An Adventure Unfolded

For those of you who read about the dangerous adventure repleat with dragons and jousting and such, the following picture will be familiar. It's a photo of the three members of the Corozal Men's Group who were able to make the officially sanctioned Men's Group outing to San Pedro on Ambergris Caye.

Dave, Craig, and Doug managed to get to the Corozal Airstrip and to Maya Island Airlines for the 7:30 AM flight to San Pedro. I asked a lady who was waiting in the passenger lounge (no lie - they have one) if she would be kind enough to snap a shot of us to mark the official kick-off of the adventure.

Tres Caballeros

The flight over was uneventful. We got off the plane and walked from the Maya terminal around the end of the airstrip to Ruby's Hotel.

Ruby's Hotel New Beach-side Office

They've changed things around some at Ruby's. The breezeway between the hotel and the coffee shop is closed at night, causing one to have to walk around to the beach-side of the hotel to gain entrance. The other change, as you can see in the photo above, Ruby's office is now located right on the beach, which actually is quite nice and convenient. Besides, they have a cooler and sell cold beer right there.

As our rooms weren't quite ready and it was early (the flight was only 17 minutes long) we decided to grab some breakfast from a nice little sand-floored restaurant a couple hundred feet down the beach. We stored our bags at Ruby's office and headed off to put on the feed bags.

Returning from breakfast, our rooms weren't quite ready yet, so we felt obligated to see if the Belikin was up to snuff. It was.

Doug Looking For Something

The above photo shows Doug rummaging for something on the lower deck at Ruby's while we're waiting for our rooms to be ready.

We had two assignments to meet for the weekend, neither mandated by the Men's Group. One, I've detailed in the previous post (http://winjama.blogspot.com/2011/12/expedition-returns.html), with the other from Craig who wanted to visit the Greenhouse, a grocery store with a great selection of fresh produce.

We spent a good bit of Friday just walking around downtown San Pedro, stopping in the odd shop or two and trying out a couple other places for food or drink, as Craig is ably demonstrating below.

Craig Enjoying A Concoction

After we got into our rooms and dropped off our bags, we rested for a bit up on the third floor deck at Ruby's. It's pretty nice with a view that is simply unbeatable as you can see by the following few photos. Ruby's is amazing. For $40.00 US, you get an unpretentious room, complete with fan and private bathroom. It's located right smack-dab in the center of town and right on the beach. Hard to beat.

Here's some of the views from the deck:

Looking South At The Cats

Straight East - Magnificent!

This next one is a bit odd. The previous night we couldn't figure out what the stairs were for on this pier. From the angle we had while dining, it looked like some large vessel would pull in and use the stairs, but that didn't really make sense.

Finally, with this view, it does. The pier is cut on the diagonal so a ferry boat can pull in without unduly rocking its passengers and load or  offload easily. The stairs go up and over the ferry thus connected both sides of the pier. Kinda cool, unless you have to haul baggage, tanks or whatever up and over. Then it might be a pain.

Odd Cut Pier

 This is the view looking north from the 3rd floor deck.

Looking North

 And a broader view looking South.

South From Ruby's

 Sunday morning, I just couldn't resist. The sun was beginning to peak through and the palms framed the cat just nicely, so I snapped this one.

A Nice Sunrise

These next shots show some of the development going on north of the cut on Ambergris Caye. Quite a few of these condo-cottages are being built. Some have covered observation decks, garages for golf carts, etc.

One of the Condo-Cottages

 This one I liked as it seemed like something we might want to try at our place if we ever build up the second level on our pool house. A living palapa as it were.

Green Cover For the Deck

 Here's a shot showing the garage at one of the places. I'm assuming the posts above are for a cover to be built.

While we were cruising around, we, of course, had to stop at a few watering holes and make sure everything was up to par. At the Palapa Bar, out on the end of long pier, we stayed for a few beers and convened the official meeting scheduled for the Men's Group. After appropriate salutations and libation, we adjourned and continued our trek.

Garage Example - Steep Ramp

And finally, here's one with a zinc roof as the cover. Turns out quite nice. I have no idea how much they cost, who the developer is or anything. If you're interested, take your own trip and check it out.

And With A Covered Deck

Saturday night, after spending the day carousing around the northern part of the island on a golf cart - interesting thing to learn how to drive. Simple once you get the hang of it, we went to Wild Mango's for supper. Great food, by the way.

Craig and I each had a nice 'umbrella' drink. Some concoction with banana and other stuff in it. I have no idea what it was. Doug contented himself with tequila shots.

Craig Being a Smartass

At some point, Craig got ahold of the camera and took some table-high shots of me.

Dinner At Mango's

We took the opportunity to toast our Men's Group brothers who were unable to make the trek with us. It was a fun weekend. We're looking forward to doing more - maybe at least once or twice a year instead of once every two years.

More Dinner At Mango's

Last thing on Saturday night, was a parade of lighted boats. I managed to get a photo of one of them. This particular boat had live music. The local school drum band was on board and cranking for all they were worth. Craig took some others after I had gone to bed. He reported that as the parade continued the nice orderly line of boats became somewhat jumbled at the end. Rum does have its effect, doesn't it?

Parade of Boats

And, finally, Sunday, at 10:00 AM, we mounted the stairs to the plane for our journey back to Corozal. Mae and their dog More, met Craig at the airstrip. Doug and I, being health conscious at that time, opted to walk home from the airstrip.

All in all a great weekend and a lot of fun. Of course, we'll make a formal report back to the Men's Group at the next meeting.