Discovering Belize
26 March 2020 | Placencia Harbor
Bert Dorrestyn | Cloudy, windy but nice warm
In our previous blog we described the plan to leave Guatemala and to sail to Belize. Most of the time these plans are written on the beach in the sand at low tide and when the tide turns the plans are gone and new ones are developing. But this time the plans exactly worked out.
We left RAM Marina on a nice Sunday morning and motor sailed over the Golfete to a bay called Texan Bay or in Spanish “Cayo Quemado” and stayed overnight so we could leave early the next morning to be just past 8:00 AM in Livingston to give our passports to our Custom Agent Raul. He always sends his nephew with a lancha and delivers our stamped passports and “Zarpe” back to us on board of “Island Girl”. A “Zarpe” is a ‘set sail document’ you need when you leave a Central America country and sail to another country.
You have 2 high tides but one is higher and the most preferable tide to cross the sand bar in Livingston. Unfortunately, on our departure day this tide was late in the evening so we used the low high tide which was only 1 Ft. A week before our departure a fellow cruiser did a survey and posted the waypoints to cross the bar. We exactly followed these waypoints, had no problems to cross the bar and we motor sailed to a safe anchorage called “Tres Puntas’.
The next morning, we left the anchorage just before sunrise in the dark for our trip to the port of entry in Belize called “Punta Gorda”. This port has no protected anchorage and can only be used in very calm weather without any swell coming in. We had such a day, but out of safety Dorothy stayed on board and I took the handheld radio so she could call me if problems arose. It took me just a little over one hour to get cleared in and we continued our trip to a very safe bay called “New Haven”.
The water was like glass with no wind and hardly any waves. This was the same the next day but it was the quiet before the storm. At 6:30 PM the storm blew in. It was a very bad cold front arriving from the USA. In minutes the wind picked up from 0 to 37 knots. The rain came down and even the very protected bay had some significant waves. The rain stopped after about one hour but the wind remained very strong the entire night. It took 3 days before the wind and seas came down and since we did not have any communication with the outside world except through our Sat Phone “New Haven” became very lonely.
On Saturday we left New Haven and motor sailed to Placencia. We did not leave the boat until Monday morning to get Belize dollars and do some shopping. Placencia is a lovely town with nice restaurants and shops. It also has Dorothy’s favorite Hairdresser shop and the cost for her typical treatment is less than half of the price in the USA. I followed with the dinghy my cruising friend John to the gas station to pick up some diesel fuel to keep the tank filled and with that preventing too much condense developing in the fuel tank. Failing to do this last year gave us so many problems to get the fuel and the tank cleaned. To get to the gas station we had to follow some of the channels to the town. Along these channels you see some very beautiful homes and rental guest houses, but many are for sale. This is what we observed in many places in Belize; a lot of development of beautiful homes and resorts but many are for sale and/or show clearly overdevelopment.
We saw this last year during our stay for 3 months in “Robert’s Grove Marina” but I write this blog during our stay in a beautiful Resort and Marina development in “Sapodilla Lagoon” called “The Reserve”. The marina has 250 beautiful slips surrounded by restaurants, bathrooms, laundry facilities and a convenience store with a car and boat fuel station. There were only 8 boats in storage in the marina and 2 boats including “Island Girl” had people on board. When we arrived, there were no boats anchored in the lagoon while this is a very protected anchorage. At the same time a lot of boats were anchored in Placencia when another incoming cold front created large swell and made boats roll in the most uncomfortable way. We left Placencia before the cold front moved in and had a great sail with a stiff northerly wind with speeds up to 27 kn. We had to tack a couple of times and sailed close to the wind but “Island Girl” was in her groove and we loved to finally sail again.
We were not planning to go into the marina, but since there were no boats on anchor and we still had some work to do on “Island Girl” we took a slip connected to shore power and water and I started one of the outstanding projects while Dorothy used the laundry facilities. We toured the proposed resort and enjoyed the beautiful landscaping of the partly developed resort.
