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Traveling west from Belize City usually means going almost all the way to the Guatemalan border. It's not that far away—about 80 miles or 125 kilometers—but there isn't much in between except the still-developing new capital at Belmopan. Out toward the end of the line are the Spanish-speaking towns of San Ignacio and Benque Viejo, and the major Mayan ruins of Xunantunich. A branch road off the Western Highway provides access to Mountain Pine Ridge, a beautiful area of pine and hardwood forests in the foothills of the Maya Mountains, much of it held as a government reserve for controlled logging.

The Western Highway is wide and smooth-surfaced and fairly straight to past Belmopan, then paved and gently winding to San Ignacio, and onward to the border of Guatemala.

The western exit from Belize City is through the cemetery. If you've been in New Orleans, this one will look familiar, with burial vaults rising a couple of feet from the wet ground. Afterward come tangled swamp and forest, broken here and there by clearings and landfills for commercial concerns, and garbage dumps with rusting car bodies. Nobody shows much concern about hiding the trash, which might be the best way to keep it from getting out of control.

About six miles out, the mangrove swamps give way to low palmetto scrub, alternating with grasslands. The dense pine forests of other times were destroyed over the years by fires and timber cutting. Only scattered trees remain. Sixteen miles inland sprawls Hattieville, where refugees from the 1961 hurricane were lodged. The "temporary" settlement looked so good to the displaced that it is now a permanent town with a population of several thousand.

The Western Highway roughly follows the course of the Sibun River for about thirty miles. The Sibun, and the Belize River, to the north, were once major trading arteries. Great mahogany logs came floating downriver at the height of the rainy season, when they could clear the rapids, and goods had no other way to move at any other time of year than in shallow-draft boats. Early in the century, before roads were even envisioned, obstructing rock outcrops on the Belize River were dynamited, and Haulover Creek was widened and dredged to allow lumber to pass more easily.

To the west and south, lumpy foothills march into the distance over the flat baseland, toward the Maya Mountains. It's easy to imagine them as cayes, or islands, in the sea that once covered this plain.

At Freetown Sibun, off the main highway from Hattieville, houseboats are available for charter from River Haven's Canadian hosts. These trim, 10- by 15-foot floating cottages accommodate four persons in two separate sleeping areas, and have full bathroom, 12-volt lighting system, CB and AM/FM radio, kitchenette, fresh-water tank, and four-foot-deep rear deck.

Weigh anchor and set off for your cruise on inland waters where few visitors penetrate. Enter the Burdon Canal, constructed long ago to connect Belize City with the south, in response to the plaints of Sibun farmers whose produce boats were swamped at sea, since bypassed by the newer roads running inland. Onward, through the Northern and Southern lagoons, the majestic Maya Mountains to the west, howler monkeys and toucans and jabirus in the scrub and forest along the way. Drop anchor at whimsy and jump over the side, or troll for fish as you explore.

But pay attention, first, at your obligatory captain's training course where you'll learn the ins and outs of being a jungle pilot.

The rate is $600 by the week, or you can get a day cruise with pilot and lunch for $200 for up to eight persons (with stops for fishing, snorkeling, swimming, birding, crocodile-watching) and shorter mid-week and weekend rentals. Housekeeping cabins in a jungle setting are also available at $250 per week or $50 per night, cabanas at $30 per night double, meals at $15 per day, and airport pickup can be arranged. Canoes can be hired as well.

Follow the signs to River Haven's port, three miles from the junction at Mile 16 on the Western Highway. For information, write to River Haven, P. O. Box 78, Belize City, fax 223-2742. Visa, Master Card accepted.

At mile 30 on the Western Highway is the turnoff for the Belize Zoo, located just off the road to the north. A zoo this is, but one with multiple messages, and like few that you've seen.

Keel-billed toucans and king vultures and crested guans perch on trees draped in wire mesh. Pathways wind through plots of forest inhabited by a jaguar, a tapir ("mountain cow"), a puma and an ocelot, to a bridge over a turtle pond. As much as possible, the animals reside in re-created habitats. There are black howler monkeys ("baboons"), tayras ("bush dogs"), margays and crocodiles, boa constrictors ("wowlas"), tepezcuintles (gibnuts, or pacas), coatimundis ("quash") and gray fox, great curassows and macaws.

Visitors from far away are welcome, but more than anything else, the zoo aims to heighten the awareness of Belizeans about their heritage of natural treasures. A section of a Mayan frieze shows ancient illustrations of the animals that live here. Part of the visitors' center is reserved for work with schoolchildren. Folksy signs and illustrations tell how the king vulture—King John Crow to Belizeans—prevents disease, and put in a plug for habitat preservation:

This menagerie was originally gathered for a wildlife film. Funds were raised to feed and keep the animals when filming ended, and the Belize Zoo is the result. The zoo moved to these new installations after years of fund-raising, consulting, design work, and site preparation, and it represents a singular ecological vision.

Animals clearly come first. While there is plenty of water to be pumped into ponds, the only toilet facilities for humans are outhouses, with no provision to wash hands (despite government warnings about cholera). Re-created habitat affords shelter from sun and from prying visitors, who peer from largely unshaded pathways. At midday, your chances of spying a jaguarundi or peccary or puma or ocelot are rather dim.

Fences and electricity, not substantial bars, are used for containment. Of course, I read to my six-year-old the warning not to touch the electric wire beyond the mesh. And of course you know what he did when his parents' backs were turned.

Myself, I felt more comfortable at the old site next door, which was something like a farm, with animals kept in enclosures of wire mesh and wood, and dirt trails winding among the pens, shaded by native trees, and overgrown here and there with un-tame vegetation. Every visitor was shown around by a guide who talked about the animals as part of his, and Belize's, family. The newer zoo can be disturbing and humbling, troubling and thought-provoking. Most certainly, it's out of the ordinary.

Hours at the zoo are 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. daily. Any Belize City-San Ignacio bus will drop you at the turnoff. Admission fee is $8 U.S. Take a look at the map before you start off! Trails wind seemingly at random. Take refreshments—none are available on-site.

GUANACASTE PARK is a protected section of rain forest replete with orchids, bromeliads and ferns filling the air at every level. Named for the huge guanacaste (earpod or tubroose) tree, the park is a small (52-acre) plot between the Western Highway and the confluence of Roaring Creek and the Belize River. There is a network of nature trails, and birding is excellent. Numerous mammals, including kinkajou, gibnut, agouti and deer, can also be seen. Best of all, Guanacaste Park is readily accessible. The entrance is on the north side of the Western Highway, at the junction with the road to Belmopan. It's a pleasant locale for a picnic if you're travelling through by car or bus.

Warning! Guanacaste Park is a mugger's paradise. The predictable appearance of lone visitors on its isolated trails attracts low-lifes who find easy escape along the Belize River or into nearby Roaring Creek and Belmopan. Walk through the forest of Guanacaste Park only in a group—wait for others if you're alone. Consult the guards at the entry.

Located about 50 miles from Belize City, Belmopan is the youngish capital of the new nation. Like its larger cousins, Washington, D.C., and Brasilia, the city was planned from scratch.

What a strange place for a Belizean town is Belmopan, arising from the pastures and scrub all around. It sprawls over open green spaces. Block houses are set well apart on curving drives in suburban-style designated residential sections, at least a mile from anything, in a city where many do not have cars. Long sidewalks connect the different sections—a challenge in the hot sun, or the rain. The centerpiece of the capital is a complex of two multi-windowed, low-lying, concrete-and-brick government office blocks that come to an apex at Independence Hill. The buildings are designed in an adapted Mayan style, though they could also be taken for a tropical junior college campus.

The population of Belmopan is only about 5000, and not growing rapidly toward the projected figure of 40,000. Belmopan is not unattractive, and not unpleasant. It's just, well, bland. Most government workers prefer the tumbledown style of Belize City, and commute daily from the coast. Diplomats, too, can be seen heading back onto the Western Highway after official business or short working days. Good housing is available, but the city has few shops, eating places, lodging houses and bars, and lacks the pulsating spirit of Belize City. The people will come when the amenities are in place; but the amenities are slow to develop without people.

The impetus for the relocation of the capital was the devastation of Belize City by a hurricane in 1961, for the second time in thirty years. The new capital, sited near the country's geographical center, sheltered from coastal storms and free of swampy surroundings, is intended to spur development of the interior. The name of the city derives from the first syllable of Belize, and from Mopan, one of the original Mayan tribes of the country.

Getting There

Buses running between Belize City and San Ignacio stop in Belmopan about every hour throughout the day. Three or four buses coming from Dangriga pass through most mornings, and stop again during the afternoon on the return run.

