Just Belize it...Part 1: The Rain Forest
08/24/2009
This past Summer I and 11 others enjoyed an international class that took us deep into the rain forests and briskly into the shallow coral reefs of Belize. One week at the La Milpa Field station in the rain forest and then one week on an island to visit coral reefs. We took a zillion pictures and hardly any are shown, so if you'd like to see more of them click on the above picture and it'll take you to the flicker account. This has all the best pictures from everyone! If you want to see even more, hunt me down on campus and we'll work something out. Part 2 will take us to the zoo and the island and coral reefs. So those that are checking out the pics prior to Part 2. Enjoy the underwater pics, most of those were taken by myself. Although you will have to wait for the stories that go along with them. I am also trying to get videos up as well, but it might take some time for those. Hopefully They will also be included in Part 2, if not a Part 3 must happen!
Well guess I should start at the start... hmmm where to start? The Airplane! Ill be honest this was my 1st commercial flight in a plane. Pretty much my 1st big plane trip. It wasn't as bad as I or a few of the others imagined. It was quite pleasent. Although we had a layover flight in TX. We kinda lost track of time and almost missed our next flight... oppps so running through the airport was fun! Here I was worried about not getting exercise that day.
After our next flight we arrived in Belize City. Smaller than I expected, but bigger than Richmond by far!
Next we met Rudy, one of our guides in the rain forest for the 1st week, and we traveled in a van for like 3hrs to get to the field station. It was dusk by the time we arrived.
The cabanas we stayed in were nice. No AC, but they had bug nets! Which one night I had to fight a cockroach the length of my hand for my pillow. ugggh. It really wasn't buggy at all. I only wore bug spray on my legs because of chiggers and not due to skeeters. Our cabanas were very nice. I got lucky and was the odd man out so I had a whole room to myself!
The field station was set in the middle of the rain forest. It was also a low impact facility. Limited water and electricity use. The place was powered by sun light during the day and the water was treated collected rainwater. This always amazed me how simple and cheap this is. Why can't we have systems like this here in the states?!
Every morning at like 5:30a we all got up and went bird watching. Saw a ton of parrots and toucans. The birds were very noisy and stunning to look at as well. Everywhere we turned we could see a different variety of bird.
We also had some night adventures as well. We went and caught tarantulas one night. A couple other nights we hopped in the back of a truck and took a bright light to look for nocturnal creatures. Here we saw Leaf cutter ants hard at work in the masses, an Ocelot, a rare jungle cat(awesome!!!), scorpions, sleeping birds, and a large, very large marine toad. This toad decided to urinate all over christina while she held it. Gross but funny.
During the days we would go on hikes on the prepared trails throughout different parts of the forest. Here we studied many varieties of plants. All with their unique appearances and adaptions for surviving in the jungle environment. There was a cacti there that grew high up in the tree tops and dangled down toward the ground and was appropriately named "Devil Guts." Alot of the plants grew cool defense mechanisms like thorns of shedding bark. One variety known as the Acacia worked with ants for defense. The plant provided food and shelter for the ants while the ants provided an aggressive defense if the plant would come under attack. The ants would also leave the plant to attack other plants growing near the acacia so the plant has room to grow! I am highly fascinated by plants and this was amazing for me to see all these different plants that have all these cool attributes and abilities.
During our day hikes we would also see spider monkeys, howler monkeys( so loud), bush dogs, lizards, snakes, and small mammals. We also saw many different and bizarre insects as well. It was awesome!!!
We also visited a bush doctor and a local school as well. The bush talked to us and showed plants that were used for a variety of things. A lot seemed to deal with fertility or impotence treatments. I'm serious! lol. Although all the treatments seemed to have multiple treatments as well. All very cool.
The school was cool to visit. The students danced for us and we tried to dance for them. lol. We also donated money to help them out to build a fence.
In the evenings and in our free time we enjoyed the quite outdoors, relaxing in hammocks, playing cards, playing farkle (a dice game), enjoying some volley ball games and enjoying the local brews. The food here was amazing! A lot of chicken and a lot of fruits! Soooo good... The best tasting fruits I have ever had in my life.
We also had trips to two different Mayan temple complexes. One excavated and fully restored and the other barely touched since the day the Mayans abandoned them. Both places were amazing, large, and spread of a vast amount of land.
The above pictures are of Lamani, the restored and excavated temple complex. The picture below is from La Milpa, the not restored complex. Hardly anything to see other then random mounds and tree growing out of them. Really cool to see how the transitions from a forest to a site are drastically different.
These were just the major adventures we experienced in the rain forest. This is where I'll end for now. Part 2: will be up within a couple days. This is where you'll see more animals from a zoo and us in our snorkel gear amongst the creatures of shallow seas. Enjoy!!!
