The Best Little Zoo in the World

I woke at six o'clock in the morning, feeling refreshed despite the early hour thanks to going to bed early the night before. I sat in bed playing FreeCell and waited for Cha to wake up. In doing so, I managed to throw my back out simply by slouching over the game. I guess I'm getting to that age. Once Cha was up, we lumbered sleepily over to the big house for a delicious breakfast of fresh-made tortillas, beans, eggs, and bacon, along with fruit, homemade bread, butter, jam, freshly squeezed juice, and coffee. The elderly Honduran couple didn't join us until we were nearly finished with our meals. The wife and I chatted in Spanish about the climates in our respective hometowns. I translated for Charlie only occasionally because I always assume he knows more Spanish than he does.

We excused ourselves from the table and returned to our room to shower and slather on sunblock and bug spray in preparation for our trip to the Belize Zoo. Anna and Tim had arranged the outing for us, and at ten o'clock sharp a Suzuki SUV rolled up to the B&B, driven by our friendly guide for the day, Ángel. For $42.50 USD he would drive us the 30 minutes to the zoo, wait up to two hours, and then drive us back. He was a very nice, talkative fellow, and gave us lots of good info about activities in the area and in Belize in general.

When we arrived at the zoo, he walked us to the admission window and then gave us a quick rundown of the path we should take to see it all. The zoo was awesome: a steamy jungle of large, low-fenced enclosures that tempted patrons to reach out and touch the nearly tame wildlife. We had arrived shortly before feeding time, so the tapirs, deer, and an otter enthusiastically drew near to us when we approached their enclosures. There were barely any visitors that morning, and most of the visitors were adults. It was a nice change from all of the other zoos I had visited that are so overrun with screaming children that you can barely even approach the cages to see the animals. Also, the animals seemed to be much more relaxed and happy than animals at the many other zoos I have visited over the years. Zoos are usually a mixture of neat and depressing, and this one was just neat.

Tapir chilling in the shade

One small white-tailed deer maneuvered its tongue through the chainlink fence, trying to snag a leaf that was lying just outside. But it only managed to scare out the small frog that had been hiding underneath it. I took pity on it and nudged the leaf just far enough through the diamond shaped gap that the deer could pull it into its mouth. It munched happily.

We visited the spider monkeys and watched one swing by its tail.

Spider monkey chilling on a branch

Then we returned to the tapirs and deer just as lunch was being served. One tapir appeared to smile as it munched on a handful of leaves with its eyes closed.

Tapir siesta

Red brocket deer going after some leaves

White-tailed deer with antlers resembling melted candle wax 

We checked out the colorful toucan, which cocked its head to and fro to get a better look at us.

Toucan

Snoozing ocelot

Margay sleeping in croissant formation

We walked by a small enclosure containing a pond, out of which a very busy and excited otter leapt to greet us at the chain link. He anxiously paced up and down the fence, grunting and chirping, diving into the water and leaping out again. At one point, he floated upright in the water, looked us in the eyes, and rapidly clacked his teeth together as if to say, "I'm hungry!" I couldn't tell if he was actually starving or if that was just his normal excitable personality. He didn't look underfed, so I wasn't too worried about him.

Busy otter buddy evades good photography

We arrived at the area where the pumas lived and they were nowhere to be seen. The black jaguar's head was barely visible from where he rested deep in the leafy shade of his enclosure. We finally spotted a huge, yellow and black sleeping jaguar, nearly walking right by it without noticing. I spotted its spotted butt through the bars and pointed it out to Charlie, who exclaimed, "Jesus!" The sleepy beast raised its head to see who was making all that racket, and then placed it down again to resume his nap.

Sleepy kitty

Far on the other side of the neighboring cage I thought I could see black and white animal spots, but I wasn't certain. As we rounded the corner of the enclosure, Charlie split off from me to go check out a crocodile. I gasped and called him back to bear witness to the giant sleeping baby I had found, spotted belly turned to the sky, mouth agape. We cooed so loudly that it disturbed the slumberer who pressed his paws to his nose to resist waking, the same way my house cats do when we disturb their naps.

Awwwwwwwwww

Lights out

We were nearly finished with the zoo and I was glad, even though I was enjoying seeing these semi-tame animals so close-up. It was almost noon and the air was so steamy hot that I felt like I was suffocating any time I inhaled. Once again the sweat faucet had been turned on over my head, drenching my face and neck. Big tears of sweat rolled down my cheeks.