ACCOMMODATIONS

It's not inconceivable that you will spend a night in Belmopan, even if you don't have business with the government, as the capital is near the crossroads of the Western and Hummingbird highways.

The most substantial hotel is the relatively new Belmopan Hotel, near the bus station and market, and within walking distance of the government center. The rate is $60 single/$70 double. Tel. 822-2130, fax 822-3066, or write to P. O. Box 237, Belmopan, gsosa@btl.net. This hotel, a former government startup, is modeled after a U.S. motel. All 20 rooms are air-conditioned, with large beds or twin beds, carpeting, fan, bureau, wicker sofa, television, snack table, and full bathroom. There's a good-sized pool as well.

Other hotels are the Bull Frog Inn, at 25 Half Moon Avenue (P. O. Box 28, bulfrog@btl.net, 14 rooms $60 single/$75 double plus tax with air conditioning, tel. 822-2111, fax 822-3155, Visa and Master Card) with a bar and restaurant; and the Circle A Hotel, at 37 Half Moon Avenue (P. O. Box 221, tel. 822-2296. 14 rooms, $35 single/$40 double, plus 10% service, Master Card and Visa). Both are clean and airy bungalows, but they're way on the other side of town from where the bus pulls in—about a mile away. Take a taxi if you have any luggage.

Where to Eat

The Bull Frog is the best eating spot in Belmopan. Meals are served in a shady, open pavilion, though the menu is the usual fried chicken, steak, and rice and beans, plus Tandoori fish fillet. Try the limeade ("lime water"). $6 and up, $11 for lobster, a couple of bucks for sandwiches.

If you're out on the market square waiting for a bus, you can step into the Caladium restaurant. Hamburgers and sandwiches go for about $2, steak and chicken meals for $5 to $8, and the fans will help cool you off.

What to See

The Department of Archaeology has a vault of ceramics, stone tools, carved monuments and other antiquities, which may be visited by the public on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 1:30 to 4:30 p.m, but only with two days' advance notice. Enter the building that is to your right, as you look up to Independence Hill, and go down to the basement. Call first (tel. 822-2106) to make an appointment, at least two days in advance.

The National Museum is scheduled to open shortly, with exhibit areas covering history, archaeology, contemporary art.

FACILITIES

The British High Commission is housed on Embassy Square (tel. 822-2146). The U. S. embassy has an office here (tel. 822-2617), but most functions are carried out in Belize City. A couple of banks have branches near the market, but otherwise, there is not much in the way of commercial activity.

Back on the Western Highway, just past the junction for the Hummingbird Highway and Belmopan, is the village of ROARING CREEK. Once a major crossroads, Roaring Creek is now overshadowed by the capital. There are about a thousand residents.

COUNTRY ACCOMMODATIONS NEAR BELMOPAN

Banana Bank Ranch, P. O. Box 48, Belmopan, bbl@btl.net, tel. 822-3180, fax 822-2366. $45 single/$55 double, or $65/$75 with private bath, higher in cabanas, plus 10% service plus tax. Add $40 for three meals. No credit cards.

Banana Bank is an American-owned beef farm where guests are more than welcome. On-site amusements, activities and attractions include horseback riding on trails through 4000 mostly jungled acres (25 saddle horses are kept), river trips, a Mayan ruin, swimming, canoeing, birding, resident artist (and co-owner), stargazing through an eight-inch telescope, lagoon with crocodile, a pet jaguar, a deer, peccary, kinkajou, coati, and spider monkey (not necessarily in order of interest). The last three are shaded by a huge tree wrapped and felled by a strangler fig. And there are assorted ornamental plantings moved from nearby forest.

A trouble with many a Belizean resort is that rooms lack character. At Banana Bank, boy, do they have character. Four cottage (or cabana) units each have two bedrooms, with tile floor, wicker chairs and sofa, curving walls, canopy bed on raised platform (one has a water bed), large screened openings, and high thatched ceiling. The bathroom in each cottage is shared. Four assorted guest rooms are available in the main ranch house, variously wicker- or wood-panelled, with lace bedspreads, screened loft, bunk or double or single beds, soaring ceilings, verandahs, arches, paintings, and furniture that I can only begin to describe as idiosyncratic. Two of these rooms have private baths. Another house on the property, a wooden, domed structure on stilts, resembles a Baha'i temple.

The folks here are positively romantic about their cattle, and barbecued beef, and beef in general, are mainstays on the menu. Beer is stocked, but bring your own booze. For river fishing, bring your own rod.

Banana Bank originated to breed oxen for the logging industry. Access is via a turn eastward from the Valley of Peace road that forks north from the Western Highway near Belmopan—this takes you right onto the ranch—or you can turn in opposite the Belmopan airstrip, proceed a half-mile to the bank of the Belize River, wave and shout, and be taken across in a boat. Pickup in Belmopan can be arranged. The taxi ride costs about $10.

Warrie Head Lodge, Mile 56.5, Western Highway, Teakettle Village. 8 rooms. $55 single/$65 double, plus 10% service plus tax. Add $27 per person for three meals. Group rates available. Reservations: Belize Global Travel Services, 41 Albert St. (P. O. Box 244), Belize City, tel. 227-7363, fax 227-5213, bzadventur@btl.net.

On the site of an old logging camp, Warrie Head Lodge is a working citrus and vegetable farm. There are, as well, 500 acres of protected riverside forest and bush, with black howler monkeys, coatis, waris, toucans, orchids, and trails to allow you to see it all.

Two of the guest rooms are in the main lodge, with fans, and double beds with good mattresses, sharing a cedar-panelled bathroom. One master bedroom in the same building has a private bath. Five other large, airy rooms in a separate building have private baths, table fans, tile floors, real closets, and good beds. Meals are served on a screened porch on the second floor of the main lodge building. The bar runs on the honor system.

River swimming is available at a shingle beach along an eddy pool on the Belize River, and canoes and horses can be rented. As well, a spring-fed creek with little falls and a rock-lined swimming hole fill up in the dry season, as ground water percolates down from the hills. Excursions are also available to Mountain Pine Ridge and Xunantunich.

Though the lodge property borders the Western Highway, and is easily reached, you should contact the Belize City office if you're interested in staying here—the lodge is often filled with groups, and a cook is sent out only when it is known that there will be guests. The warrie (or wari) of the name is the white-lipped peccary, which the creek next to the lodge is supposed to resemble.

Past Belmopan, the Western Highway traverses rolling, lush countryside. Vegetation is exuberant where land remains fallow between shifting use as corn plots and pasture and orange groves. The road is narrower, and the going is slower, with curves, and occasional climbs and descents.

At mile 59 is the turnoff for SPANISH LOOKOUT, a Mennonite center six miles to the north. You'll see horse-drawn carts at the roadside, and straw-haired, straw-hatted kids waiting for their parents to return by bus with supplies from the city.

Three Flags, at mile 61 on the Western Highway, is a gas-station-general store-restaurant, and universal stopping point on the way to San Ignacio. Breakfast and sandwiches, prepared to home-style standards, are available for $3 or so, chicken and fish dinners for $7 to $8, and everything is served on a pleasant shaded terrace. If there's anything you need, from children's books to cheese, check the store.

At Georgeville, a wide spot in the road 66 miles from Belize City, is the junction for the branch road into the Mountain Pine Ridge Forest Reserve, a 300-square-mile area of controlled logging, and also a concentration of spectacular scenery.

Here, on the west slope of the Maya Mountains, numerous short streams rush through granite rocks and tumble over falls, eventually to join the Belize River. The sand and gravel of the broken terrain and the cool air make for a relatively sparse growth of pine and grasses at higher altitudes that recalls scenic landscapes of more northerly latitudes.

In fact, this mountainous landscape is as unrelated to its tropical surroundings as it appears. Geologists believe that the granite ridge gradually drifted westward, and rose up over millions of years along with the limestone seabed that underlies lowland Belize. This "suspect terrane" (in the language of geologists) meets the tropical rocks below along a spectacular fault line, marked by an escarpment, creeks, falls, and breakneck changes in vegetation.

At lower altitudes, and in river valleys, are lush, dense, bromeliad- and orchid-laden hardwood forest. Numerous caves perforate the landscape. The plentiful water and lack of people, the variety of birds and butterflies and foliage, the views down warm canyons and up to the high saw-ridge of the Maya Mountains, make the Mountain Pine Ridge area ideal for leisurely exploration in a sturdy vehicle, on foot, or on horseback.

