Map of Belize |
Placencia Peninsula from the air |
Road winding around the airport runway |
A modest home |
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Placencia
Belize is a small independent country of about a quarter million people, nestled between Mexico and Guatemala in the armpit of the Yucatan. Despite its Central American location, Belize considers itself a Caribbean country and it definitely has the feel of such. Historically it was in the center of the Mayan empire, and dozens, if not scores, of Mayan ruins still exist there today. Off the coast lies the world's second-largest barrier reef; combine that with the Belizian push towards environmentalism, and you begin to see why so many divers flock to their waters.
While visiting Belize, I stayed in Placencia, a small town at the end of an eleven mile long peninsula of the same name, which lies toward the south. As is typical of tropical countries, it is a sleepy village where the pace is slow and life is simple. The Placencia peninsula is narrow, ranging from a few dozen to a few hundred meters wide, and its length is spanned by a single, mostly dirt, road. (There are apparently few paved roads outside the major Belizian cities, and some of the highways are still dirt, making cross-country travel a slow process.) In the village of Placencia, the road is paralleled by a Main "Street", which is actually a sidewalk just tall enough to rise above the drifting sands.
An interesting thing about Placencia - while the road and the sidewalk form lengthwise thoroughfares, there are no "formal" routes to laterally traverse the the village, yet there are plenty of restaurants and other businesses without road or sidewalk frontage. It seems to be perfectly acceptable to walk between buildings and private properties to get from Point A to Point B. That takes a little getting used to, coming from an urban environment filled with "No Trespassing" signs.
It takes time to acclimate to Belizian life. Things are not rushed and hectic there, and you have to learn to slow down and relax; many hours are spent each day reclining in the shade with a good book. In fact, looking around town with a critically objective eye, I began to wonder what the local residents did with their free time. Other than a few restaurants and bars there is no "nightlife" or cultural attractions, the shops do not sell any books (other than the occasional tour book), craft supplies or writing paper, and neither is there any sort of secondary school around. This falls right in line with what I've seen in other "second-world" countries - people just live differently than we do.
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Two views of Main Street |
Colorful garden & houses |
The grocery store is in the blue building |
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