Jennifer, Carla, & Pat

We had a laughter filled visit with Jennifer, Pat, and Carla, a sister-sister-daughter/niece trio from Georgia, Virginia, and Washington, DC, who met in Atlanta and flew to Belize. I picked them up from the airport, recognizing them immediately as they walked out of the gate thanks to Jennifer’s forethought in sending me a photo of herself and Carla. We than went to lunch at Cheers, and then backtracked a couple of miles for a tour of the Belize Zoo, where we were lucky enough to run into Sharon who was walking around feeding chicken parts to the predators – which gave us an up-close and personal look at some animals we might not have otherwise seen.

Pat & Carla with a famous Moonracer Farm breakfast. 
We have no pics of Jennifer since she was always behind the camera!

The next day Tom took them into town to meet Selmo, who took them on a tour of Xunantunich before handing them over to Link, who took them kayaking in the Mopan. After a great evening visiting, they were up early the next morning to head to the Guatemala border, where they met Hugo who took them to Tikal where they both ziplined and toured the site.

The next day they were heading to the water taxi to continue their vacation on the cayes, but thanks to the late afternoon water taxis, we were able to get a full days of touring in before they left. We started with a visit to the Green Hills Butterfly Ranch, early enough to still see the butterflies emerging from their chrysalises and drying their wings. We then traversed the rough road to Barton Creek Cave, where Jose paddled them through the cave while Louie and I watched Mango the monkey.

We got out of Barton Creek around 1:00, and started the run to Belize City. It was Belize’s Independence Day, so none of our usual lunch stops were open and we ended up stopping for takeout at a Chinese restaurant in Belmopan. That was fine, except a new speed bump had just been put in the highway between Belmopan and St. Matthew’s. That would have been okay, except I was talking, laughing, and trying to eat the fried chicken Jennifer was passing to me…and didn’t see the new bump until I hit it at about 55. I said something I probably shouldn’t write, and then looked in the rearview mirror as I hit the bump, and it looked like Pat and Carla were in a snow globe as they bounced up, surrounded by the flying fried rice. Lucky for me, all three of them have VERY good senses of humor, and we all started to giggle. They cleaned up the rice as best they could, and all the way to Belize City we all periodically erupted into fits of giggles. The car smelled like a Chinese restaurant, but by the next morning when I got around to finishing the cleaning job that was already quite well started, most of the rice was dry and I just swept it out! We made it the rest of the way to the water taxi, said good bye, and they headed to the cayes as I headed home.

The school children of 7 Miles got a big bonus from these three women. Jennifer is a sixth-grade teacher, and Pat is a retired librarian, and they arrived in Belize with an entire suitcase of school supplies. Because they visited over Belize’s Independence Day holiday weekend they weren’t able to deliver the goods to the school themselves, but as you can see from the picture, the kids were very happy and appreciative!