interval (the reef is so close to land there is no need to stay out). Our 2nd dive was again just the 4 of us, this time the girls were finished with skills and Adolfo was able to take them through the canyons to experience the same beauty we had. On that dive there was a large nurse shark that followed us closely. It was never more than 10-15 feet from one of us. Christian was pushing it away with his gopro. It was not threatening, but maybe curious. After our dives we reluctantly said good bye to Adolfo and Turiano. Ramon’s has been a wonderful dive shop and the resort has a Disney-ish feel of excellence. (The owner of the resort and dive shop are actually Mississippians). While pricey, they earn it. We changed into dry clothes and headed for the water taxi. After checking our luggage and buying our tickets we had time to duck into a little beachfront restaurant for lunch. The owner was from Canada and stood out on the front patio and talked to us while we ate. Another fascinating patron we met was Coconut Leo. He had dread locks like I’ve never seen and he sat next to us and told us how he made his living climbing Palm trees and picking people’s coconuts. We were really fascinated by the story of his life (you can find videos of him on YouTube) After our traditional lunch of stewed chicken with rice and beans,we asked if he’d climb one of the trees for us. He said he was happy too (for a small donation of only $5- this was his livelihood). We were absolutely astounded by the way he climber that huge tree- quickly and doing tricks the whole time. Pretty good for a man in his 60’s. It was time for our water taxi, and our encounter with coconut Leo made a good last impression of San Pedro. The short 30 minute ride to Caye Caulker (pronounced Key Kawlker) brought us to a modern day Gilligan’s island. We walked down the pier to the beach to “luggage claim”. There were 6 backpacks, 4 of which were ours, but we still had to show claim tickets. There were a few golf cart taxis who we asked about the location of our hotel. (There are no street address in Caye Caulker- only names of the hotel/restaurant/home you’re looking for). Our hotel was only about a hundred yards down the beach so we just carried our luggage and walked. We were so pleased to see this beautiful yellow stucco hotel with immaculate grounds and pool just a few feet away from the water (not a few feet from the beach- hotels are ON the beach here and only 50-100 feet from the water). Our small 2 bedroom condo is charming! We walked around a little until it was time to meet our friend John Newhouse for dinner. John has a beautiful home on the island which we got to take a tour of after we arrived. After waiting for John for a few minutes inside the open air restaurant, a man rode up beside us on a bike and asked if we were the Browns?! Well, yes, as a matter of fact we are. He was a friend and neighbor of John’s who had been sent to tell us John had a sudden water leak and would be a little late because of it. We have no phone here so sending a friend on a bike was the easiest way to let us know! John did show up a little later (water leak fixed). We went out to the front of the restaurant where they display their fresh catches that have literally JUST come off the boat. You choose what you want and they cook it for you. The lobsters were beautiful, different than ours – with no claws. (We had seen a few diving but didn’t know all the lobsters here looked like that. We chose barracuda steaks (because we couldn’t pass up trying barracuda!) and it was fabulous. Very meaty whitefish cooked to perfection. John entertained us with hilarious stories of island life. After lingering over dinner a while we walked the streets a little. John explained the lay of the town to us. With only 3 streets (front, middle and back) expanding about 6 blocks in either direction, we would not get lost. John treated us to ice cream at an adorable little stand. He commented that this is the busiest tourist season of the year and there are not usually nearly this many people on the island. What?! We looked up and down the sand street as far as we could see and there were maybe 15 people in sight. When he saw how surprised we were, he explained that most often, he could count the number of people in sight on one hand. Wow, the town didn’t feel deserted, but it did feel like you had the run of it. We even saw the guy from Australia that we met in San Pedro. We strolled the 2 blocks back to our hotel as it started to rain. We have noticed that no one seems to care or really even notice light rain. They don’t even walk faster. Tomorrow we hope to explore more of this charming island. It’s so hard to believe a place like this still exists, but at the same time it’s somehow exactly what I would have pictured…