Boxing Day

Monday, December 26, 2011

Boxing Day is a holiday in Belize. Not sure the significance--maybe someone can comment to explain?
It is also a holiday for my University so I felt no guilt about spending the day with family and friends.

After doing chores at the house, we set out by car. Up the Placencia peninsula and over to the Southern Highway. North on that, past farms. This photo shows a banana farm:

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Turned left (west) onto the Hummingbird Highway. Prettiest road in Belize. Bought gas in Belmopan (about US$5/gallon), then turned right (east) onto the Western Highway. Dropped in for lunch at Cheers restaurant (http://www.cheersrestaurant.bz/) without reservations. No problems! Greeted warmly:

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and promptly served our favourites: tamale and stewed chicken:

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Rhea and the owner discussed their mutual passion, horses:

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while I admired the palms:

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which grow like weeds:

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In my opinion, Adonidia merrillii is the quintessential Christmas tree:

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From Cheers, we headed down the road a bit to the Belize Zoo (http://www.belizezoo.org/). We love the Belize Zoo and try to visit our favourite animals on every visit to Belize. Alas, today we were on a mission. I played "delivery boy" and dropped a freshly burned stack of "Birds of Belize -- Belize Zoo special edition" DVDs for the gift shop to sell. This is an endeavor to raise funds for bird conservation in Belize. Many of the video clips are also on YouTube. To help you find them online--and as a shameless plug for an excellent conservation group--you can go to the Belize Raptor Research Institute (BRRI) website for a link to some of them: http://belizeraptorresearch.com/whats-new/. Check it out!

We continued east on the Western Highway to Hattieville, then north at the round-about to Burrell Boom village. Not sure of directions, we asked a young woman  on the side of the road for directions to the Castleton Race Track. She offered to guide us there in exchange for a lift--she was heading there herself. We chatted as she directed. Turns out she works at a call centre. I didn't know Belize had international call centers, but as clear as her English was, it makes sense.

Having been warned on the Belize Forums, we parked on the street vs in the parking lot. The alert was that getting out of the lot after the last race would take a long time as there is only one exit. We walked in and paid admission--BZ$5 each. Continued walking along the edge of the track to the grandstand. It was very crowded. It crowd seemed to be all Belizean, primarily Creole. We seemed to be the only tourists. That was nice. We do plenty of touristy-things; it was nice to participate in something Belizean.

Rhea admired the race horses in their stalls:

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And made several short (about 30 sec.) video clips she narrated:




The horses were thoroughbreds of high quality. Healthy, well-fed, well-groomed--excellent quality horses. I find myself a bit embarrassed to have been surprised. So I'll say it again: these were very good horses.

Rhea found an owner/trainer she knew from past visits to Belize and chatted with him about his horses:

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But I know you really care about the races themselves. I took snapshots of one race, and Rhea video clips, so I'll share some of the horses and jockeys getting ready, starting, and finishing the race:

Getting Ready--

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Track surface--


Loading--


Starting--

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Finishing the race--

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In short, super races, with great jockeys and horses.

We got out of Burrell Boom first (given our parking space--thanks, Belize Forums!) and then had the drive back to Maya Beach. Long day, but a very good one.