Story: BELIZE - The Hard Road to Paradise

Tourists go to specific places, on specific schedules, often led by persons known as tour guides. Make no mistake, the tourist's life is good - cruise ships and luxury hotels are seldom unpleasant.

Travelers, on the other hand, insist that the journey, not the destination, matters most. They are found navigating foreign lands alone or in the company of a fellow traveller, relying only upon tattered guidebooks and rumors to steer their course.

Our question, "Where next?" was answered by a finger, falling from behind closed eyes, upon the tiny Central American nation of Belize. Do we go as tourists, or travelers?

Belize, 180 miles long, 80 miles wide, is heavily marketed as a tourist destination. No wonder: The second longest barrier reef in the world, pristine beaches, crystalline waters, all inclusive resorts - everything a tourist could wish for. There is, however, another Belize - one with jungles and Jaguars, fog shrouded mountains and ancient secrets. One that calls to travellers !

A tramp freighter might have been appropriate, but reality demanded expedient travel. We landed at Belize City's Airport noting that tour operators sold their services just beyond customs. But such is not the way of the traveller - we go as the locals go. A cabbie, short on words, delivered us to the downtown bus station, a fly-infested building rife with panhandlers.

Questioning the wisdom of our journey, I was approached by a sweaty man in a straw hat. Soon I knew why we came this way - to remind ourselves we were members of the human race, and did not live, or travel, apart from it. The man, threatening at first, apporached not to beg or harass, but to offer assistance to wayward, fellow, travellers. Thanks to him, we found ourselves aboard a bus bound for San Igancio, the cradle of the ancient and mysterious Lost Mayan Civilization.

The public bus is the principal means of travel in Belize. Ours was a resurrected Blue Bird model, retrofitted with a roof luggage rack fabricated from water pipe. We departed Belize City on the Western Highway, one of only two paved roads in the entire country. A gale blasted through the twenty or so open windows, drying the sweat of the forty or so passengers.

An hour later we reached Belmopan, the capitol. Mimicing Brazil, Belize built this city specifically to be their capitol following independence in 1983. It is a masterpiece of urban planning - wide boulevards, utilitarian structures, but someone forgot to tell the people. Few actually live here. Most commute for Belize City, the old colonial capital.

Beyond Belmopan the flat, coastal plain gave way to hills, open fields to jungle, and the old Blue Bird to gravity. Slow, then slower. Behind each hill, a village, and we stopped at every one. The sun was setting before we rattled across the ancient Hawksworth Bridge into San Ignacio.

We passed up the well appointed Hotel San Igancio which hosted Queen Elizabeth on her last commonwealth visit and called upon Godsman Ellis, keeper of the less auspicious Piache Hotel. Mr. Ellis welcomed us like old friends, offering cool drinks and asking about our travels, our home, and our plans in Western Belize. He sketched out an itinerary that would fill our next seven days assuring us he would make the necessary arrangements.

Each morning a different person would mysteriously appear at breakfast - an envoy sent by Godsman Ellis to show us the beauty and mystery of the region. We visited Mayan ruins, explored the Rio Frio caves, canoed down the Mecal River, and were introduced to a Mayan medicine man said to be 106 years old, always as the sole clients of a local guide handpicked by Mr. Ellis.

Evenings we spent at Eva's Restaruant, the chosen hangout of backpackers, archeologists, guides, ramblers and gamblers, but not tourists. Like the fictional "Rick's" of Casablanca, everyone goes to Eva's.

After a week of gracious, albeit Spartan hospitality we struck out for our next waypoint, Placencia, and The Paradise Hotel. We would cheat the gods of the travellers and morph into toursits for the last week of our adventure, basking in opulence at a hotel called Paradise!

Transportation was familiar - a bus ride to Belmopan, then another bus for Dangriga via the Hummingbird Highway. Locals call it the "Humming-butt," and with good reason. In reality it is a dirt road winding through the Cockscomb Mountains and the world's only Jaguar preserve. The locals tie bandanas over their faces to reduce the inhalation of dust ! The journey, 150 miles only, was gruelling, but amazingly beautiful.

In Dangriga we missed our connection and were told to take the bus to Mango Creek and the ferry to Placencia. Simple? No. The road to Mango Creek was a single lane track through endless banana plantations planted so thickly the leaves slap through the open windows. The ferry, was a dugout canoe fitted with an outboard motor and skippered by a tall and very jolly man who took great pleasure in operating his vessel in such a manner as to elicit screams from his passengers.

Plowing aground on a beach after crossing an open sound in growing darkness, our boatman directed us to a path hacked out of the dense growth. "Follow dat - aboot a mile ya find da Paradise."

We complied. Half and hour later we stood, drenched in sweat, before a ramshackle, tin roofed builiding resembling a barn, not a luxury hotel. "Pardon me," I queried a man seated on the porch, "We are looking for the Paradise Hotel."

"Ah, you already der. Dis be da Paradise Hotel." He said from behind a broad smile.

Could this be right? No! We came here to become toursts, to bask in opulence...

Between toursits and travellers there is a line - one that may never be straddled. We go as toursts, or travellers, never as both.