Un-Belize-able summer vacation with the Tuckers

We have traveled for 3 summers now with our best buds, Sarah and Cody Tucker.  Our first year together, we got them into scuba diving so for our past trips we have done beach vacays where we can dive.  This year we chose Belize.  It's one of the top 10 dive spots in the world with their Blue Hole location.  In the past, we've done all inclusive hotel vacations and have not been impressed with the sub par food and watered down beverages.  So, this year we decided to rent our own condo and then we would have the liberty to cook our own meals and supply our own alcohol while still going out and enjoying the cuisine the island has to offer.  We stayed on Ambergris Caye, an island about a 15 minute (teeny tiny) plane ride away.  It's a low key diver's island and is pretty mellow, yet were told still had night life.

Our mode of transportation

 
Our first day in we flew (hesitantly) on our 14 person plane with Sarah and I squeezing hands as we swayed with the wind passing over the ocean.  We arrived to a tiny airport and found ourselves escorted to a pier to wait for the boat to pick us up and take us to our resort.  Luckily, the pier had a cute family owned open air bar that we toasted the beginning of our vacation at.  It was swarming with kiddos selling us things they've made including ceviche, and offering services, such as taking our luggage to the boat upon arrival.  They were too cute and sweet to turn down so we indulged them in most of their requests.  Yes, we're suckers! :)  Michael was a favorite of ours.  He immediately hooked on to Sarah and I and began commenting and asking questions about the jewelry we were wearing, where we came from, and telling us about himself.  We realized we would no longer wear the jewelry, not because it was unsafe in Belize, but just out of place.  We ran into Michael multiple times on our trip and were able to get some ice cream for him and see him light up. 

Sarah and I started our trip off right while waiting for the boat to take us to our resort

When our boat arrived to the resort- a boat because there aren't any cars on the island, you walk, boat, or ride a golf cart - we were hurried to a welcome dinner which really was just stale chips and drinks! :)  We had a blast taking in our on the water resort and talking up our adventures ahead.  Our condo was to die for!  It was directly on the water.  Not a thing in front of it.  It was beautifully upgraded and had a hot tub on the pool, which we took advantage of nearly every night.

Windy boat ride to our island

The resort bungalows--we stayed in a condo at this resort.

Pics of our condo!  This was the way to do it!

Welcome dinner the first night at the resort

Our first night was mellow as we just got settled in and prepared for our diving the next day.  We had three consecutive days of diving planned, with the last being the epitome of diving!  The Blue Hole.  The morning of day one was diving, and the afternoon we took our golf cart into town- about a 20 minute ride-and stopped off at a bar called Palapas for lunch and banana mango drinks.  Here, we left our mark like many of the other tourists.  We wrote out our newly declared double name on the wooden posts of the bar.  The Johnstons and the Tuckers are now 1 entity.  There is no separation between us:  We are now "The Johnckers" and it is marked for all future explorers to see.  This will forever be our traveling sign off together.  We made it to the market to gather our food for the week, signed up for a day trip to zip line and float through caves, and headed home for some pool time before Zach made dinner for us. He made 2 on this trip:  lobster tails, heavenly!  and sausage pasta which hit the spot.  Our night ended with some drinks in hand and some hot tub relaxation- on our balcony. 

Sun bathing after our first dive:  getting rid of those purple lips!

At Palapas- beautiful bar with beautiful view

Fighting over the tab

LOVE this couple with my whole heart!

Day two we cancelled our diving because of not being overly impressed with Day one - it was going to be basically the same dives as the day before.  We chose to spend the day in town milling around the tourists shops and looking for souvenirs to take home to the kids.  We ate at Elvis, which was good and came recommended over and over.  Cody was insistent on having conch, but it was out of season so he and Zach harassed our poor waiter saying, well, If I can't have the conch fritters, I'll have the conch salad, ohhhh..no conch salad either, I'll have the conch pasta.  Our poor waiter did not get their humor and was not having a great time re explaining that nothing with conch was available.  :)  Leave it to these two guys.  When we got back home we spent the late afternoon in the scenic pool reading magazines.  Aaaaa, the life.  That night we had dinner at a resort buffet where the pig was the guest of honor and had spent the day being cooked underground to provide a yummy taste---it grosses me out! :)  I got to enjoy my delicious wine, which was the first day of it!  Yummm.  Sarah and I sat in the HUGE two person chairs in the bathtub in bathing suits when we got home for a fun convo while the boys hit up the casinos! 

Our delicious resort dinner night, I clearly loved the wine more than the pig.  Step away, Zach!

