Having spent nearly two weeks in Belize, living in jungle-like conditions without any of the comforts of modern life, my group of five explorers and two guides were looking forward to what our travel agent recommended as a modern resort. with sandy beaches. , a Chinese restaurant and excellent rooms.

As we entered the city, I began to have suspicions about how nice this hotel would be. I didn’t see anything that made me believe that a 5-star resort was on the horizon. Still hoping against hope, we all expected to spend 2 nights in a real hotel.

Suddenly the van stopped, here we were. The Miramarr Hotel, the place was a dump. A large two-story building with bars on all the windows. There was a Chinese restaurant, however I’m not sure what century it was last cleaned. Everyone looked in horror, were we going to spend two nights here?

Staring at the driver, he replied: “I didn’t know, I haven’t been here for ten years, it was wrong the last time I came, no one comes here.” I came to find out that the travel agent had not been here either, she was only referring to a brochure that she had seen. (must have been published by the local Chamber of Commerce).

Since this was the only place in town, and sleeping here or on the jungle floor were our only options, we started unloading the van. The driver was going to his house in a clean and warm bed. Immediately after checking in, it was necessary to go up an outside stairway to our second floor rooms. Getting into our room required picking 2 locks, and I noticed there were four locks on our interior door, which makes one feel really safe. Bars on the windows and barking dogs greeted us, this is going to be a great night.

All this travel and opulence had made everyone hungry, heading to the restaurant and past the bar we found several British soldiers passing the time getting drunk, can’t say I blame them. We had passed their barracks on the way to town, the barracks were situated under the road and due to the extremely wet conditions the men were walking in the mud all day. I was wondering what they had done to deserve to be stationed here, it must have been pretty bad. The troops acted as if they had been lost at sea for months and we had come to their rescue.

The restaurant turned out to be a buffet, looking at the state of the food I quickly realized that it would not be a good idea to eat vegetables, so my dinner consisted of whatever meat I could find and beer. (Bread was extremely stale, could have been used as a hockey puck).

We had traveled here to visit the Lubanaantum, the pyramid where Helen Mitchell-Hedges had discovered the crystal skull many years before. Tomorrow should be interesting.

With all four locks on the door locked, the windows barred, and the dogs barking, we retired for a good night’s sleep. It was then that I detected a stench from the garbage below, placing my hand over my mouth and nose and drifting off to dreamland.

Getting up early, he found a restaurant on the other side of the street where he devoured a pleasant breakfast. After a short drive to Lubanaantum the van pulled to the side of the road and the half mile hike to the pyramid began, up a one lane mud road walking past cows and mud puddles we reached the site. A lot of work is going on and the site should be restored soon. It is interesting with a great view from the top, one can see the Gulf of Mexico.

Before heading back to our luxury suites, the decision was made to try some local cuisine at a roadside food stall – great choice! Tomorrow we would be heading north for one more day in Belize, than back to the good old USA.

It had been an eventful 2 weeks, much had been learned about the Mayan culture and way of life in Belize. They have a lot going for them, and I expect the country to change a lot in the next few years, as they told me, they desperately want to improve their lot in life and all they want from us is our advice and knowledge, they don’t want our money. How I wish more countries felt this way.