BELIZE CITY
Ambiana has been studying the Lonely Planet book for a place to stay and had decided upon the Belcove Hotel and we walked there from the bus station and found it was right on the river just up the street from the swing bridge, the Ocean Ferry and the spot where we caught the bus to Sarteneja 3 weeks ago. We inquired about a room and were offered the deluxe 2 queen bed with TV and air conditioning but asked for something smaller and got a 2 twin bed room with a fan and a shared bath overlooking the river. The bonus was a balcony overlooking the river just outside our door.
We went to Brodies for food and at a chicken lunch at a kiosk in the square and then came back to our hotel where I spent the afternoon on the balcony sipping a Guinness and watching the boats motor up and down the river while chatting with an Italian guy who is in a band called the Sweet Life Society.
Colleen cooked us a dinner of hot dogs and broccoli and we ate it as darkness descended and we watched the police unload a body from a boat across the river and put it in the back of a pick up and drive away.. The rain came and we went to bed and listened to another survival podcats about a fall in a canyon and then I had the worst sleep of the whole trip , it was not because I was sharing a twin bed with Jakobi who got up in the middle of the night with poopy butt but because the fucking fan had to be on all night making noise and blowing cold air on me in an annoying oscillating pattern.
The church bells woke us up at 6am and we ate oatmeal cooked on our stove on the balcony and I let the stove burn off our excess fuel. Our plane is at 5pm and we are taking a local bus to the airport this time, check out is 11am and we are relaxing til tehn when we will make our way to the bus station and spend the last of our belizian money on what else …ice cream!
We didn’t get ice cream after all due to a kid implosion/meltdown. Colleen took a solo tour of the farmer’s market next to the bus station while Ambiana, Jakobi and I cooled off in the station.
We found a paper about the tsunami alert that occurred while we were at Mayflower-Bocawina National Park, we didn’t hear about it until the next day when a man on the bus told us about it. It occurred on Ambiana’s birthday which is ironic because 4 years ago when we were in Puerto Rico Ambiana was terrified of a tsunami occurring while we were camping on the beach. We were 8 miles inland and hopefully high enough above sea level if a tsunami had occurred but if we were still on Castillo Beach I hate to think what could have happened. It was Belize’s 1st tsunami alert and it sent the residents of Belize City into a panic. I doubt we would have been warned but maybe we would have because everyone has a cell phone and maybe Norman would have run out to our tent to alert us…regardless nothing happened, the water did recede a bit so we were told but no wave came.
The bus took us to within 2 miles of the airport where we spent our ice cream money on a taxi to the terminal. It was the most crowded terminal i ever have been in, probably because it was so small.
We breezed through customs and walked out on the tarmac to board our plane.
HOUSTON TEXAS
Three flights to Vermont, the first took us to Houston where we spent the night with Colleen’s Biological Dad, Mark Steiber and his family, Rhonda and Elyse. Grampy Mark has only met us once and this was the 1st time he met Jakobi. The last time we saw them Elyse was 12, and Ambiana 2, Now Elyse is 22 and Ambiana is 12. They cooked us an awesome meal and we gorged on butter!!!! It was a quick visit but nice one. The girls got on well with Elyse and we even recruited them for our family dance video. !2 hours after arriving we were back at the airport for the final 2 legs of our flight.
NYC
We flew into LaGuardia Airport and because we were using frequent flyer miles United had our connecting flight to Burlington going out of Newark, NJ. We assumed that United would have a shuttle or something to get us to Newark but NOOOO! We were on our own. Options: Uber-$120, A private shuttle bus- $40/person. We took a public bus to the subway to Times Square and Port Authority and a Newark Express Bus for about $60.
All our winter clothes were in our truck in Birlington and it was about 15 degrees out. We ate dinner in Times Square and lounged in the airport until our 9:45pm flight.
BURLINGTON VT
We arrived in Burlington at 11:30pm and got to our hotel around midnight. It was -5 degrees and I brought all our clothes in from the truck so they would not be still frozen in the morning.
We slept like babies home at last!