Visiting Mountain Pine Ridge

There's no public transport into Mountain Pine Ridge. You can join arrange a tour, or rent a vehicle for an excursion, in Belize City or, more easily, in San Ignacio. A taxi trip for a few hours will cost at least $100, an individual place on a trip, when available, $20 to $40. See San Ignacio, below, for details. There are also horseback trips (see the end of this section).

The roads are mostly good and graded during the dry season, but there are rocky stretches that will give you and even the sturdiest vehicle a good shaking, and maybe do some damage. Inquire about conditions if it's been raining. Logging roads in the reserve are well marked, and there's little chance of getting lost.

Thousand Foot Falls

The main route leads south from the Western Highway, rising from tropical hilly jungle to sandy pine barrens. Past the entrance checkpoint, the main road traverses an area of pines standing up in red dirt—pure Georgia.

Follow the Baldy Beacon road westward. Out this way are the heights known as Baldy Beacon and Baldy Sibun, with some of the oldest rocks and soils known—anywhere.

A rock-strewn spur leads back to the north, braking suddenly at the edge of a gaping canyon.

Steps lead partway down the escarpment, from which you can look across to the Hidden Valley (or Thousand Foot) Falls, a narrow chute of water spilling a thousand feet over rock. Below, vegetation changes over several thousand feet from pine to leafy jungle. If you had an impression of Belize as all lowlands, you will be suddenly and totally undeceived. The falls are 20 miles into the reserve.

Nature's Water Park.

The main road of the reserve continues southward from the Baldy Beacon junction, crossing the Río On 18 miles from the Western Highway. Here the river splashes down over huge boulders and chutes and dashes through granite water slides, to and through and around pools ranging from personal solar-heated Jacuzzis to Olympic-sized. Park at the picnic area, or farther down, and scamper out over the rocks for a delightful swim in lukewarm waters, but take care. Nature's water park comes without lifeguards or first-aid stations, and accidental careens and loose footing result in bruised arms and bashed heads.

Río Frío Cave

Five miles beyond, past the government camp at Augustine, signs point the way to several caves. The largest, the Río Frío Cave, is at the end of the side road, about a mile from the camp, after a descent through lower rain forest. Trees at the parking area are handily labelled—rubber trees, mahogany, breadnut, and many other species. Walk into the forest, to the huge, arched, 65-foot-high cave mouth, and beyond. There's no need for a flashlight here—plenty of light enters. Observe the bared strata of rock, and stalactites. There are no stalagmites, but rather, a boulder-strewn riverbed with sandy beaches where the Río Frío flows through. Continue over a rock formation that looks like rice terraces, and another that looks like a waterfall, and you'll come through to daylight again.

Two smaller caves are located on either side of the road to the Río Frío Cave.

There are many other caves in Mountain Pine Ridge, some of them spectacular. Contact a travel agency in Belize City or one of the hotels in San Ignacio to engage a guide for further exploration.

Staying in Pine Ridge

Though Mountain Pine Ridge is a reserve, it contains several private accommodations:

Pine Ridge Lodge is about five miles into the reserve along the main access road, on rolling, sandy-grassy grounds dotted with pines and broken by frothing streams. Rates are from about $35 double, more in river-view units, and will probably rise once the six cabins are more finished. These are well spread among the pines, and for now, they only have beds, louvers, screens, and bare cement bathrooms. Lighting is by kerosene lamps and candles. There are river pools for swimming, and an 85-foot waterfall on the property.

Meals are served to guests and drop-ins on a thatch-roofed terrace for $4 to $6. As the sign says, this is the last place to stop for a cold beer, and it also strikes me as a mountain biker's haven. Things are strictly laid-back and low-key. Guided trips into the nooks and crannies of the reserve are available. Call 824-3310 for a radio patch to the lodge. Or write to: P.O. Box 2079, Belize City, or 2968 Somerton Rd., Cleveland Heights, OH 44118, tel. 216-781-8288 or 932-7342, prlodge@mindspring.com.

Hidden Valley Inn is on the way to the falls of the same name, 17 miles from the Georgeville turnoff, in the midst of scrub pines on an 18,000-acre estate. Accommodations are in twelve rooms in six stuccoed, tin-roofed cottages with tile floors, fireplaces and electric lights, and full bathrooms with tubs. A central lodge room contains the dining area, library and video entertainment.

Available activities here are horseback riding, mountain biking and rafting, and tours are available to some of the more remote parts of Mountain Pine Ridge and the ancient city of Caracol. Trails wind through the property, and guests can be given a lift to sites for birding and hiking.

Rates at Hidden Valley Inn are about $80 single/$105 double with breakfast, plus 10% service and tax, and another $25 for lunch and dinner. Add about $150 to pick up a small group at the international airport. Contact the Inn at P. O. Box 170, Belmopan, tel. 822-3320, fax 822-3334, or in the U.S. at C.W. Maryland & Co., 1220 E. Park Ave., Tallahassee, FL 32301, tel. 800-334-7942 or 904-222-2333, fax 904-222-1992, hiddenvi@btl.net.

Blancaneaux Lodge, (14 Fort St. in Belize City, tel. 224-5286, fax 31657, blodge@btl.net) has recently re-opened after a dormancy of some years. In a country where everything has an unusual background, Blancaneaux stands out as a partnership between a local woman, Martha Williams, and a noted Hollywood director. Construction is native-style, of saplings ("pimento") stuccoed on the inside, with thatched roofs. Six individual cabanas furnished with Guatemalan blankets and decorations rent for $100 single/$125 double per day with breakfast, six lodge rooms for $85 single/$100 double, sharing bathrooms. Swimming is in river pools. Guests report being more than satisfied, especially with the food. Pizza is prepared in a wood-burning oven, hot espresso is always available, and guests may use the piano.

Blancaneaux Lodge is located about 15 miles from the Georgeville turnoff, and a few minutes past Pine Ridge Lodge on the main road south.

Camping is available for a fee at Pine Ridge Lodge (above), and permitted at Douglas D'Silva Forest Station (Augustine Village), the administrative center about ten miles to the south of the main reserve entry. Ask permission of the forestry officer there. To stay elsewhere in the reserve, you have to apply first at the Forestry Department in Belmopan, though permission is usually denied. Several lodges in the Cayo area operate overnight trips to Mountain Pine Ridge and Chiquibul Forest Reserve, to the south (presumably with permission). Inquire locally, or try calling Neil Rogers, tel. 824-3452.

In the area of Mountain Pine Ridge are several private reserves. Slate Creek Preserve, near the northern edge, encompasses lands voluntarily protected against clearing by private landowners. The area is habitat for many resident and migratory species. Mountain Equestrian Trails (see below) operates riding trips through the area. Society Hall Nature Reserve is closed to the public, and used for research purposes.

Horseback trips into Mountain Pine Ridge, are offered from January to September by Mountain Equestrian Trails. Full- and half-day trips take visitors over trails and along rivers to waterfalls and canyons that can't be seen from the roads. Cost is $45 to $65 per person, excellent box lunch included. Any travel agent in Belize will book a ride and connecting transportation.

Mountain Equestrian Trails also operates spelunking excursions, some by boat and raft to caves with Mayan remains, to which it has the exclusive rights to bring visitors. Thatch-roofed Casa Cielo cottages are available for rent here as well. The four units go for $80 double, including breakfast and dinner. Mountain Equestrian Trails is 3/4 mile off the main road into Mountain Pine Ridge, at mile 8, just before the junction for the San Antonio-Cristo Rey road (Central Farm P.O., tel. 824-3180, fax 824-2060).

Guacamallo Treks, Mile 4-1/2, Pine Ridge Rd. (P. O. Box 198, Belmopan), tel. 824-2188, fax 824-2060, at Maya Ranch, has horseback treks to the vast Caracol archaeological site, a shorter ride to Pacbitun, and a wagon trip to the Barton Creek Mennonite community. Fees range from $35 for a short ride with breakfast to $280 for the Caracol ride with a night's lodging before and after. Call for scheduling.

An alternative way into Mountain Pine Ridge, or out, is the road from San Ignacio through the villages of Cristo Rey and San Antonio, joining the main road just north of the reserve entrance. San Antonio is a Mopan Maya village, picturesque, with many thatch-roofed houses.

Three miles to the east of San Antonio is the Pacbitun archaeological site, where recent excavations have unearthed a number of stelae and Mayan musical instruments. Pacbitun consists of several temples atop pyramidal bases, the largest being 50 feet tall.

