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July |
Jump to updates:
25 July - Ron's Birthday
23 July - New Kitty & volunteer work
14 July - Out on Lago de Izabal
02 July - Back on the Rio Dulce
25 July - Ron's Party & The Incident with the Beard
Took the boat over to Ron and Ariane's near Suzanna's Laguna and anchored up for Ron's birthday party.
Click here to see photos. A good night was had by all, especially the mozzies that absolutely ate me alive, even though I was wearing long trousers and was covered in mozzie repellant. The evil monsters bite you through your clothes, you practically have to bath in the stuff to stop them from getting at you. So am in a very itchy spotty situation at present!
Anyway I had to do a quick update here as the most surprising event occurred at this party, half way through the night Stuart shaved his beard off without warning! It really confused me after a few beers, he looked like a completely different person!! But hurrah the beard is no longer! Well it is still there but much shorter, Chewie is now back to Stewie. We'll just have to wait and see how long it takes before it gets big and horrid again! Click here to see the new Stuart
23 July - New Kitty
& Day Volunteering with the Jungle Medic
We went to Casa Perico for dinner with the group from Tijax and had a really nice evening then had a bit of a get together on 'That' a Pot Luck, it seems to be the popular thing to do here. Everyone just brings some sort of dish then you all sit around and eat and drink far too much all night long! Suits me fine! We had a massive thunder storm and a lot of rain, so we scuttled inside and had a bit of a Monty Python video evening.
We have finally got round to making ourselves a water catcher since we have had a fair amount of rain lately, it feels such a waste seeing it all just run away when we know our tanks are getting less and less water in them. It looks a bit primitive but seems to do the trick. It is quite nice to be totally self sufficient.
We now have a new deck hand, our friends on Xanadu, Ron and Ariane, have a cat which has recently had 5 kittens. They were having trouble getting rid of them and we have somehow been talked into taking one! They have said they will look after him when we want to go traveling inland so that won't be a problem. I doubt we will be taking to boat to Belize again and apparently Honduras is very relaxed with pets on the boat so it shouldn't cause too many problems. There are a lot of people around the river that travel with pets aboard and they don't seem to have any trouble when they are out sailing, we will just have to wait and see, only time will tell. Click here to see pics of Mano our new deck hand! He is a complete lunatic and wakes me up every morning at 5.30 on the dot, mewing and attacking my arms and legs! Its one way to make sure you get up early.
We took another trip into Puerto Barrios with Ron and Ariane, they have a car here so it meant we didn't have to ride in the crazy mini buses. We saw someone who have been knocked over and killed on the way there which was pretty sad. But the people are all quite mad and you see them walking along a busy road with lots of fast traffic and they just amble along with their children right on the road, there must be soo many people killed here like that. Anyway Puerto Barrios seemed bigger and a bit nicer than it did last time we went. We managed to get another 12v fan for the boat which we had been meaning to do for a long time, just incase we have guests! We can now keep them cool if anyone comes to stay on the boat.
On the 21st we did some volunteer work with the Jungle Medic. We were taken out in a mini bus to a village at the Finca Paraiso on the way up to the Agua Caliente to help give out medicines, and vitamins.
Click here to view the pictures of the day
It was a really nice experience, the villagers were all very nice and everything was pretty well organised. We got there at about 9.00 am and set up stalls at the front of the school.
The Jungle Medic and Another medic were on a stall in the centre, here the villagers queued to tell them their symptoms to get the medication they needed. The medics would write down the medication that they needed and sent them off to the next stall to be seen to. You then had 4 stalls either side, the first one was for worms, where they had to squirt a syringe full of worm medicine into the villages mouth. This didn't go down well with some of the children and there was a lot of very upset kids in line.
Then you had the vitamin stall, where you checked their list to see what vitamins they needed and hand these to them. This was the job that Stuart and I had to do, which was a bit of a relief to start with as it was the easiest job there!