And then the cold front moved in; howling wind and the temperature dropped like a rock; it was very cold at 65 F when we went to bed at 9:00 PM, but we slept so well that we did not wake up the next morning until 7:00 AM instead of my usual 5:00AM. It is amazing that we were only 2 weeks on our way and had 2 major cold fronts coming down on us here in Belize. Many cruisers who spend a lot of years in Guatemala, Belize and the Honduras Bay Islands told us that this was very unusual. The next morning it was raining and it lasted the entire day. We had reserved for the next day the only available car to drive to a little town named Hopkins and a larger town called Dangriga both along the coast to do some provisioning and at the same time some sightseeing. The people who used the car dropped off the key in the evening and they were drenched from the rain but despite the weather they said they had a good day.
We had a great trip to both cities and we even took some time to drive along the Hummingbird Highway which circles into the mountains to the new capital called Belmopan. We were lucky to go to the grocery store just before 12:00 PM; it was a national holiday and the stores were all closing at noon. Three employees helped us to scan all our items, pack them, took them to the car and they closed to door behind us. The marina is in receivership and allows only cash transactions, so we needed to go to the ATM. We do not know if it was because of the national holiday or that the ATM in Dangriga never allows transactions larger than BZ$ 100.00 (US$ 50.00) but that was all we could get. We needed a lot more so we made a lot of transactions to get what we needed.
The next day we checked out of the marina and went on anchor in the lagoon in preparation for the next day trip to South Water Cay. We made this trip via “Blue Ground Water Range” which is a collection of mangrove cays that enclose a 40 ft deep lagoon. Entering this lagoon is a little intimidating since you must cross over a shallow reef between two cays. Our friends from “s/v Aeesha” guided us through. The remainder of the trip goes over a shallow area with a lot of coral patches but we followed a track from our dear friends and “adopted” children Keith and Ida from “s/v Cheers”. We had a great sail, arrived safely and anchored in front of “South Water Cay”. On this location you are so close to the outer reef that you hear the constant sound of the waves crashing the reef. We stayed there for one week and had a great time with snorkeling and using my Hookah to dive underneath the boat to remove a fishing line and a lure from my propeller.
We were surrounded by 12 other boats, but one morning everybody left. We found out later that everyone wanted to return to Guatemala before the borders closed. And now they are locked up in the Rio, cannot leave since all the borders are closed and the airlines are not allowed to fly to and from Guatemala.
We could not use our cellular phone at this location since the reception was to weak. A fellow cruiser advised us to raise the phone into the mast and use the “Hotspot” this worked out great; we got all the news and could stay in touch with the family.
We sailed back to Sapodilla Lagoon and every afternoon we went with our dinghy to the “Beach Club” to swim in the wonderful pool and enjoy the beach. During the week the “Beach Club” is closed, but we can use the facilities. In the meantime, I also worked on some boat projects although I could not solve every issue we have.
At this moment Belize has only one infected person with the “Corona Virus” but is preparing for more problems. The schools will be closed for 1 month, but there is no restriction on travel in the country. The airport is still open for local traffic and charter flights taking tourists and some cruisers back to their home country. We had not experienced an impact of the Corona Virus Crisis but we needed to renew our visa and cruising permit and for that we needed to go back to Placencia. There is a lot of confusion at which immigration offices you can do this and it seems that the one in “Big Creek” which is close to Placencia is the only safe option. We heard rumors how bad it was and how difficult it was to get provisions so we were a little apprehensive when we went ashore. Placencia is a tourist town and in the high season there is a lot of activity going on. However, now it was very quiet, restaurants and bars are closed but shops are open and we could find all the provisions, parts and fuel we needed without any problems. A lot of places have a mobile sink outside with a water hose, soap and paper towels and you need to wash your hands before entering. The water hoses are lying in the open and with the sun shining the water is warm, which is a luxury for sailors who do not always have warm water available on board.
Getting our visa, custom clearance and cruising permit extended was no problem and since we were the only one in the offices, we were done in a record time. So, we are ready to spend another month in Belize and hope to find a lot of new places we can enjoy.