Caye Calker

Hilary and I have been waiting at the hot, oven of a house without electricity with the promise that the electricity would be turned on that day.  We waited, and waited, and had everything set up, but the electricity. After working straight through the weekend, we decided to peace out Sunday after church and head over to caye caulker.  We got there and walked around the island.  We got lost the only non-tourist district, and stopped this little girl to ask her what the quickest way to get back to the north side of the island was.  She looked at us and said, "where's that?"  So we pointed, and asked what the quickest way to get over there was.  She replied, "with a boat."  True.  Unfortunately, we only had feet. 

While we were there, we made friends with some people who are here on a medical mission.  They traveled Belize with the Senator doing health fairs.  Two of them are staying for the summer to go door to door.  Kendra said that the major concern is sugar consumption.   It's through the roof, and there are a lot of people with diabetes.  We talked about her using some of our volunteers to help her with her project. 

Let me tell you about the hostel that we stayed in.  We asked for a private room, but it wasn't really all that private--there wasn't a door on it.  We got in, and climbed some stairs, climbed some more stairs, went through a wall, and then climbed up more latter-like stairs to the attic of this bungalow.  I loved it.  I felt a lot like Peter Pan.  The attic has a sweet view of the sunset.  We thought that we would have a nice view of the sunrise, so we woke up to see it, but only saw a tree, so we rolled over and went back to bed. 

On Monday, we got up and went kayaking around the Island.  It was Hilary's first time, but she really loved it every time we were in the blue water.  It was so beautiful.  I have to be honest, though. Caye caulker doesn't have the prettiest beaches… or any for that matter.  Still, the kayaking made up for it.  After kayaking, we met the new friends for lunch and had Caunch Ceviche and ice cream.  I have to be honest, I haven't loved the ice cream--I actually don't like it.  I am holding out for Cayo Twist, which is supposed to be made from Coconut milk, and I have heard good things about them.  Anyway… I got a little burned.  Ok, anywhere that is not normally covered by my cycling shorts/jersey is scorched.  That night, Hilary and I went to get dinner.  Half way through dinner, I started feeling queezy and   the culmination of it came when they brought me the chicken.  I couldn't eat.  I ended up just getting an orange juice and stopping for gatorade on the way home.  I drank soooo much water that night, and soaked my poor skin in aloevera. 

We had set up a time for the power company to come turn on our power, and when we were back early, we called the power company to make sure they were coming and tell them that we were back early.  They asked what time I would be available tomorrow, and told me that I would have to be home all day tomorrow to wait.  I tend to be very laid back when I am the foreigner, but this was about my limit, and I said, "no, you will come today.  We have made ourselves available today."  It worked!  They came, and we have power again!  Yahooo!  We cleaned out the fridge, and are going to put the aloe gel and ice cubes in there.  

Life Tile Checklist from the weekend:

1. Drinking coconut water out of the coconut with a straw

2. Kayaking/swimming in the Caribbean Sea

3. Staying in the attic of a bungalow

4. Eating caunch Ceviche

5. Eating at a restaurant on a swing overlooking the ocean