Crowd-free Central America: The far-reaching stretches of Belize are a cruisers long-awaited dream
It took me 20 years and three days to get to Belize. For one day only. Not quite the six-month Central and South America adventure I plotted aged 17, during a long summer waiting tables in Cornwall. I’d bought the travel guide (“If I buy the book, then I’ll go”) and loosely etched the route – Tijuana to Peru. But life and work got in the way, the trip was parked, and the book accompanied me through many a house move to now, where it’s sandwiched between Kitchen Confidential and Through the Looking Glass; well-thumbed, but never realising its potential.
When the opportunity finally came to visit Belize before the pandemic, there was no 40-litre backpack rubbing my shoulders. No long coach journeys to get there or bedding on a shoestring. This was a much more luxurious trip. My vessel was the 930-passenger Viking Sky and my starting point was Miami.
I arrived a day early, which I suggest you do, too, to allow time to soak up the sugared-almond Art Deco in and around South and Mid-Beach; to sip cafecitos in Little Havana; to spy the street murals in Wynwood, before taking a taxi to the cruise port. For two days and three nights, the endless ocean is the only thing in sight.
Having traversed the Rhine on a Viking river cruise almost a year earlier, I felt immediately at home in the familiar Scandinavian décor and ambience, retaining the laid-back and intimate spirit of the river fleet. No gaudy gala dinners, dinging casinos or long queues for anything (except the ice cream). More floating hotel than ocean cruise ship, with a Edvard Munch collection to rival some museums, a spa that would meld comfortably into the sleekest of boutiques and eight dining spots.
When we finally arrive in Belize, the port is a welcome jolt of colour. Now, this is where I should segue into a tale of how a snorkelling trip to the Belize Barrier Reef (the world’s second-largest after Australia), encountering nurse sharks and stingrays, dazzled with chromatic coral and healed my fear of predatory fins. Alas, Mother Nature put a stop to that one, too. It was cancelled the night before and we transferred on to the Xunantunich Maya Temple tour.
When the sunshine welcome turned to downpours of biblical proportions and back again several times through the day, I was thankful to be cosied up on plan B. Better still, the two-hour coach ride each way doubled as a sightseeing tour of Belize, taking us from Belize City in the east to the very west of the country where it meets the Guatemala border, passing through the capital, Belmopan, and San Ignacio for lunch.
“Every day may not be good, but there is some good in every day,” so says Jesus, on one of many positive scrawls on walls we pass.
Equally cheerful are the technicolour wood and corrugated houses stilted over green pastures freckled with dinky palm trees, and chirpily named shops and street vendors, such as En’Joy and Good Friends, selling tacos, tropical fruit and coffee for pennies. There’s even a Mike the Mechanic, which I like to think is a fun tribute to the English rock group. Belize’s time as a British colony is evident: Queen Elizabeth’s face (a much younger version) adorns the Belizean dollar. Otherwise, it feels very much Caribbean; almost half of its total border is lapped by the Caribbean Sea.
Belize is the least populated country in Central America with around 350,000 inhabitants, and 60 per cent of the land remains in its natural state. A land made up of far-reaching stretches of palm, mango, citrus and nut trees; red, white and black mangrove, tropical rainforest; and a crocodile-inhabited river that stretches for 180 miles. Our drive-by tour offers a window seat to most of this, while our guide Terese feeds us facts and anecdotes from the front of the coach. We learn about the national animal (tapir) and bird (toucan), and the 62 species of snake, including the “three-step snake”: “Because if you get bit, it’s three steps and you’re down.” There are turtles, too, basking beside the riverbank, and green iguanas, stretched almost invisibly along tree trunks. I know, because I spot them.
The coach drops us off next to a row of open-faced handicraft stalls, draped in brightly woven blankets and painted wooden masks, backing on to the Mopan River. For the final stretch to Xunantunich, we hop on to a centuries-old, hand-cranked ferry – a floating platform with capacity for around four small cars or 40 people, for the two-minute ride to the other side. Out of more than a dozen Mayan sites in Belize, the city of Xunantunich is one of the most popular. I expected it to be swarming with visitors, but even with us cruise ship lot rocking up (albeit, 26 in all), it’s gloriously quiet. The main draw here is El Castillo, the second-tallest man-made structure in Belize, which juts 130-foot out of the dense jungle that surrounds the site on all sides.
On the walk up to and around El Castillo, our guide points out a hefty termite nest and up to the turkey vultures gliding overhead. It’s 140 steps to the top, with plenty of places to perch for a breather. The same walk Prince Harry took when he toured Belize on royal duty for the Diamond Jubilee in 2012. After passing intricate carvings and alcoves filled with the stench and bodies of sleeping bats, we’re rewarded with sweeping views across the Cayo valleys and into neighbouring Guatemala. Silence bar the sound of unfit breaths, birdsong and hair-knotting wind. Belize me, as the souvenir shirts say, it’s worth the two decades’ wait.
The details
Viking’s 15-day Panama Canal & Central America cruise, round-trip from Miami on Nov 17, 2022, costs from £4,290pp, including flights, all on-board meals and tours (0800 298 9700; vikingcruises.co.uk). For more inspiration, see our complete guide to the best hotels in Belize.
Overseas holidays are currently subject to restrictions.