You then sent them of to the next table which was ear, eyes and skin. This was the least popular stop of all for the children, the eye drops must have really stung as there wasn't one happy child who came away from there! Poor kids, they must have hated us coming. Fist of all they are frightened and don't want to take the worming medicine so make a bit of a fuss, then they get walloped round the head by mum telling the to get on with it and behave, then they are sent of to have nasty stinging stuff put in there eyes! Mind you they got balloons and lollypops and all was soon forgotten and they were back playing and messing around in front of the cameras again.
The final stall was the pharmacy where the more serious medicines were dished out.
All of the volunteers were boaters from the river and there were a number of nurses amongst them, they were all put on the pharmacy as they obviously knew what they were doing! There was also a number of Spanish speakers, which only helped so far, as the main language for the village is K'iche and a lot of them only spoke this.
The final station was hair washing to get rid of the lice, this was a great spectator sport for all the kids.
We saw about 470 people in total and eventually finished up at about 3.00pm. We then rode up to the Agua Caliente and all had a dip in the hot falls which was really nice and refreshing after a long day at the village. It then completely tipped it down with rain and we stayed wet for the rest of the journey home. Which resulted in me getting a cold! Could have done with some of those vitamins that I was dishing out!
It was a good day out and I would like to think that the stuff we did will make a little difference to the villagers, it was well worth the effort. The Jungle Medic Brian and his wife Jungle Jane, are missionary's and are supported by a number of churches. They are in the process of building a new house and dormitory for the groups of volunteers they get, near San Felipe over looking the lake, if you want to find out more about the work that they do click here to visit their website.
Right, that is all the news we have for now. We have another Pot Luck party to go to tonight for Ron's Birthday so best get cooking!!
14 July - Out on Lago de Izabal
We got a little bored with staying at the marina all the time waiting for the weather to clear up so we could go out to sea. so we took a couple of days out on the Lake to take a look around there. Click here to see the pictures.
We anchored up at Denny's Beach again for the first night, click here to see their website. Then the next morning we headed off for Finco El Paraiso which is on the lakes north side. The Finca is a working ranch, there is a beautiful spot in the jungle that you can walk to from here with natural pools and hot springs to relax in and an amazing hot waterfall, heated through the volcanic rock.
We managed to hitch a lift with a tractor on the way up which was good fun although very bumpy. There were quite a few people at the waterfalls as it was a Saturday so all the locals were there for a day out. It was really nice there and lovely to sit under the hot waterfalls. Although we both got attacked by some creature in the water! We were standing in a nice hot bit when all of a sudden something came along and nipped our feet!! We never found out what it was, it was just a bit of a shock! We didn't want to stand in any one spot for too long after that!
After our day out we upped anchor and headed off towards the far end of the lake and anchored up in 'Ensenida Las Largotos' near the mouth of the Bocas del Polochic Wildlife Reserve. The water was very shallow here and we managed to get suck in the mud for a bit but it was very soft so pulled our way through it. We had a bit of a storm that night and pretty high winds, it managed to blow the fuse in the wind generator, must have been blowing at least 40 or 50 knots for it to have done that! We also dragged a bit, but it wasn't so bad as there was nothing to that we could hit that would damage to boat, just more mud! The Anchor reset itself pretty quickly and we were set then for the rest of the night.
The next morning we took the dingy up the river of the wildlife reserve. Click here to find out more about the reserve. It is meant to be a great spot for seeing manatees, alligators, birds and monkeys. We had fun motoring up the river although it was tough work on the little 2hp engine as the rain the night before has caused the current to be pretty strong. We managed to get a couple of miles up the river, although we didn't spot a thing! We did see a couple of logs that looked very much like alligators but that was about it. I think you are meant to go very early in the morning to catch the wildlife, we didn't go up there until the afternoon. We did hear the Howler Monkeys though and there is no mistaking where they get their name from. They make such a such a scary noise, I was a little relieved that we didn't see them in a way! It was like a scary war cry, I wouldn't want to mess with them. We turned back after a while and rowed half the way back to see if having the engine off would give us more chance of seeing anything but no joy. We got back down the river just as quickly rowing as we did motoring up with the current doing most of the work for us!