Our last stop was the harpy eagles where one of the largest, most beautiful birds I have ever seen, posed in a stately fashion. Indeed, the American harpy eagle is the largest bird in the world, known for picking full grown sloths out of trees for dinner. Her claws were bigger than my own hands, one of which she lifted and balled into a triumphant fist to show just what an epic creature she was. The only aspect of her that contradicted her appearance was the sweet chick-like "peep" sound that she made. I heard a nearby tour guide say that she was "Larger than Panama." I wondered if this was a direct translation of a Spanish expression that I had never heard. But as we moved on past the female harpy eagle's cage, I saw that the neighboring male harpy eagle was named "Panama." Best not to overthink things.

The harpy eagle makes the bald eagle look like a wimpy seagull.

Ángel found us as we neared the end of the walking path that wound through the zoo grounds. We visited the gift shop briefly and then quickly made our exit when we saw a hoard of tourists approach. I was starting to feel woozy from the heat, so I was glad when we were back in the air conditioned car. Ángel suggested we stop for lunch at a friends restaurant, but I told him that I was not feeling up for it. Charlie suggested maybe stopping for quick street food instead and Ángel said he knew of a small deli where we could go instead.

In a few minutes, we pulled into the driveway of a sturdy looking white rectangular house with green trim. It was smaller than a single-wide trailer and surrounded by boxes and parts of machinery. At the point where the driveway met the Western Highway stood a corrugated metal lean-to where three short women worked to clean up after a recent meal service. This, I realized, was the deli. We got out and Ángel inquired about food. The oldest of the women informed him that they did not serve lunch and generally ran out of food in the morning. All they had left at that moment was burritos. We all agreed that this would be fine, if they would be so kind to serve us. They obliged us with a smile. We took a seat at one of the brightly painted blue picnic tables and drank coke while we waited for our food. I noted the campout-like setup of the deli. They had a large sink hooked up to plumbing with two-inch PVC piping, where one woman stood washing dishes. There was also a rectangular table with two gas burners, on top of which sat large but lightweight dutch oven style cookware. To one side stood a prep table where the eldest woman, who seemed to be the boss, oiled a large plastic tupperware lid with her fingers. She would then use it to form tortillas.

One woman emerged from the house carrying a small bowl that contained 3 balls of dough. The eldest flattened them out in the oiled tupperware lid and cooked them on the electric griddle. I could hear the sizzling of the refried beans and chicken that would fill the burritos. The girl who had brought out the drinks and dough grated cheese into the open tortillas. After a couple of minutes we were served. These were far from gigantic American style burritos. They were more like flautas with just enough of a smearing of refried beans to glue the thing closed, plus a few shreds of stewed chicken. This was actually perfect considering that I felt too ill from the heat to eat much of anything.

After we had finished eating, we inquired about the price and offered to buy Ángel's lunch too. The total bill for three burritos and three drinks amounted to about $3.75 USD. When we got back to Twin Palms, we paid Ángel for his time and thanked him for being so awesome. As we got out of the car, we were greeted by Anna, Tim, and their three large, friendly dogs (the same ones I had heard snarling menacingly when unknown persons approached the property). They offered to arrange the cave-tubing trip we wanted to take that week and then invited us to some of their leftover turkey soup from dinner the night before. We thanked them and said maybe later, returning to our room. I decided to lie down for a while to try to recover from heat sickness and the nagging back pain I had acquired that morning. Charlie headed out to the pool to smoke and, when he was done, we swam for a while. After we showered, we returned to the big house, interrupting Anna and Tim's dinner to take them up on their turkey soup offer. Anna gave us two large bowls of it, with a couple slices of homemade bread. We ate at the poolside while mosquitos ate us. The soup was delicious, and we started a game of Qwirkle while we ate. Once we had finished, I walked up to the big house to return our bowls. I rang the bell, but no one answered. However, Smokey had seen me approach the door, walked up meowing excitedly, and then slid the door open with his paw to let himself in. I decided to follow and quietly left our soup bowls in the kitchen.

Can you spot the green and red humming bird?

Gecko regrowing its tail (probably lost in a battle with Smokey)

I see you!

Charlie and the terrifying guard dog

"Clyde Frog" hunting under the garden lamps

Another view of Clyde Frog

An armored locust-type insect

Charlie managed to beat me at Qwirkle by only one point, and afterward we headed inside to watch Planet Earth. On this particular episode, killer whales were killing baby seals. We found that we had run out of bottled water, so we devised a plan to microwave the hell out of the local tap water. I don't know whether or not our science was sound, but we didn't die of either dehydration or giardia, so I guess it was okay. After Planet Earth, we tuned in to a little bit of South Park, and then went to sleep.