2003-11-29 Belize Zoo 2003-11-30 Rafting the Caves Branch 2003-12-01 Jungle Biking and Cave Tubing 2003-12-02 Rafting the Macal 2003-12-03 Kayaking the Sibun 2003-12-04 Island Day 1 2003-12-05 Island Day 2 2003-12-06 Island Day 3 2003-12-07 Lamanai Ruins

Day 3 (Sunday, 11/30/2003)

Ian Anderson's Jungle Lodge, located a short distance south of Belmopan on the Hummingbird Highway, sits on the banks of the Caves Branch River, a tributary of the Sibun that flows out of the nearby Blue Hole National Park.  Ian Anderson is a cheeky British Columbian (and no relation to the rock & roll floutist by the same name, by the way) who founded the lodge with the idea of creating a tourist destination that is in all possible ways a part of its natural surroundings.  Ian tries to emphasize this with riveting after-dinner lectures on the parasites and venomous snakes of the region, often with detail a bit too graphic to make one care much for dessert.

With its gourmet meals, flush toilets (standard Central American rules apply), and queen-sized beds, staying at Ian's is far from "roughing it."  But it calls to mind a bygone era in which wealthy travelers lodged in such rustic but decidedly genteel settings all across North America, an era in which eco-tourism was the only kind of tourism on the then undiscovered continent.  Those who have visited the tea houses perched on nearly inaccessible glaciers high in the Canadian Rockies would understand the spirit under which Ian's was built.  It provides civilization in the wilderness without civilizing the wilderness.  One could easily imagine Teddy Roosevelt showing up in his khakis and boots and not appearing at all out of place here.

Ian's generates a limited amount of electricity to light the dining hall and power ceiling fans in the guest cabanas, but all other lighting is accomplished with lanterns.  The bathrooms are all located in outbuildings, and the outdoor showers are a rather clever contrivance made of holy buckets and Bunsen burners.

Our first full day at Ian's consisted of a rafting trip on the Caves Branch River, which flows right by the lodge.  The eight adventurers and our two guides, "Bones" Davis and Neri Chi, put in at the lodge in two rafts and proceeded downstream.  A few words about the guides:  Bones is a somewhat outgoing and offbeat Coloradan who plays drums in a Grateful Dead cover band, tends to break into Frank Zappa songs at odd moments, and has been running rivers practically since he was in diapers.  He reminds one a certain amount of Captain Ron but without the eye patch.  Neri Chi is a shy native Mayan with accented but impeccable English, an expert river guide and a student of Mayan history.

The Caves Branch is a mostly tame Class I-II river, the most dangerous aspect of it being the spiny bamboo that grows along its banks.  But about a mile and a half downstream from Ian's, the Caves Branch lives up to its name as it cuts directly through the mountains in a series of large limestone caverns.  The caverns vary in length from several hundred yards to a half a mile, pitch black except for the occasional "window" where the rock has collapsed to provide a brief glimpse of the sunlit jungle beyond.  For the most part, the caverns have relatively high ceilings (at normal river flow), but there is one in particular that is completely submerged and requires a quarter-mile portage through the jungle (or the ability to hold one's breath for a really long time.)

After a long day on the river, we returned to Ian's around mid afternoon and enjoyed a hot shower, a relaxing dinner, and a heated game of Scrabble.  I don't remember who won, but chances are it was Brian.