The Jade: Belize

 Again, you're getting out of order pictures from three months ago (no matter that I'm changing the publish date so they'll seem like they got posted in March when it is in fact June). But here we are on the NCL Jade with our day in Belize. Many years ago (2106 maybe?) we did this same itinerary of a cruise, but Belize had to be scrapped because of leaving Tampa late thanks to mechanical problems. So, we had never actually been there. New country for us! (I might have all 50 states but my country travel is restricted to Canada, Mexico, Honduras, and Belize- at this point). 

Technically, NCL parks in Belize at their own private island, Harvest Caye. This is a little different from other private islands as food and drink are not included. But, it is still run by the cruise line, and has all the usual private island amenities: a nice beach, games, various water rentals, zipling, and a pool. Of course, you can always do excursions from here through the cruise line as well. 

But Harvest Caye also has a bit of a 'hidden' diy excursion if you will: a ferry ride to the nearby Belizian city of Placencia. There's no way to book this online, you simply have to arrive at the marina early enough to pay and grab your spot. They'll charge the ferry ride to your room (I think it was like $29 a person- kind of pricey, but not if you're treating it as your excursion for the day), and give you a wristband tell you when to be back for the ferry. You'll get a return time too- but it's not exactly set in stone. First of all, everyone runs on 'island time', aka lesuirly, and second, you can catch one of multiple ferries back, assuming there is room that day. 

The ferry ride is about 20 minutes, and the people who run it aren't NCL related. They live on Placencia and will tell you all about where you can go on the island when you get there, and some things you might want to look for. I had done my anxiety related exhaustion of Pintresting and youtubing, but it was still nice to hear from them. They drop you at the dock, which has a map of the area, including the long sidewalk you can follow along. That's the more 'touristy' area (though I say this, it's not like Florida touristy- just obviously catering more toward visitors than the parallel street, which is for locals. 

I was a bit lost in my directions, though the island isn't totally huge. The people there are very friendly, and many of them came from other parts of the world. We met a lovely man who had lived in Tampa and moved there years ago, shouting from his front porch about how much he loved Placencia and telling us his favorite places to go. Another man, with a lovely Bristish accent and a fun knapsack sent us one street over to find the grocery store. 

Our captains of the boat suggested we swing by the grocery store for the famous hot sauce on the island, we thought that would be nice to bring home to people, so we swung by. Everything was in Belizian dollars, which is worth about half as much as American. And the hot sauce was only listed at $4.50 Beliezian. Everything but the ferry ride turned out to be very inexpensive in American. Anyway, since hot sauce was so cheap, we decided to check out alcohol- it was also very, very inexpensive (and half off the listed price thanks to the conversion rate), a lovely woman who was a bartender there pointed us to the best stuff and we collected far more then we needed at those prices. 

The same local street also had a cute fruit stand, and next to it, a juice stand. We decided to plop ourselves down there and had a lovely chat with a woman visiting from the states, as well as the woman who ran the stand. You could mix and match flavors and we ended up with some kind of tamarind juice, which I just loved. It had a sweet and sour kind of flavor to it, and was served out of one of those plastic containers like a quart of eggdrop soup from Chinese restaurants come in. Asa and I shared it, while sitting on makeshift benches at the window of the shop and learned about how 'built up' Placencia had become over the years. It was hardly the 'built up' we think of in Florida though. It still was just a sidewalk with some brightly colored stops of shops and restaurants. But all very, very casual. 

That same street was home to this little green hut I'd seen on my spins around the internet. According to instagram, this hut (with no real name) had some of the best tacos. We headed up to the window, and a little old woman not more than 4 and a half feet tall, took our order and then proceeded to cook us tacos right in front of us on the grill. It was something like $3 American for some of the most delicious tacos I'd had in my life, so we tipped her very well. It might look like an unassuming little hut, but that grandma knew how to cook. I've been dreaming of those tacos every since. 

After that, we headed back to the 'touristy' sidewalk. There we stopped at a famous bar, or famous on all the travel sites for Placencia: The Tipsy Tuna. It was still early in the day, and we were basically the only people in the large outdoor bar. Again, the food was delicious, and inexpensive. Asa got a quesadilla, I got shrimp caviche, and we both got rum punches (that were just $5 in Belizian, making them $2.50 American!) 

The views there were gorgeous, too. While we sat looking out at the water, a mom and daughter came up to his with a bag full of handmade crafts. We had been told that many women and children came down from the mountain areas when cruise ships were in port hoping to sell handmade goods while their husbands are away working. We happily bought a few things from Carla and her mom, and they continued on their way. (There were also tables along the sidewalk for those who had a more permanent home base). 

By now, it was our time to head back to Harvest Caye. For whatever reason, there were not a lot of people who had made their way over, so we could have taken a later ferry if we wanted to stay longer, and we did want to stay longer. But, Asa had an excursion of zipling booked back on Harvest Caye, so it was time to depart. We made our way back to the docks, and then had to wait quite awhile on those working the boats on island time. While we sat there waiting, security guards were happily picnicing their lunch with coke and rum. Living the dream. 

Back on Harvest Caye, Asa headed up to do his zipling. Normally we don't book stuff like that, because it can be pricey. But this was a Norwiegan cruise, and they give you $50 every excursion for the first person on a booking. That meant zipling was like $20 if Asa wanted to do it, instead of the usual $70. (I didn't feel like it was worth it for me to do it for $70). So, we headed back to the beach for him to do his superman Zipline over the water, which he loved by the way. 

Harvest Caye is unique in its private island-ness in that it has a little animal/bird area. The birds were cool enough, and the reptiles were fine, nothing too crazy- but the Butterfly house there with the giant blue butterflies is not to be missed! A highlight for sure. We also played some beach Chess, and swam in the pool a bit to complete our Harvest Caye experience. 

Back on the ship, we had a nap and a lovely dinner at the buffet with crepes, before finishing up our day with karoke. It was early to bed for us, though, because our next day in Roatan was to be a big one!