A roadside handicraft store, the self-styled Tanah Museum, is operated near San Antonio ("Ta Nah" in the Mopan language) by the Garcías, Mayan sisters who specialize in carving reproductions of ancient Mayan glyphs in slate. Roadside stalls and shops are a common sight in neighboring Guatemala, but unique in Belize, so all organized trips make a stop here. The building is an unpretentious structure in traditional Mopan style, of limestone and thatch. An admission fee is charged. Woodcarving is also developing as a local art, with the encouragement of visitors.

San Antonio is also the home village of famed healer Eligio Pantí, and it is here that Don Eligio receives patients who come from all over Belize for herbal cures.

South of Mountain Pine Ridge, in the Chiquibul Forest, is the Caracol archaeological site, a once-densely settled area of ruins and roadbeds that flourished in the Classic Mayan era. One of the pyramids, called "Canaa," or "Sky Place," rises 139 feet (42 meters) above the plaza floor, just two meters higher than the largest structure at Xunantunich. The ruins cover more than 30 square miles.

The siting of Caracol in a part of the Maya Mountains devoid of reliable water supply is a mystery. Specialized plants might have been harvested there, for trade to other Mayan areas. In any case, Mayan engineering ingenuity overcame natural limitations, with the design and construction of reservoirs and agricultural terraces.

Caracol was settled around 300 B.C., and occupied well into the Late Classic period of Mayan culture. Carved deities date mostly from around 600 A.D., when other Mayan sites were declining. The glyphs on one of the structures at Caracol record a war with Tikal, the major Mayan site 60 miles to the northwest, in present-day Guatemala. The wars might have yielded slaves or other profits, for Caracol went through an active construction period soon after, while Tikal itself experienced a period of stagnation. The population of Caracol and its surrounding city-state might have been as high as that of all modern Belize.

Among unusual features at Caracol is the widespread use of tombs for group burials, possibly of nobles of lower rank, and not only for rulers.

Excavations are being carried out by archaeologists from the University of Central Florida, led by Arlen and Diane Chase.

Visiting Caracol

Caracol has just re-opened to visitors after several years off-limits to the public. All the lodges in Mountain Pine Ridge (see above) and some of the operators in San Ignacio arrange one-day tours, in cooperation with the archaeologists on the site. Expect a long day's round trip.

The Chiquibul cave system that extends to the west into Guatemala underlies much of the Maya Mountains, and could be the largest system of caverns in the Western Hemisphere. Over 100 miles of passageways have been surveyed, some with widths of over 100 yards. The Belize Chamber in the Chiquibul system is one of the five largest natural caverns in the world. Recent explorations have yielded fossils of extinct species of insects and crustaceans previously unknown.

The caves are not yet open to visitors, and permission to enter must be obtained from the Department of Archaeology in Belmopan. The best time to explore is in the dry season—the underground rivers that helped create the caves can flood them during wet periods.

San Ignacio, also known as Cayo, or El Cayo de San Ignacio, is the major town in western Belize. Located about 72 miles from the coast, it was once a loading point for the chicle and mahogany that came out of the surrounding forests. Both industries have now declined, and San Ignacio has become a bustling agricultural center, serving the cattle, citrus and peanut farms of the area.

Most of the townspeople of San Ignacio are Mestizos and Mayan; and Spanish, with Guatemalan overtones, is the main language. But there are also storekeepers of Lebanese descent, and assorted settlers from far and wide who have found here just the right combination of pace, economic opportunity, climate, adventure, and rolling, unspoiled landscapes. San Ignacio sits in a valley, and the surrounding rolling hills, furry with vegetation, misty after a rain, are always visible from the declivities of its streets.

Across from San Ignacio is Santa Elena. The sister towns are connected by the substantial Hawkesworth suspension bridge, spanning the Macal River, a tributary of the Belize River. Together, the two towns have about 7000 inhabitants.

Cayo has the best hotels in western Belize, which makes it a good base for seeing the Mountain Pine Ridge area, the major Mayan center of Xunantunich, and smaller ruins. River trips, jungle walks, and an easy-going air will tempt the visitor to stay on. Accommodations are available both in town, and in unusual cottage resorts in the surrounding countryside.

Getting to San Ignacio

Batty Buses leave Belize City (Mosul St. at Bagdad, a block from East Collet Canal, tel. 227-2025) for San Ignacio at 6, 6:30, 7:30, 8, 9 and 10:15 a.m. The schedule varies slightly on Sunday. Most of these buses continue right through to the Guatemalan border. Novelo buses leave Belize City (19 West Collet Canal, tel. 227-7372) about every hour from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m., and at 9 p.m., passing through San Ignacio about two-and-a-half hours later and continuing to Benque Viejo. Sunday departures are from noon to 5 p.m. only. There are additional Shaw buses running between Belmopan and San Ignacio.
 
 
 
 

HOTELS IN SAN IGNACIO
 
 

Hotel San Ignacio, 18 Buena Vista Road (P. O. Box 33), tel. 824-2034, fax 824-2134, sanighot@btl.net. 25 rooms. $35-$85 single/$50-$95 double, no service charge. Add $28 for three meals. Visa, Master Card, American Express.

The best in-town hotel, located uphill about a half-mile from the Hawkesworth Bridge. On the outside, the hotel looks like a farm building, but inside it's rather pleasant, basically a concrete structure softened with extensive hardwood detailing, planters, a pool, deck with white-painted wrought-iron furniture, and lovely terraces overlooking the Macal River, the town of San Ignacio, the misty plain to the east, and the surrounding mountains. All rooms have ceiling fans, balconies, and private bath; higher rates are with air conditioning and television. The dining room is breezy and pleasant, with a menu offering a range from rice and beans to kebabs and lobster, for $4 to $10 a la carte. The bar has Formica booths with Formica tables, vinyl seats, and tropical wood panelling and screens—a typically Belizean combination of the best native materials and imported accretions. Other facilities include a travel service, gift shop, laundry service, and meeting facilities.

Just up the road from the San Ignacio is the Hotel Piache (tel. 824-2109, piache@btl.net). The owners treat you as family, and the grounds are lovely and gardened, with many plant species labelled for your edification. The 17 rooms are basic concrete units, on the small side. With shared bath, the rate is $20 single/$27 double, an air-conditioned unit costs more. Rates may be lower out of season. Meals are provided on request at the adjacent thatched, sapling-sided bar, furnished with the oddest collection of castoff furniture.

Back down in the center of San Ignacio are three economy hotels on Burns Avenue, the main street: the Central (No. 24, easyrider@btl.net), the Budget (No. 22), and the Jaguar (No. 19). There are about 60 rooms between them, all quite simple. Rates are about $10 single, $15 double sharing bath. The Budget has some doubles with private bath at about $20 double. Rooms at the Central are light and airy and larger than those of its neighbors, and the place is generally more pleasant.

A step above these is the Venus Hotel (tel. 824-2186, emorfing@btl.net), also on Burns Avenue, with 25 rooms on the second and third floors above the commercial level. Everything is brand-new and clean, and the rooms have fans and even wallpaper, though many are situated along inside corridors, with no outside windows. Take a look at your room first, especially in hot weather. The rate is about $25 single/$35 double with private bath, or $15 single/$20 double sharing bath.

The New Belmoral, 17 Burns Avenue, tel. 824-2024, has been totally renovated, and offers rooms with television, fan, private bath and other modern conveniences for $30 single/$35 double, which includes continental breakfast. Some of the rooms are quite large and pleasant. Master Card and Visa are accepted. The Plaza Hotel, 4A Burns Ave., tel. 824-3332, has 12 new concrete rooms above a furniture store at $25 single/$35 double with ceiling fans, $10 more with air conditioning, Master Card accepted.

If these hotels are full, adequate accommodations are available at the Hi-Et, a block to the west, at West and Waight streets. At $10 or so for a double, it's a Belizean budget bargain. The Hotel San Juan also has cheap rooms. And if absolutely everything in San Ignacio is full, cross the river to Mike's Grand Hotel in Santa Elena, where you can have a roof over your head for under $10 per person; or inquire at the Fruit-aplenty store for rooms.

In the hills around San Ignacio, and westward toward Benque Viejo, are half a dozen hotels of individual cottage units. Each is not just a lodging place, but a resort in itself, with its own special characteristics and advantages. Activities for guests might include horseback riding, river swimming, visits to archaeological sites, birding, and canoe trips.

If you arrive in San Ignacio without a reservation, call first to inquire about vacancies (from the telephone company office or Eva's Bar).

Maya Mountain Lodge, on the road south from Cayo toward the villages of Cristo Rey and San Antonio, is a farm and mini-forest preserve, as well as a hotel.

