The next portion of our Belize trip required moving into the western part of the country: the Cayo. Thus we repacked our bags and got into the taxi to travel to our next lodging. When I had booked the Banana Bank Ranch I was intrigued and excited to read that it was quite isolated, actually nestled in the heart of the rainforest, only accessible by boat. "Accessible by boat" I had, somewhat naively assumed (and we all know what happens when you assume...) meant that we would travel to a dock and unload our bags onto some sort of water taxi which would ferry our band of happy travelers to our well marked destination into the welcoming arms of our hosts.
Imagine my surprise when our car heads off the road and parks by the side of a deserted riverbank. Our smiling driver leads us down a rickety staircase onto a tiny wooden dock where 2 beat up looking canoes are tied up. "This is the Belize River. Here are oars (handing us 2 objects that were clearly oar shapes cut out of 4x6 wooden planks). The hotel is that way (pointing down river). If you see any men on the side of the river...just stay away." "Wait!" I gulped out, slightly panicked, "what about the children? What about our luggage?" At this point I swear our driver was actually giggling. "Here are some small life vests for the babies. Don't worry about your luggage - I will take it to your hotel." And off he went.
Huh. My husband and I looked at each other. I believe he sighed. I smiled brightly and said, "c'mon kids! It's another adventure!" and we loaded ourselves carefully into our canoes and cast off, having pretty much no idea where we were heading, alone on a river in the middle of the central american jungle.
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| The Belize River with dock |
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| canoeing down river in search of our hotel |
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| luckily I had Captain Bligh to help me navigate |
We decided G would ride with her father while S sailed with me. Who knew such a cute little girl would turn out to be a raving she-devil on the water? But we bravely paddled on down the river, looking for any signs of civilization amongst the tangle of jungle greenery and vines. And we paddled. And we paddled. We did see some men dressed fetchingly in what appeared to be dirty loin cloths squatting on the river banks once or twice. They shouted what I'm sure were helpful hints in some strange language ("haha there go another bunch of foreigners down the river - let's hope they are eaten by alligators"). We carefully avoided them as instructed. Finally after conservatively 1 1/2 hours of wandering around, straining our eyes for any signs of any kind of lodging (and a distinct feeling of unease setting in on all except S who was too busy shouting commands, i.e. "Raise the sails, batten down the hatches, I'll keel haul the lot of ya!"), my husband finally caught site of a rope strung across the river. I didn't even notice it (although in my defense I was concentrating all my energy at that point into not throwing my delightful child overboard). As we got closer we saw that the rope led to a small empty dock where we aimed our canoes figuring we were getting out no matter where we were.
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| The Banana Bank Ranch - note the rope strung across the river was the only thing visible from the river itself |
And we were in paradise! The Banana Bank Ranch - which still exists although now it is much more built up and commercial (http://www.bananabank.com/) - in 1996 was owned and run by a Montana cattle rancher and his wife, an artist, and consisted of a few thatched cottages, a stable for horses, a main house where the couple lived and where the communal dining room was located (we ate family style with the owners and the meal consisted of whatever the cook felt like making that day), and the most incredible little zoo/aviary/orchid garden you could ever hope to find. It was a kid's dream. All located in the middle of the rainforest.
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| Tikka |
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| The girls and Tikka |
The BEST feature - at least as far as my kids were concerned - was Tikka, the household pet JAGUAR. Tikka had been found as an abandoned cub and was brought up by the couple who owned the ranch. Up until recently Tikka had been able to roam the hotel grounds freely, but as she had taken to pouncing the hotel staff, playfully of course, the wife pointed out that it might be better if she were left in her enclosure as some of the guests might take a friendly pounce the wrong way.
Tikka was not the only animal attraction. "Look over there in that paddock," the owner proudly indicated a small wire enclosure. "That monkey there is a famous celebrity! He is the very same monkey they used in that movie 'Heart of Darkness". Not wanting to miss viewing a simian celebrity. the girls hurried over to see the monkey. G, arriving first, grabbed the wire fencing in her rush to get the first glimpse of the movie star. ZAAAAPPPP!!! She was thrown back about a foot by an electric jolt - which we should have figured out in retrospect as what monkey in their right mind would stay in an open air wire inclosure without an electric fence. Startled, but basically unhurt, G recovered her composure and scampered away to investigate the other sights. (Later that day my husband approached the owner regarding the dangers of having an unmarked electrified fence around children. "You know my daughter got a shock when she touched that electric fence," he began. "Yeah. Shouldn't do that." replied the owner with a look that said only a city slicker idiot would allow their kid to do such a thing. My husband respected him for that. The Belizean local credo seemed to be "if you do something stupid - it's your own fault")
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| "Heart of Darkness" Monkey - he was opposed to signing autographs |
As many of you know I am a bit of an avian aficionado, thus my favorite part of the ranch was the open aviary which housed many exotic parrots and other birds. I absolutely fell in love with these little colorful toucans which flew around freely, alighting on your arms and generally being cute and friendly. There were also many (non-celebrity) native monkeys, peccaries, and other assorted creatures.
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| cute little toucan |
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| quite inquisitive |
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| G and toucan friend |
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| peccary |
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| non-celebrity monkey |
The ranch had a generator for electricity which ran from about 7AM to 7 PM. At about 5 PM each night a staff member would come around to your cottage to fill up your kerosene lamps as that was the only source of light at night. The cottages were well equipped with excellent mosquito netting (and fire extinguishers for the occasional kerosene fire) and had lovely little patios from which you could sit and sip your cocktails and watch the sun set over the jungle river. Dinners, as I had mentioned, were family affairs - the ranch owner loved the little kids and would frequently bring some little wild creature to the table for the children to see and touch. A particularly fond memory is when he brought this tiny little mouse deer and plopped it on the dining table whereupon it began to pee and poo all over in fear as his wife screamed at him to get it off, we EAT on that table damnit! The kids were delighted with this.
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| our cottage |
The Banana Bank Ranch was one of the best places we have ever been - my kids still talk about how much they loved that place. I fear now it will never be the same as I read they have a swimming pool and wifi and spa treatments. We were just so lucky to have been there before it was a tourist attraction. It was a little piece of heaven. And I didn't even get to the jungle horseback ride yet! That will have to wait until my next post, "Coracol and the Jungle on Horseback"
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