Back Home in SoCal.

After being gone for almost two months, I am back home in southern California. It's nice to be home to Mischelle and the dogs, but after the drive home from the airport, I am ready to go back to Belize.

The trip home from Belize was a breeze. I left Consejo at around 3:30AM to catch to 6AM bus out of Chetumal. Belize and Mexico have an hour time difference and Mexico is an hour ahead of Belize, so I needed to be at the bus station at 5AM Belize time. The van, from Belize VIP Transfer services, was there on time to pick me up and drive me to the bus station in Chetumal. Once in Chetumal, I caught the bus to Playa del Carmen, where I would pick up another bus to the airport, The cost of the bus from Chetumal to Playa was $210 pesos ($16US) and about a 4 1/2 hour bus ride. The bus from Playa to the airport was $90 pesos ($7US) and about an hour drive.

I spent some of my extra time I had between bus rides, in Playa, sitting at a restaurant on 5th Avenue, watching the tourists go by. Drank my first beer in weeks, that was something other than a Belikin. A nice change of pace. I caught the 2:10 bus from Playa to the airport ( I lost track of time and missed the 1:10 bus ) and arrived at the airport at 3:15, and I had a 4:30 flight. Time was just a little tight so I rushed into the terminal expecting to see lines. Nope. The terminal was only marginally busy and there were no lines to the ticket counters. As I approched the ticket counter, I was stopped and asked for my health certificate. My What? Seems that due to the swine flu, you needed to go to a health screening area, on the OTHER end of the airport, fill out a small health form and have your forehead scanned for fever. That was it. About 3 minutes in line and about 3 minutes for the test. But that would have been a REAL time killer if it was busy. So, with my health form in hand, it was back across the terminal to finally check in. With nobody in line, I sailed through the check-in counter and security check points and was at my boarding gate with 45 minutes to spare.

Mischelle had booked my return flight through Mexico City because the direct flight home was sold out, so the plane I was on was a domestic flight with an international connection. Instead of American tourists that were headed home after a week in paradise, I had a combination of Mexican tourists and business people that were headed to their homes in Mexico City. From Cancun to Mexico City was a full flight and I was hoping that the flight from Mexico City to LA wasn't going to be as crowded. Mexicana didn't assign a gate to the Mexico City to LA flight and I was told to check with the information booth upon arrival in Mexico City about the new gate assignment. The Mexico City airport is famous for switching gates at the last moment and I'm thinking this is going to be one of those times. I had only an hour between flights and 20 minutes after arrival in Mexico City, I still didn't have a gate assignment for the next flight. I had arrived at gate 24 and was just waiting for them to announce that my departing gate will be gate number 1. But much to my surprise, they announced my flight was leaving out of gate 27. I made the short walk over to gate 27, sat down and started recharging my laptop at one of Samsung charging stations. Wi-Fi was available, but at a $10 fee for 24 hours. Of course, no sooner did I get it plugged in, they were ready to start boarding. The surrounding area was full of people, but only about 50 boarded our flight to LA.

On the flight home, I had the 3 seats to myself, so I was able to stretch out, put my noise cancelling headphones on and go to sleep. I woke up about 30 minutes out of LA to the Captain announcing the current conditions in LA were 63 degrees, cloudy, with rain. What a change from Belize.

Once on the ground in LA, I was the first in line at the Immigration counter. My bag was one of the first dozen bags off the plane. I breezed through customs and was out on the street, waiting for Mischelle, in under 20 minutes. This was great. I had called Mischelle from the baggage carousel and she was there to pick me up within 5 minutes. I was headed home, and in record time....until we got on the freeway. Just after we get on the freeway, a highway patrol car is weaving back and forth across all lanes, to slow traffic to a crawl. I'm thinking great, a big accident just happened and we're stuck behind it. Welcome back to LA. I'm ready to go back to Belize. But they were just closing lanes for construction, so in 10 minutes, we were back doing 70 mph down the road. We were home within an hour.

As we pull into the driveway, I can hear the dogs barking from inside the house. I get a joyous greeting at the door...I'm home. After being gone for so long, it is good to be home.

Is It Friday, Yet?

Here in Belize, Is It Friday, Yet?, takes on a whole new meaning. Nothing. Nada. Nyet. You don't count the days here in Belize, you live them. Friday is just another day here in paradise. Yes, you might want to hit the market for fresh veggies and fruit, or maybe the butcher, for fresh pork chops. But, then again, maybe not. Do I feel like driving to town? Do I need to?