Cottages are set on a breezy hillside among trees laden with orchids (including the black orchid, the national flower). Each has a private bath, and hammock outside the front door, and many have a bunk bed as well as queen-sized bed. Inside, under the high thatched roof, furnishings and finishings are: screening around the eaves, linoleum floor covering, pedestal fan, hardwood doors, and pebbly, rough stuccoed walls. Creature comforts here include full-time hot water and electricity. The view from most cottages is a slope of semi-cleared jungle. In the morning, there are bird and insect calls—but no mosquitoes. Rates are $70 to $90 double, plus 15% service, and tax. There are also two shared-bath rooms at $40 double, making a total of 14 units. Children under 12 stay for free.

The food at Maya Mountain Lodge is some of the best at any lodging place in Belize. Meals are served family-style on a covered patio, approached at night along a lantern-lit walkway. Help yourself to seconds—nobody's counting. It's not the usual Belizean fare—the bread and yogurt are homemade, and the vegetables are straight from the garden. I recently had a good lemon chicken. The menu is fixed, but changes daily, even the breakfast menu. Desserts are fruit cheese cake, pineapple upside down cake, and the like; juice is fresh-squeezed. Be sure to let them know if you'll be skipping any meal. Meals range from $7 for breakfast to $12 for dinner, and superb box lunches are available for day outings, including fruit beverages in a cooler. Mixers and ice are available if you bring your own liquor (none is served at the lodge).

Owners Bart and Suzi Mickler encourage visitors to get to know the country and countryside. A collection of books and monographs on archaeology, natural history, and things Belizean is available to guests, along with board and card games. A guide booklet helps you find your way along a network of forest trails to the lodge's very own Mayan ruin, advising due caution for black poisonwood and other uninviting species. Plants along the way are labeled. Talk to Suzi, and you can arrange a guided tour of the garden, with edible and decorative plants, from annato through cow's foot and croton to tamarind, with over 100 species in between. The style of service here includes a lot of personal attention, if this is suitable to your tastes.

The lodge also has its own canoes ($40 for a full day), horses for trail rides, mountain bikes, and vans for land tours, and a swimming spot along the river. Trips are operated to Mountain Pine Ridge, the Pantí Trail by boat, Xunantunich and Tikal (see below). Package tours using the lodge as a base are available in the summer. Example: $300 for a three-day, two-night package including a river trip, tours of Xunantunich and other western sights, meals, lodging, and airport pickup

To reserve at Maya Mountain Lodge, phone 824-2164 (fax 824-2029) in Belize, e-mail adventure@mayamountain.com, or 800-344-MAYA in the United States. The mailing address is Box 46, San Ignacio. If you're travelling without reservations, and show this book, you'll get a discount on a space-available basis in shared-bath rooms. Call first from the telephone company office in town. To reach the lodge from San Ignacio, turn right just after crossing the Hawkesworth Bridge, then left and right again onto the Cristo Rey road. A taxi costs about $3. The lodge is less than a mile from the main road. Airport pickup is available for about $100 for up to four people.

I should disclose that I know Suzi from way back when, but I would recommend her place anyway.

About a mile and a half north of San Ignacio, at Branch Mouth, the confluence of the Mopan and Macal rivers, is Las Casitas Resort. This is an idyllic spot, with three high-peaked cottages on a hilltop, and grounds nicely finished with lawns and bougainvillea and hedges and concrete steps. In fact, it's suited to a higher class of accommodation than what you get: bare cubicles with cement floors. The rate is about $25 double, and meals are available for about $5 each. For just a few dollars, you can arrange to sleep in the tri-level hammock tower, or to camp out.

To reach the hotel, take the local commuter canoe (fare 50 cents Belizean) from the end of the road, along with locals, who walk through the grounds at all hours to the adjacent village. Telephone 824-2506, fax 924-2475 to leave a message.

Out on the Bullet Tree Falls road, about three miles from San Ignacio and encircled by a loop of river, is Parrot's Nest, which I endorse unreservedly because the originator was Fred Prost, creator of the Seaside Guest House for budget travellers in Belize City. Fred's new venture has four thatch-roofed units going for $30 double, and the name tells all: they're tree houses with some stilts for added support, and though they ain't for the birds, they get you right up there and into nature. Swim in the river, hire horses, hang out. Call Fred at 824-3702, or write to him at General Delivery, San Ignacio, or parrot@btl.net, to hold your place.

Cosmos Campground, a half-mile north of San Ignacio along the road to Branch Mouth (look for the yellow sign), will provide a tent, hammock space, showers, flush toilets, laundry service and cooking facilities. Charges start at about $3 per person per night.

Mida's Resort, also on the Branch Mouth road (tel. and fax 824-3172, midas@btl.net), consists of four round thatched cottages alongside the Macal River. The owners are a British-Belizean couple, and the rate is $38 single/$44 double, slightly less with shared bath. Campers can find space at $5 per person, and meals are served.
 
 

The Windy Hill Cottages are on a bare, exposed hillside about a mile and a half west of San Ignacio. Television is available.

The Indio Perdido Jungle Lodge is on a ranch north of the Benque Viejo road—turn right about six miles out of San Ignacio, then follow the branch road for another mile, along the Mopan River, to where a cable stretches across the water. If nobody shows up, beep your horn or shout. You'll be fetched across in a boat, by someone using the cable as a handhold.

What a lovely spot, with waterbirds fluttering about on the jungle-lined river. Accommodations are in thatched bungalows and lodge rooms sited on the edge of a pasture. There are 11 rooms. Bed-and-breakfast rates are about $40 single/$60 double, or $30/$50 with shared bath. Activities, centering on the ranch and river, include horseback riding and rafting, kayak trips, and river fishing. There's also a pool table and library. Baby sitting is available.

Note: The lodge has been closed but there are plans to re-open soon. Call first before you go out—tel. 824-2188. In the States, contact Le Grand Travel, 2600 Garden Road, Monterey, CA, tel. 800-833-9992 or 408-646-1621.

Chaa Creek Cottages are 16 white units with Mayan-style roofs, furnished with Guatemalan blankets and weavings. Common facilities include a round dining pavilion with high ceiling, candlelit in the evening, and semicircular bar and lounge opening onto a deck with river view. Always the best-equipped of the Cayo-area lodges, though, oddly, never too welcoming. Current amenities include watersports equipment and mountain bikes, and exercise and massage facilities. The rate is under $200 double with meals. Located four kilometers along a rough road from a junction eight miles west of San Ignacio. Book through travel agents, or call 824-2037 in San Ignacio, or contact reservations@chaacreek.com.

Off a fork from the Chaa Creek road (currently being improved), and also four miles from the Western Highway, is duPlooy's, set in hills sloping down to the Macal River.

Accommodations in the stuccoed stone buildings of the main lodge are nine river-view rooms, two sharing bathroom facilities. All showers are tiled, and all guestrooms have hardwood vanities, good mattresses (not the case in every lodge in the area, sorry to say), and screened porch. There is also a separate, six-room house where the facilities are more modest, and bathrooms are shared.

Rock-paved walks lead to the common facilities. Meals (except for breakfast, served in a basket on your porch) are taken in a screened dining pavilion with a view to the limestone cliff tangled with vegetation on the opposite shore.

For an afternoon and evening of relaxing with a drink in your hands, to the accompaniment of bird songs, continue to the Hangover Bar, cantilevered from the cliff edge and 30 feet above the river and anything solid.

Guests receive the attention of owners Ken and Judy duPlooy (from England and the United States, respectively). Ken takes people birding day and night—over 100 species have been sighted on the property. Other activities are hiking, and fishing for tarpon (occasionally) and tropical species that resemble snook and bass; swimming at a sandy bank (one of the few such spots in western Belize) and tubing and canoeing on the river; tours to Tikal, Mountain Pine Ridge and Xunantunich; horseback rides to Vaca Falls and to caves with Mayan pottery, with a return by canoe; and overnight jungle trips. A trip to Laguna Aguacate, near Spanish Lookout, for spotting keel-billed toucans, crocodiles and turtles, will cost $100 for up to four persons, a day trip to Tikal, about $90 per person in a group.

If you stay here, walk through the gardens to see the pineapple, limes, papaya, hot peppers, bananas, coconuts, tamarind, mangoes, oranges, watermelons, etc., before they are removed from their natural habitat and brought to the table. Beyond the gardens, the ground are mostly rolling and grassy. Or wander down to the tangled banks of the river, watch the leaves roll by, and listen to the music of the forest. Only the background hum of the generator, persisting until 10 p.m., reminds you that there are modern amenities here.

