…SOMETHING REAL…

What do you do when your hard drive fails? You go mental, right?

I haven’t updated this space in a long time mainly due to not having a working hard drive. One day it started shooting out “I/O access” errors then, next thing I know it would blatantly refuse to boot up.

Finally, after a couple of weeks of scratching my head, I managed to repair it. Thus, my system is working again but all data was lost.

I had many unfinished blog posts - they just needed some last minute editing and bits of TLC - but they’re gone now. If I were somewhere else, I would have lots of spare time to redo them. Not here, not now. I’ll see if I can fill that gap somehow.

…

A few weeks ago, I wrote an entry labeled “Where is the real Caribbean?” Click here to revisit it.

http://pauloishere.blogspot.com/2009/10/caribbean.html

Daniela, a cool Italian girl emailed me recently informing me that she has found the “Real Caribbean” down in Nicaragua and although a) it is far away, b) difficult to get to (by plane only) and c) it rains a lot, Corn Islands are everyone’s dream place.

Stubborn as I am, I maintain what I stated previously – there are no Caribbean beaches in Guatemala not up the Belizean Coast – so the nearest and truly amazing white sandy beaches are the isles officially known as Sapodilla Cayes.

Well, turns out that Carlos, the owner of the Finca Tatin, Livingston, Guatemala, used the above little story to promote his new “Belizean Cayes Boat Trip”. Escorted by a group of seven curious tourists (plus a baby), he asked me to come along (free of charge, of course!)

With a busy agenda filled with snorkel, snorkel, snorkel and even more snorkel…, the seven tourists (Mercedes, Javier, Lorenzo, Laura, Jake, Agustina and Alfonso), the baby (Sunny), the Finca Tatin owner (Carlos), the captain (El Enano / The midget) and yours truly, hopped on a large launch boat with a 200 horsepower engine and set sail towards our paradisiacal Cayes. 

With such horsepower - the difference is ever so noticeable - we crossed the waters smoothly & rapidly and in less than 60 minutes, we spotted the small archipelago, sitting on the distant horizon line, waiting for our entourage.

And as soon as our lancha passed the first islet (Ragged Caye), several cameras started recording the event.

Had to do a quick stop at the Nicholas Caye to pay the Marine Reserve entry fee ($10 per person).

 

Back on the boat, and surrounded by natural beauty, every single one of us was gagging for a bit of snorkeling already. Thus, even before we set foot on what would be our Caye for the night, we dressed down to our swimming suits, put on a pair of goggles & fins and jumped in the water.

 

The sun was hot, the sea water was just perfect, the coral reef was colourful and the rest is … just stories narrated via the four hundred photos taken swimming underwater, catching our dinner, strolling down white sandy beaches, getting attacked by sand flies, swinging on hammocks, etc.

 

  

C L I C K  H E R E  T O  S E E  A L L  P H O T O S!

Twenty four hours later, tired but very pleased, we were heading back to Livingston, Guatemala, knowing that we all took part of something amazing…something REAL...something Caribbean.

Ciao 4 now

~ Paulo ~