From here we went back over to the north side of the lake and to the town 'El Estor' where we stopped to get some more petrol for the dingy. The pilot guide has told us where to find the petrol station, although again what with the book being a few years old was a little out of date again and the petrol station looked as though it had been closed down for about 10 years! That meant no more dingy adventures for us whilst we were out on the lake. It was a Sunday and most of the town was pretty closed up, there were a few market stalls around and it seemed like a very nice little town.
We then headed back over to the south side of the lake and anchored up in 'El Refugio'. This was a lovely spot to stop, very sheltered and very peaceful. It was so quiet, you could stay there undisturbed for days, had the best nights sleep I had had in a long time. The next day we headed back towards Denny's where we had a bit of a mishap with the engine. We were in spitting distance of Denny's and the weather had just picked up and was getting a little more lumpy when the engine just decided to stop. After an hour or so and dropping the anchor to make sure we didn't do zooming off into the distance, Stuart managed to fix it. The problem was a blockage in the fuel pump. So all fixed and off we went back to Denny's for a couple of well earned beers and dinner!
The next day we arrived back on the Rio Dulce and are now anchored up in between Tijax and Brunos again. It looks as though our plans to head out to Honduras any time soon have been a bit scappered due to all of the hurricane activity at the moment. There has just been Daniel which went up the east cost of the USA and I believe caused a fair bit of damage. Now we have Emily which is heading towards the Western Caribbean and is dues to hit either the Yucatan or Belize, although could change course at any point. There is another tropical wave appearing out in the Atlantic which could develop into another hurricane, so we are keeping an eye on that also, so god knows what will pop up next. If you are interested in keeping an eye on the hurricanes, check out the NOAA website: www.noaa.com. So we may just leave the boat here for a bit and go on a bit of a back packing mission.
Will keep you posted!
We're off to Casa Perico for dinner tonight, then off over to 'That' tomorrow for Pot Luck and a few beers. We have also managed to volunteer our services to the Jungle Medic and should be back off to Finca El Paraiso on 21st to help distribute medicine to the villagers. Well at least that's what I think we will be doing, Stuart agreed to do it whilst we were a wee bit drunk last night! We're looking forward to it though, it should be a good experience. Will let you know how we get on.
2 July - Back on the Rio Dulce
Oh dear, after last months exciting adventures, this month is beginning off a bit dull! There aren't even any new pictures for you to look at.
We got back onto the river on 16th June, we had no problems clearing back into Livingston so all our paperwork is now up to date and good for another 3 months. We anchored off for about a week, then went back to Tijax mainly to make it easier for Stuart to work on the boat. It is nice to have shore power again and not to have to worry about the water tanks running out.
Stuart went with Jeff to Morales to get the alternator fixed, the guy did a good job and sent it back a couple of days later all mended. Stuart also fixed the bilge pump which was began to make very odd noises and produce a very nasty smell, ending up in the water refusing to drain, but that is all fixed now too.
The current job which has now been current for the last week or so is the tightening of the Stays. Stuart untightened these a while back only to realise that the boat moves far too much during the day with all the launchers zooming past to be able to tighten them correctly so has decided the best time to do it is very early morning at sunrise. So far he hasn't managed to make it out of bed before 9 despite setting the alarm in the mornings, so we are left with the boom lying on top of the boat and the Stays clanging about all day long. No doubt this will get finished eventually.
Recreation wise we have been out for a few nice meals, had friends over for dinner, played with Ron and Arianes 5 teeny weeny new born kittens!! They are soo sweet! I have been working on 'That-Boat's' website, which should be up and running soon. Other than that its all been a bit slow round here. The rainy season appears to be showing its face a bit and most nights we have rain and thunder storms, but it works out quite well as this usually happens whilst we are sleeping. We are still planning to take a couple of weeks out to Honduras in the near future. We just have to get the final few bits of work done, which is really just to tighten the Stays also the Stern Gland is leaking which needs fixing to stop the boat sinking. Then check for a good time with the weather then we should be ready to go.