Afternoon tea and all meals are included in the lodge rate—$150 single, $200 double, plus 10% service, plus tax. Shared-bath units in an adjacent concrete house may be available for much less, without meals. Credit cards accepted with surcharge. Telephone and fax 824-3301 or 2057, duplooys@btl.net. Guests can use the lodge's shuttle service (from San Ignacio at 9 a.m. and 4 p.m., $5 per ride, or free with three-night stay), or take a taxi from San Ignacio for $45; or, with advance notice, they can be fetched in a boat.

Also eight miles out of San Ignacio is the turnoff for Nabitunich ("Stone House") on San Lorenzo Farm, just a half mile to the north of the Western Highway over a good gravel road. The eight simple cottages, each different, are on a slope below the farmhouse where an English-Belizean couple, Rudy and Margaret Juan, live with their seven children. Rooms are of varying sizes, some larger than others, not elegant, but neat, with basic furnishings, and naturally cool. The nicest is a sort of A-frame.

The view from the farm is commanding. Down through the meadow, across the river and up the hill are the Xunantunich ruins. You can walk to the site, fording a river on the way, or just gaze at the spectacular sunset behind them. Meals are copious, served in a lovely white dining room with great arched openings and a high thatched roof, and the menu changes every day.

There are no packaged tours, library or bar here, but you are not without diversions. Horseback rides can be arranged on trails that run through parts of the property that have been left otherwise untouched (cost is about $20 for the day), and there is a lovely swimming area down along the river. You can take off in a boat or canoe, or walk through the pasture and forest, pick allspice or a lime, go birding, or espy bromeliads and orchids overhead. Fishing for catfish can also be arranged without much ado.

The setting is genuinely homey, and the rates at Nabitunich are lower than at the other cottages: about $75single/$85 double with three meals, $35/$45 for room only, tax and 10 percent service additional. Extra beds are available at $10. Telephone 823-2309 to reach the farm. If you're not carrying too much luggage, you can take a Benque Viejo bus to the turnoff, and walk in.

Other countryside lodging/camping/roughing-it spots have been mushrooming around Cayo.

Chechem Ha, ten miles from Benque Viejo on a poor road, is near caves, and offers hiking trips from its cottages. Call on radio frequency 905.5 from Eva's.

Crystal Paradise, a couple of miles up the Cristo Rey road on the way to Mountain Pine Ridge, is a farm with guest rooms, operated by a Mayan family, and guests have expressed their approval. The rate is about $25 per person; slightly more with private bath. Horseback riding and river trips are available. Tel. 821-2014, cparadise@btl.net.

Countryside lodging is experiencing such rapid growth that the proprietors have run out of names. Two establishments bear the name Black Rock. One is Caesar's Black Rock, off the road to duPlooy's, and about six miles from the Western Highway. The last 20 minutes are by trail to a hillside clearing above a waterfall. The energy supply is plentiful: solar electricity, solar hot water, and solar pumps. Local adventures include river tubing and caving. There are six double-occupancy tents (at a daily rate of about $35 double), and a thatched pavilion eating area ($5 to $10 for meals). That's a lot of money for hiking and camping, so speak to returnees before you go out. For information, contact Caesar Sherrard, Box 48, San Ignacio, tel. 824-2341.

The other Black Rock is now known legally as Ek Tun cottages, tel. 824-2002, ektun@btl.net.

Where to Eat

Eva's Bar, at street level below the Hotel Imperial on Burns Avenue, serves breakfasts, and meals of steaks, and chicken and rice and beans, sometimes tamales and mole and chicken curry. A meal costs $5 or less, and is not at all bad. But you don't come to Eva's just for the food and the Belikin. Eva's is the hub of the Greater Cayo jungle telegraph. This is where visitors get together to plan excursions to Mountain Pine Ridge and elsewhere, where the local taxi driver can tell you about growing up in the bush and treating illness with native plants, where the Mennonite whose faith is not firm slouches over a rum and Coke, where the fellow who's been here a few days longer than you will give you the total lowdown. The expatriate owner scurries among the tables and behind the bar, seeing to every need of his customers. Scores of postcards from past patrons are tacked onto the walls. Hand-lettered posters announce new cottage colonies, tours, goods for sale. And there are NOTICES from the management. (NOTICE is a common Belizean word, you will find out.) Guatemalan handicrafts are on sale, to satisfy a market lacking in local production. I am sure Eva's will be immortalized in some novel of the Belizean jungle.

At 27 Burns Avenue, the Serendib is a pleasant restaurant and bar. Burgers and sandwiches are served, along with beef dishes and Sri Lankan curries and seafood. Your check comes on a little tray with two hard candies. "A" for effort. Closed on Sundays, and between 3 p.m. and 6:30 p.m.

The Red Rooster Bar & Grill, 2 Far West St., tel. 824-3016, fax 824-2057, hosted by folks from Colorado, has an open kitchen so you can see the cooking, and serves pizza, nachos and liquid nourishment. They cater to rafters and canoers and bikers and everyone else.

Out of town just over a mile on the road westward, the Kon Tiki Restaurant offers an honest menu of hamburgers, burritos and chili con carne, all for $3 or less at lunchtime, and dinner plates for $5 to $6.

For a change of scene, try dining at one of the lodges outside San Ignacio. Most will accept outsiders for dinner, and the surroundings are certainly more refined than at any restaurant in-town. Maya Mountain Lodge has consistently good food, served on a sheltered terrace approached by a lantern-lit walkway, to the mysterious accompaniment of the calls of forest animals. Call 2164 around to see what's for dinner (about $18 with service charge) and if they have room for you, and to reserve. Ask around among your fellow travellers as to the state of culinary affairs at the other lodges outside of San Ignacio.

Maxim's, a Chinese restaurant, is on Far West Street, which is a block over from West Street proper. There is no Farther West Street. The atmosphere is typically Chinese-Belizean—small, dark, plastic tablecloths—and so is the food—egg foo, mein, fried rice, and curries with chicken on the bone. So-so, at $4 to $7 for a meal. And there are the Oriental and New Lucky on Burns Avenue, with similar fare.

For snacks, the Farmer's Emporium, a general store below the Hotel Central, sells fresh-baked bread, granola, yogurt, and cups of the most delicious chilled, fresh-squeezed orange juice. Across the street, the Jaguar Inn serves hamburgers, and sometimes has game such as deer or gibnut.

AROUND SAN IGNACIO

With good accommodations, ruins and Mayan villages nearby, caves to the south in the Maya Mountains, and the clear, clean waters of the Macal River available for recreation, San Ignacio is a lovely place in which to spend a few days, comfortable in the midst of the tropical forest, and far away from the cares of anywhere.

The Hawkesworth Bridge, which connects San Ignacio with the village of Santa Elena on the east bank of the Macal River, is the only suspension bridge in the country, a substantial and unexpected engineering accomplishment in a garden setting. It is the Brooklyn Bridge of Belize, illustrated on, among other places, milk cartons.

Like many a town built on hills, San Ignacio has a certain amount of physical charm, arising in part from changing vistas available from different points, of residential neighborhoods, of the river flowing into the distance, of the hillsides all around carpeted in tropical forest.

San Ignacio has the air of an outpost of the British Empire, of the sort depicted by E. M. Forster, Paul Scott and Eric Blair, remote yet cosmopolitan. British Forces roll through the streets every now and then, along with an occasional Gurkha unit. Members of the Belize Defence Force jog double time. (Guatemala, and intermittent claims to Belize, is not far off). Horse-drawn carts of Mennonites pass by (the clapboard architecture and many second-story porches make a perfect backdrop), as do huge four-wheel-drive pickup trucks of American missionaries. And don't let me fail to mention the Lebanese, the Chinese, the Sri Lankan, the South African, and the Swede who make this their home. In San Ignacio, the natives do not appear to be at the bottom of the pile. Ev'rybody happy in Belize, mon.

In the days of the mahogany and chicle trade, San Ignacio was a fairly busy port. Craft called pit-pans plied the river. The trip to Belize City took ten days. The chicle industry has died, killed by substitutes in chewing gum, and timber and people move on trucks and buses.

Nowadays, the riverside below the bridge is a gathering spot of a different sort. People wash trucks, and themselves, and clothes, and buses, and horses, and picnic along the banks. If you have some spare moments, wander down, past where horses graze near the town center, and take in the scene. It makes harried feelings seem impossible. You can join in, or, for more bucolic surroundings, walk a mile-and-a-quarter north to Branch Mouth, at the confluence of the Mopan and Macal rivers, a popular, grassy-banked bathing spot.

