Tobacco Caye – December 11, 2010

 

Today was to be the second day of my three day sailing trip along the Belize Barrier Reef with Raggamuffin Tours.

We woke up on Rendezvous Caye to a fabulous sunrise…I mean amazing.  After taking some pictures, I noticed that others were starting to get up and the crew was busy making us a yummy breakfast.  Throughout the trip I was amazed at the food the crew cooked for us in the very small kitchen of the sail boat.

Before breakfast I noticed that Captain Ramsey was fishing off the dock.  He caught a yellow-tailed snapper and a box fish.  He kept the snapper, but threw back the box fish because they are a hard fish (like a crustacean) with no internal bones.  Very strange.  I asked if I could give it a try and he willing handed me the pool.  I caught a very small grunt first which we kept for bait.  I casted again and caught a yellow-tailed snapper.  We kept my snapper too.  I kind of assumed we’d get to eat them with breakfast, but instead the crew ate them both.  Honestly I was ok with that because they deserved it.  They were awesome.

After breakfast we broke down camp and loaded up the sailboat.

Our first stop of the day was for snorkeling.  I started to get the hang of snorkeling and I took some pictures.  The water was a bit cloudy, but still it was fun.  I saw a jelly fish and tried to get a picture, but it kept get swept towards me and I wasn’t sure how dangerous it was so I headed back to the boat to ask.  I described it to the crew and they said it was probably a good idea that I stayed away from it.  Some people snorkeled out with Captain Ramsey to attempt some spear fishing.  I really wanted to go, but I wasn’t a strong swimmer/snorkeler and I knew I’d get left behind.  Everyone came back admitting that it was a lot harder than they expected.  They didn’t catch anything.  But, one of the guys did spot a lobster and between him and another guy (can’t remember who they were) they were unable to grab it with the hook.  Captain Kamani told them to stay with it and he jumped in to get it.  He was successful, but let’s just say it was kind of a baby.  Still it was the only thing we caught that day so there was no way it was going back.

Our second stop of the day was for lunch and swimming at Colson Caye.  It was so much fun jumping off the boat and swimming around.  By this time of day a nice swim to cool off was just what we needed.

We finally reached Tobacco Caye which would be our home of the night.  We setup camp again and quickly discovered the showers…if you could call them that.  Only one worked and it was just cold water that came out of an outdoor type facet.   It ended up being more of a rinse than a shower.  Turns out we couldn’t use much water either because it was collected rainfall so it needed to be conserved.  Honestly, I should have just passed on it completely.

Dinner started with lobster ceviche and included the ‘baby’ lobster we had caught earlier in the day.  It was followed up by more grilled lobster and lots of other yummy food.

We had heard that we might get to see local drummers later and when a group of people started heading to the opposite side of the island some of us started following them.  We were not sure whether we were headed to see drummers or following these folks to their rooms.  Turns out we made it to the bar.  There was no one there to serve so someone started making drinks and people just left money.  The workers/owners finally showed up and the drummers started playing.  They were great.  The people we followed turned out to be a REI tour group.  I chatted with one of them for a while.

All of sudden there was wailing (that might be a small exaggeration…but not much) from Lindsey from Colorado.  Captain Kamani ran over to see what happened.  He strolled back with a ‘what a dumb shit’ look on his face.  Turns out she was holding a hermet crab and it grabbed her and wouldn’t let go.  I wasn’t surprised that it happened to her…she wasn’t too bright.   The power went out at the bar a couple of times and interestingly enough nobody even flinched…we were on a remote island in Belize for crying out loud…who cares.  Besides the night before we had no power at all.

I did get a little ego boost that evening.  I can’t be certain, but I’m pretty sure I got propositioned that night.  My uncertainty was due to it being really loud and I tried hard to just keep chatting and laughing it off.  But, it was still flattering.

Things started to quiet down, so we headed back to our tents for a much needed rest.  It’s amazing how exhausting chilling on a sailboat all day can be.

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