“I pray thee, Rosalind, sweet my coz, be merry” (As You Like It) and she was when we met in a bar near Embankment station.
She had just come back from a holiday in Belize. I had been in 1973, doing a gap year commission in the army, and want to hear what it’s like now. Then the country had a Governor but was self-governing in respect of its internal affairs. It was a one party state led by George Price. The country changed name from British Honduras to Belize while I was there. The capital was in the process of moving from Belize City, on the Caribbean, to Belmopan, fifty miles inland. The idea behind this was to be safe from hurricanes. The roads were very poor. When neighbouring Guatemala had internal problems (often) they deflected attention by claiming ownership of Belize. I often thought I was in a Graham Greene novel.
Belize won full independence in 1981 with George Price still in power. Later in the 1980s an opposition party started to gain some support and now it is a two party state. Ros says that Belmopan is still a work in progress. People prefer living in Belize City and most foreign diplomats have never moved.
The terrible road inland to San Ignacio is now a highway to the border with Guatemala which now accepts Belize’s sovereignty. On the north side of the Belize river, at Spanish Lookout, was a Mennonite settlement. They had cleared the jungle, built houses and farmed the land. Their route to the outside world was by a chain ferry across the river. The ferry was just big enough for their lorry that took produce down to Belize. If they needed to visit San Ignacio they would use horse-drawn buggies. If you have seen Witness, a 1985 film starring Harrison Ford about the Amish in Pennsylvania you will get the picture.
The Mennonites are still there and have made new settlements in other parts of the country. Ros says the chain ferry is still there. I hooked a tarpon there one evening fishing with a spinning rod. Unfortunately I kept the rod tip up, usually a good thing, but the line broke when the fish leapt out of the water and the line took the dead weight.
Ros wasn’t there for the fishing. She was visiting Mayan ruins at Xunantunich. I went there too but had the luxury of travelling by helicopter. She also visited Actun Chapat, a chain of caves along the river that have signs of human habitation going back to 4,400 BC. They had not been discovered in 1973.
She went out to the cays and fulfilled a cherished ambition: to see sea turtles. The cays are a chain of small islands with the second longest coral reef in the world (after the Great Barrier Reef). Diving and snorkelling are both as good as when I was there, the main difference being that it’s possible for tourists to get out there now. I used to go on my brother’s sailing boat.
I bought a few stamps. They are interesting because if you hold them up to the light you can read “British Honduras” under the silver strip that reads “Belize”.
The bottom right stamp depicts a mountain lion, better known as a puma. They still live in the jungle but are hard to spot. Here is one in the Belize zoo.