Surprise! In a spot of dense jungle right above San Ignacio is Cahal Pech ("Place of the Ticks"), one of the most attractively and genuinely restored Mayan ceremonial center in Central America.

Unlike Mayan cities excavated years ago, Cahal Pech's center has not been denuded of shading trees, and the park-like archaeological site is alive with birds and forest mammals. Most of the structures were found standing and intact, so there has been little guesswork in the restoration. Laborers under the direction of Dr. Jennifer Taschek of the University of Oregon have simply taken structures apart, de-rooted the pieces, and put them back together, with a strong mortar topping to withstand modern foot traffic. For now, visitors have an unusual opportunity to look over the shoulders of working archaeologists.

Classic Cahal

Like most Mayan sites, Cahal Pech was occupied for centuries, during which its buildings were renewed, reconstructed, and covered over. It probably flourished in the Classic period, until about 900 A.D.; but some features, porticoes of corbeled arches, suggest a post-Classic occupation under the Toltec-influenced Maya of the Yucatan. And it could well have been an important center as early as 200 A.D. Dr. Taschek suggests that Cahal Pech functioned more as a noble family estate, or castle, than as a political capital, and was originally occupied by Maya-related peoples as early as 850 B.C. Cahal Pech is just one of the Mayan centers that occupy virtually every hilltop in the Cayo area.

Cahal Constructions

The main constructions of Cahal Pech are situated around two principal plazas. Most of the buildings, of the type generally called palaces, are long and low-lying. The eastern side of the main plaza is lined with noble tombs, long ago violated by looters, while "official"-type structures form the other sides. Some of the surfaces have been re-covered with lime plaster in the Mayan manner. Rooms are large by Mayan standards, and corbeled archways are wider than elsewhere, perhaps due to the strength of the mortar made from local limestone.

The building known as the Audiencia, on the west side of the main plaza, was probably used for public ceremonies, to judge by the rise in the middle of each wide tread of its stairway, a trick of perspective to center attention on any ceremonies performed there. The outer structure dates from the ninth century, but parts of the stairway and foundation platform, dating from a century earlier, are left exposed and unplastered to show of their earlier appearance.

Climb the steps of the Audiencia, and you will look down onto a smaller plaza that once served as some sort of official reception area. The large temple on the south side, the tallest structure here, can be ascended by a stairway and path for a general view of the site. About a third of the way up is an inset that archaeologists call a throne room and seat of power.

At the northwest corner, a narrow passageway leads through the complex. A dump found below its exit suggests that this was a service passage. To the southwest of the tallest structure is yet another courtyard, possibly a private reserve for the noble family. Excavations suggest that the residents lived in increasing privation, as Classic Mayan civilization declined after 800 A.D.

To reach Cahal Pech, walk or drive past the Hotel San Ignacio, along the curve toward Benque Viejo. The ruins are on a rise off to the south. They offer spectacular views of San Ignacio (also available from the nearby disco known, as well, as Cahal Pech). Look for the red sheet-concrete roof of the new museum-visitors center, where artifacts from nearby sites are displayed. Exhibits are planned to illustrate the daily life of the Maya. The center is meant to educate Belizeans about their heritage, to encourage preservation, and to discourage looting. There is a small admission charge.

Tipu, another site in the Cayo area, is the locale of an old Spanish mission church, one of the few that were established in what is now Belize. Pilar, a few miles west of San Ignacio, is a Mayan ruin that has not been extensively investigated. Both sites are unrestored, with little to attract the casual visitor.

Amusements

On any weekend night, and most nights during the week, drift along toward the sound of reggae music to find a place to unwind. The most distinguished name in dance in the Cayo area is currently the Cahal Pech disco. You cannot miss it, green and concrete and open-sided, with soaring thatched roof, on the hilltop south of town, next to the radio tower and microwave dish and Cahal Pech archaeological site. Cahal-Pech-the-disco is the dancing spot with the mightiest views in all Belize. It's almost within walking distance of the Hotel San Ignacio, though you should take a taxi to your dancing date after dark.

Airport

An improved civilian airstrip off the Western Highway is ready and waiting for scheduled flights. Until these materialize, an air taxi is the quick way back to the international airport and your flight home.

Auto Rental

Maxima Car Rental, tel. 824-2265, has junior-sized pickup trucks available at about $75 per day.

Facilities

Banks: The Belize Bank and Atlantic Bank have branches in San Ignacio. There are no other banks on the way to the west, but there are money changers right at the border of Guatemala.

The telephone office (B.T.L.) is on Burns Avenue. The post office is above the police station, up near the Hawkesworth Bridge.

Excursions

Easy destinations during day trips from San Ignacio are Mountain Pine Ridge (described above), the Mayan ruins at Xunantunich, and the Pantí Medicinal Trail (see below). The Caracol site has just re-opened to visitors. San Ignacio is also a good base for longer runs to the Belize Zoo, to several caves, the Crooked Tree reserve, and even to Tikal in Guatemala.

Mountain Pine Ridge is the most popular day trip from San Ignacio, and various operators put together groups, at about $18 per person. To get aboard, inquire at Eva's for Louis or for Chris Heckert.

Red Rooster Inn (see below) takes groups into the reserve for $30 and up per person, including lunch.

A full day tour of Mountain Pine Ridge by taxi will cost about $100, though some drivers will try to give you a shortened trip for the same price.

Tour Services

The cottages in the vicinity of San Ignacio offer tours to all possible attractions. Those run by the Maya Mountain Tours (at Maya Mountain Lodge, tel. 824-2164) provide the services of a naturalist. Maya Mountain Lodge will take a group of four into Mountain Pine Ridge for $165 for a full day; to Tikal for $300 for the day, or about $200 per person for an overnight trip; to Xunantunich for $70. A boat trip upriver from the lodge to the Pantí Trail costs $120 for two, $40 per additional person.

DuPlooys' runs a half-day excursion by car or horseback to Xunantunich for $50, a half-day boat trip on the Macal River for $60 per person, and a day trip to Tikal for $200.

A current provider of adventure excursions is Chris Heckert, who takes his clients out in a Unimog, which is a combination of Jeep and armored personnel carrier. Ask Herr Heckert to take you to Caracol. In a group, figure about $60 per person. He also takes groups on day trips to Mountain Pine Ridge ($18 per person), to Vaca Falls, and to a cave with Mayan inscriptions, using old logging roads impassable in conventional vehicles.

Taxis

Taxi trips (including waiting time, prices courtesy of the local taxi cartel) to the Guatemalan border cost about $15; to Xunantunich, $25; to Belmopan, $30; to Belize City, $75; to the airport, $88; to the Belize Zoo, $50.

To Flores, Guatemala, the fare is $150, and to Tikal, $200, or $250 if you stay the night. You can cut the price to Guatemala by more than half if you take a Belizean taxi to the border and pick up a Guatemalan taxi in Melchor de Mencos. You just have to hope that a Guatemalan taxi is available when you show up. See the next chapter for more details.

Canoes

Inquire at Eva's for Toni ("Bob's brother-in-law"), or call 2267, to arrange to rent a canoe for a float down the Macal River. An all-day trip, unaccompanied by guide, costs $30 and up, depending on where you arrange to be retrieved, and there are hourly and half-day rates. Canoes are also available from Float Belize, about a mile-and-a-half out of town on the road to Guatemala.

Rafting

You can also arrange canoe trips, and rafting, at the Red Rooster Inn, 2 Far West St., tel. 824-3016, fax 824-2057. A full-day float trip on the Mopan River (Class I and II rapids) costs from $30 to $50 per person, depending on the number in the group. Included are lunch, snacks and equipment. Half-day biking/rafting tours cost the same or slightly more, again depending on numbers.

For more adventure, Red Rooster also has river trips extending over two, three and four days, at about $40 per day. Pickup at hotels in San Ignacio is included, and there are small additional charges to fetch passengers at country lodges.

Horses

Various of the lodges around San Ignacio will have horses brought in for guests. Or, if you wish, check in at Easy Rider stables, less than a mile up the road to Bullet Tree Falls, where you can have a full horse for half a day for $30. They can also set you up for river fishing.

The Pantí Trail

The unusual Pantí Trail, a few miles west and south of San Ignacio, is where visitors may learn about native medicinal plants. One plant is used to stop internal bleeding; another provides pure water; another cures dysentery; others are poisonous. These are more than curiosities: many modern medicines are derived from the plants of the tropical forest, and the race is on to discover the secrets of the jungles before they are destroyed by land-clearers, and before university-trained doctors totally displace traditional healers. The trail is named for Mayan healer Eligio Pantí. Plants, which are all growing in their natural environment, are labelled in English, Spanish, Mayan, and Latin.