Oh, I remember now. Friday is the day we go to Chetumal, to look at a new window supplier. I was up early, to be at John's house at Four Mile lagoon, by 7AM. The traffic was tolerable. I saw one other car on Consejo Road. It took me 20 minutes to go the 15 miles to John's house. I had to pass 3 farm tractors and a car or two. And that's a busy day on the Corozal roads around the outside of town.

After arriving at John's home, I parked my truck and John, Gusto, Donna and Jeanne were all waiting for me. I was two minutes late and blamed it on Belizian time. Jeanne said it was Jamaican time. I was just glad I was there around the right time. I haven't set an alarm since December 26th. So we all piled into John's truck, with Gusto at the wheel, and away we went to the border crossing.

The border crossing is fairly easy once you know the routine. On the Belize side, you pay the $36BZ or $18US for the environmental fee then take your receipt to the immigration desk, where they will stamp you out of Belize and send you on your way. On the Mexican side, you go into the immigration office and fill out a visa, they look at your passport, stamp it and send you on your way. It's that easy...if there are no lines

So away we went to Chetumal. We stopped off for coffee at the large mall that has a 13 movie Cinema, McDonald's, Liverpool department store and a large grocery store. Just like home. After coffee we made our first stop at what was to be the window manufacturer. Turns out they are just a distributor and only can get powder coated metal windows. Not what we were looking for, so it was off to try and find another window manufacturer.

But after a couple of attempts to locate a manufacturer in town, we found a supplier that was in Tampico. John is going to contact them to see what they may have to offer but he's not giving up on finding one in Chetumal.

John had Gusto drive us around town so we could see what Chetumal had to offer and then it was off to lunch in Bacalar. After a short drive, we ended up at a restaurant at the Cenote Azul, which borders the Bacalar lagoon. This was a beautiful restaurant location overlooking the cenote. The water looked so cool, clear and refreshing. There was a high diving platform that we were dared to go off. I told Jeanne it was she and I that were going to make the first jump. She didn't like that idea so much, but Donna said she might be willing to make the jump. John said he had made the jump before and gave a lame excuse as to why he wouldn't jump this time.

So we went into the restaurant for a wonderful seafood lunch. John and I split a seafood platter that said it was for 2 people. It probably could have fed everyone at the table We had lobster, shrimp, and 3 or 4 different kinds of fish. All of that fish and shellfish cost 400 pesos, or about $31US. Quite a deal. And for a nice change of pace from just Belikin beer in Belize, I had a few Negra Modelos, which went down nice and smooth. It was nice to have a selection of just more than three beers, like it is in Belize.

After lunch it was time for a swim and maybe a jump from the platform. I was up for it and after a little coaxing, Donna was up for it too. Maybe John would jump if Donna and I did. But no. Same lame excuse. So Donna and I both made the 18 foot jump and John showed us his world famous back flip off a 2 foot high dive platform. (See John, you should have jumped with the big kids, just so you wouldn't get sh*t in my blog.)

The Platform Jump

Me after my jump.

Donna getting congrats after her jump.

John getting ready to wow the crowd.

Too much splash on entry, John. The judges only give it a 6.0

Jeanne enjoying the cool refreshing cenote waters.


After the swim in the cenote, we dried off and enjoyed music from some of the local musicians. We did a little dancing and singing, another cold Mexican beer and then it was time to get to our next destination, the Las Vegas Casino, in the free zone.

That was my idea, but I was just planning to have them drop me off and I would catch a cab back to John's house a little later. But I guess I wasn't the only one who wanted to visit the casino. Donna had wanted to see what the casino was like, but I don't think she mentioned it to John, so when I brought it up, John was nice enough to show us around. Nice little casino, but it was kind of quiet when we were there in the early afternoon. So I bellied up to the nearly empty tables and proceeded to gamble away all my left over money from lunch. But I did have a good time while I was losing.

After leaving the casino and doing the border thing, we headed back to Johns' to pick up our trucks and to head over to Donna's place to see the clearing and the filling of her lot. They did quite a bit of work cutting down all that jungle and now they are doing the job of filling it all in. George Greenwood of Taribo Industries, is the man to see for that (tariboind@yahoo.com , local no. 501-621-3244). He and his crew worked on our lot and they sure know how to handle that equiptment and move that dirt around.

They have done a good job of filling Donna's lot and it should be ready to build on when she and Jacques are ready. Now comes the fun part of the house design. Good luck.

P.S. Thanks Donna for the extra restaurant pics.