Day three was our major dive day.  The experience took up a whole day!  And oh so worth it.  This day was indescribable.  It began a bit rough as the 2 hour boat ride out caused a whole lot of sea sickness (which even in tiny boats we don't normally experience).  But once we got out to this gorgeous place, all thoughts of ooooye tummies ceased.  We dove in and began our descent to 160 feet below the surface- our deepest dove yet.  What makes this dive so special and different from the others is that it is an underground cave loaded with stalactites and stalagmites.  It also houses many....sharks.  All kinds.  Sarah and I had said that if there was a bull shark, we were heading straight back to the surface because those are not the guys to mess with.  We had our signals prepared and a promise to eachother that if one wanted to retreat, we would go as a team. I was a bit nervous about having my life in Sarah's hands with these magnificent creatures as I thought back to a time in high school where we were walking late in the night and a big dog jumped out at us.  Out of fear, she grabbed me and threw me as a barrier between her and the drooling, teeth baring dog.  My fate was much different during that moment than I would imagine it would be if we had a repeat with these predators. Se la vie!  We swam through the cave beauty and were then greeted with many curious sharks...many more....many many more.  All of a sudden, we realized there were about 30 sharks around us.  AMAZING!  Our dive instructors were thrilled because due to the size of the Blue Hole, it is hit or miss.  Well we were HIT!!!  Our instructors were encouraging us to swim out closer and closer to the sharks.  I LOVED watching them, but sure didn't feel adventurous enough to go face to face with them.  I'm so glad I didn't see that one was approaching me about 10 feet from my head , as Cody later told me.  The scary part:  I knew, and later found out my fellow divers knew, was that we saw a bull shark!  Welp, is it safer to retreat, two tasty looking American divers or stay hidden amongst the many other divers and stalactites?  We decided to stay.  When we got to the surface, I asked the instructor if it was a bull shark and was quickly told NO! Of course I didn't believe that since I did lots of research to be able to identify them so I could avoid them. I asked another instructor who replied no, but upon me questioning said "there were 2 down there with us, if you think you saw one, you did.  We don't tell divers that usually because they freak out."  REALLY?  THEY DO?  I DON'T UNDERSTAND WHY!  So, I met my greatest fear face to face (almost).  We stopped at 2 more dive sites that day on the way back to the island.  They were beautiful dives!!  One was followed up with lunch on a private island where we could go see the Blue Footed Boobies Sanctuary after our feast.  It was relaxing and beautiful.  A perfect wrap up to such a wonderful diving day.

WOW!  The Blue Hole--you can actually see the coloration differences too!

Swimming very very close to us!

Zach and I at the Blue Hole!

Crazy Zach wanting to get closer to that beautiful danger

Cody finally did his underwater flip!

Sarah, men and Zach

Always playful boys

After this undescribable dive!

The private island lunch route to see the Blue Footed Boobies

Watching the Blue Footed Boobies from a bird watching tower!

Zach cooked us a delicious pasta dinner that night and we were pretty low key.  It was the perfect place to have our  mixed drinks because the view from our patio was breathtaking.  The only down fall was the ravenous mosqitos who LOVE American tourist blood and are determined to make you think twice about coming to their area.  They did a great job showing us who was boss and that we were in their territory.  We left with warning welts covering our bodies.  But, we beat em....bring on the bug spray! :)
We spent another entire day on a tour that left our hotel at 5:30 am.  We headed out to a zip lining area and after zooming through the tree tops on 20 different lines, we had lunch quickly before our second adventure of the day.  The cave float!  This was very memorable.    It was something different than our normal daring excursions.  We simply hiked through Belizean jungle to a river and floated our way peacefully through dark, black caves.  We had on headlights so we were able to see the beauty in the cave.  I think all 4 of us were in a trance after the relaxing outing.  After our bus ride home, we jumped on a boat to take us the remainder of the way and saw a crocodile out in the water.  Very near.  It was an interesting thing to see!

Wahhoooooo!!

Cheers for finishing the 20 lines!  Now on to part two of our adventure!

Relaxed.

A fun and yummy night out, we had the boys find a restaurant that we could indulge in sea food and drinks.  It worked out great!  It was tasty and the sandy floored out door bar was fun to enjoy after dinner too.  We got a little silly and had a lot of laughs!

One of my favorite memories of the trip was our last night in Belize.  We were determined to go out with a bang so we planned to have a nice dinner and then hit the nightlife!  It began POURING rain right after we got all dressed up and ready to eat.  We debated what to do because our only mode of transportation was our open aired golf cart.  Might as well live it up, golf cart it is!  We found our recommended dinner spot and were convinced they were closed.  Just as we began turning away, an employee insisted we come in..the back way.  This took us through the pitch black kitchen into the dining area lit by only 2 tables' headlights and a couple candles.  The storm was so bad that it knocked the power out.  After insisting that they could still cook, we decided to stay, and glad we did because it was a hilarious meal watching Zach eat with his headlight on, not to mention delicious too!  We attempted to head out on the town afterwards but didn't get very far after realizing the distance we'd need to go on our golf cart to get there.  It didn't ruin our night though, we spent the night taking funny pictures, cracking ourselves up, singing, watching Cody nearly break his shin, being surprised by Zach popping his head into the front seat-from on top of the golf cart, and many many more silly things!!  It was a fun and memorable way to end the trip.

Able to order dinner in the blackout beacuse of this handy light!

Best friends and great times

Cody may or may not have hurt himself falling off the cart

I need OFF this cart!  Two crazy guys!

Quite the surprise to look up and see.

Captain Morgan Models

Tree huggers

Manly bonding...?  :)

Round two of Cody's pains!  Sarah tried to stop him from falling out of the tree

The way out would normally not hold any stories as they were all made during the trip, but this one ends with a little tale.  I got vehemently sick in the middle of the night of our last night and continued the entire day traveling home.  It didn't help that once again, we had to jump on a small plane to get to the main island...this time though, 6 people made up our flight and all of their lives were in my hands.  Ok, not really, but I was told I had to sit upfront with the pilot as the co-pilot.  So, the tale is significant because I now feel as though I can add this job onto my resume.  And who knows?  Maybe one day, you the readers, will be flying on my plane! ;)

Oh yeah, and Sarah found a scorpion in her bed!

                                            



Until Next Time....