The Pantí Trail is located at Ix Chel, a farm named for a Mayan goddess and belonging to Rosita Arvigo, an American disciple of Pantí. To arrange a visit, call the Environmental Information Center at 45545 in Belize City; or dial 2188 in Cayo; or contact a travel agency. You can reach Ix Chel, which is adjacent to Chaa Creek Cottages, by taxi from San Ignacio, or by boat along the Macal River. A tour will cost about $15.

Dr Arvigo also gives five- and seven-day seminars in herbal healing, and even dispatches herbs by mail order (in case you're strictly an armchair traveller). Write to Ix Chel Farm, San Ignacio, Cayo, for details.

More Information

For general information about the Cayo area, your best source is the bartender at Eva's.

On from San Ignacio

Batty and Novelo buses for Benque Viejo pass through San Ignacio about every hour during the day, less frequently on Sunday. Batty departures from San Ignacio for Belize City are hourly from noon to 5 p.m. In the morning, catch a bus passing through from Benque Viejo. The first few stop at the town circle, near the police station and the bridge. Others pull into the parking area off Burns Avenue in the center of town. There are additional Shaw buses running between Belmopan and San Ignacio.

About 80 miles from Belize City, Benque Viejo del Carmen is the last settlement in Belize on the road to Guatemala. The name of the town is probably a Spanish-English corruption of "old bank," "bank" being a riverside logging camp. The name bespeaks the time when the border between Belize and Guatemala existed more in theory than in fact, and English-speaking loggers and Spanish-speaking chicleros, or chicle gatherers, both exploited the forests. The town's population of about 3000 includes many Mopan Maya Indians.

Though Guatemala is just a short jog away, Benque is a typically Belizean-appearing village of two-story clapboard houses with tin roofs overhanging second-floor porches, set amid haze-shrouded hills. Benque sprawls, its houses set wide apart one from another. If you're coming in from Guatemala, you'll be impressed by the rather substantial services available in a little Belizean town—a large police barracks, clean running water, even a fire station. It's also frankly Hispanic. You won't find a city hall in Benque, but rather, a Palacio Municipal.

Getting to Benque and Back

Batty Bus departures from Belize City (Mosul St. at Bagdad, a block from East Collet Canal, tel. 227-2025) are at 6, 7:30, and 9 a.m. Novelo's Bus Service (19 West Collet Canal, tel. 227-7372) buses depart every hour from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m., and at 9 p.m., from noon to 5 p.m. on Sundays. For Belize City, Novelo's departures from Benque are every hour from 4 a.m. to 11 a.m., from 5 a.m. on Sundays. Batty departures from the border for Belize City are at 7 a.m. and 2 and 3:30 p.m.

Accommodations

Benque has some simple hotels, if you have to stay here. Oki's, on George St. (the main drag), charges $6 per person. The Maya Hotel, on the same street, charges $4 per person. Hospedaje Roxy, at 70 St. Joseph St, on the way out of town toward Guatemala, is r-r-really basic. For better lodgings, if you're driving, look in at Nabitunich cottages (mentioned above) and the other lodges on the way to San Ignacio.

Border Arrangements

The Guatemalan border post is about a mile beyond Benque Viejo. The 6 a.m. Batty Bus from Belize City goes right to Melchor de Mencos on the Guatemalan side, connecting with a bus for Flores, the main city of the Guatemalan department of El Petén. With luck, you can connect at the El Cruce junction with a bus for Tikal. If you take a later bus for Benque, you'll have to walk or take a taxi to the border.

From Flores, you can travel onward into Guatemala by bus or plane, or to Palenque, in Mexico, by a combination of bus and riverboat. See the next chapter for details.

The Guatemalan Consulate is a few miles back from the border, along the Western Highway in Succotz, near the Xunantunich ferry.

Around Benque Viejo

The major attraction of the area is the nearby Xunantunich archaeological site, described below. But, as elsewhere in Belize, the human landscape is also fascinating.

Just outside of Benque is the Mopan Maya village of San José Succotz. The inhabitants are descendants of migrants from San José village in the Petén department of Guatemala, and the ancient Mayan customs and folklore have been more faithfully maintained in isolated Succotz than in modern San José. Mopan is the first language, and the fiesta days of St. Joseph (March 19) and the Holy Cross (May 3) are celebrated every year.

The site of Xunantunich ("Maiden of the Rock") is just northeast of Benque Viejo, near the confluence of the Mopan and Belize rivers.

The ruins of Xunantunich comprise the largest archaeological site in the Belize River valley. Indications from pottery and from stelae inscribed with date glyphs are that Xunantunich was occupied until about 850 A.D., somewhat later than other sites of the Classic period. The eminently defensible situation of the ceremonial center, with its commanding view of the surrounding countryside, might have had something to do with this relative longevity.

Though known to archaeologists since the late nineteenth century, Xunantunich was not excavated until 1938. A Cambridge University team explored the site extensively in 1959 and 1960, and started the work of stabilizing the structures. More recent excavations took place after looting. Only limited restoration and reconstruction has been done.

Visiting Xunantunich

To reach the ruins, walk or drive from Benque Viejo toward San Ignacio, about two miles, to the village of Succotz, where a hand-operated cable ferry winches cars and people across the Mopan River. Service is from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., and there is a small charge on weekends. Follow the dirt road from the ferry landing another mile uphill to the entrance, where an admission fee is collected. Bring a snack and something to drink, as there are no facilities for visitors.

El Castillo

At the heart of Xunantunich are three adjacent plazas laid out roughly along a north-south line. Dominating all is El Castillo (structure A-6), the massive pyramid at the south end of the main complex. At 130 feet in height, it is the tallest building even in modern Belize, but for the recently measured Sky Palace at Caracol, to the south.

The outer shell of El Castillo is the last of a series of temples and pyramid bases superimposed one atop the last over a period of centuries. Its corbel-vaulted temples were decorated with stone and stuccoed friezes, though these have mostly been destroyed over the years by wind, rain, and penetrating jungle vegetation. One frieze on the east side, from an underlying earlier temple, shows through the damaged outer layer, and has been partially restored. Its carvings represent astronomical symbols. The temple complex was probably once covered by a roof comb, long collapsed. A wide terrace, about one-fourth of the way up, once supported lesser temples.

The main temple at the top of El Castillo is a typical Mayan structure. Interior rooms are capped with the corbelled, or false, arch, layers of stones protruding successively inward. This technology allowed only short spans, so Mayan interior rooms are narrow and cramped.

El Castillo can be climbed on a trail that winds back and forth across its face—certainly a less intimidating experience than going up the steep staircases of such extensively restored structures as those at Tikal. Near the top, a set of concrete steps winds diagonally up the western face, an accretion as un-genuine and atrocious as will be found in any reconstruction. On the opposite face, in a more protective approach, a wooden stairway rests above the temple and shields it from damaging foot traffic.

Whichever route you take, from the top you can see steaming, undulating rangeland and jungle, stretching away for miles to the east; the Maya Mountains to the south; and Benque Viejo, and the lowlands of the department of the Petén in Guatemala, to the west. It is one of the most impressive views in Belize.

Other structures in the central area of Xunantunich include the small A-16, along the trail between the two main plazas, in the plaster of which Mayan graffiti may still be seen. It is sometimes called the "stela house" for the stela that was found in its rear room. Structure A-15 features a room with a built-in bench. Structures A-18 and A-19, on the edge of group A, flank a one-time ball court. Stela A-6, which used to sit in the plaza in front of El Castillo, has been moved to a thatched pavilion at the side of the plaza. It's a good place for you to get out of the sun. An altar from Xunantunich was removed to the British Museum in the 1920s, though its carved portion was sliced off, and has been misplaced.

Excavations at Xunantunich have yielded up objects of stone and obsidian, an abundance of seashell and jade items, a spindle whorl used to make thread, and what appears to have been a jeweler's workshop, complete with flint hammers and stone chisels. These, the variety of pyramids, palaces and ball courts, and the friezes and glyphs that decorate the buildings, are indications of a complex and well-ordered society. The Cambridge University team discovered substantial damage to the site from an earthquake, which might have been the immediate cause of the city's demise.

About a mile and a half north of Xunantunich are the Actuncan ruins. Pottery similar to that of Xunantunich was found there, indicating that Actuncan might have been a satellite of the larger center.

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