Time has come to
settle into something of a routine. Daily entries will become weekly
entries unless something extraordinary occurs. I will not do the Day
4, Day 5 routine anymore.
As I go to the
Village to eat or shop, I will highlight “Bill's Favs” on a new
tab. Today I took my first trip to the Village since I arrived on
Wednesday. I have been settling in and getting comfortable once again
with my own company and allowing myself to adjust to the new pace. I
do take one day at a time. I went to the Above Grounds Coffee Shop
and rather than have coffee, I opted for a large lime juice ($7
BZ/$4.50 US) which I needed!
I left my place
around 10 am, crossed the canal aainst a strong head wind, tied my
boat up on the other side. I made a mistake and wore a pair of slide
on sandals that I could not keep on my feet! It took me probably
twic as long to get to the main street as it should have! I'll give
that pair to a thrift store in the Village next trip in. I wanted to
get a second steel cable to use on one side of the canal or the other
to lock the boat up.
I was exhausted
just getting to the main pier in town. The temps were heating up.
Fortunately, Above Grounds is almost right at the intersection of my
road to the main drag, hence my choice of a Lime juice! Yum...
I took a walk
around down by the main pier in town, found only one market open
(Chinese run) and picked up a couple of items. The nearest hardware
store was closed. Most small shops (hell, they are all small private
shops! Entrepenurial spirit is alive and well here!) seem to be open
and a fair number of beach goers were mulling about.
There is a famous
4 foot wide boardwalk (no bike allowed) that stretches for I think a
mile starting at the pier and heading north, providing easy access to
many resorts along the shore line. I took it for a stretch, but quite
honestly, I was tired, tired of screwing around with my sandals! I
took a short cut back through a neighborhood and stopped at the
market to get my items, including a coconut water, which I sorely
needed. So my excursion was about an hour and quite honestly I was
glad to return home.
The heat of the
day is not my best time. I will probably adjust my walks to go try
the many eateries earlier in the day for breakfast, or late in the
afternoon for dinner. One I will get to again was Dawn's Walk N' Go,
small outside place run by a charming black woman. Mike and Gayle
met her on their trip down last year and recommended the place to me.
We ate there on Weds but I was feeling the heat and the trip down and
let Gayle and Mike have my chicken meal. Well, actually, I was to
take Gayle's half of hers and my own with me, but I left it and my
two new pairs of shorts in their car!
There are a
reasonable spectrum of places to eat, including Mexican, creole,
Chinese, Italian, and I read about a Austrian restaurant. The major
resorts also have top end eats as well.
So far, I seem to
sleep fine and awake about 5:30 or so, grab another shower (finish
the day with a shower as well), and make coffee. I read my morning
devotionals and meditate on the porch. I have a good selection of
novels here, so I am working my way through the collection and read a
few pages. Read an old classic by Steinbeck, “Of Mice and Men”
and I started on T.S. Eliot's play entitled, “Murder in the
Catherdral.”
Still spend way to
much time on the internet, but that pattern is also beginning to
morph into self limiting behavior.
The bedroom has a
door and there is a small AC unit that I tried out the second night.
It seems under powered or inefficient as there is really no way to
truly close windows here! The windows are a typical Belizean style
with slats that close, but not tightly (no glass windows, just
screens)...just one of the many small differences between here and
the comforts we take for granted in the states. I woke up sweating
about 4 am and just opened the windows again and caught the breeze.
Looks like the average electric bill for this house is about $15-$25/
month. Well, you just adjust...no sense complaining! A nice breeze
blows almost constantly, and a rain shower hits usually in the middle
of the night for a few minutes and maybe mid afternoon. To hear the
sound of rain falling on a tin roof is a comfortable sensation.
Besides the
Iguana, nothing has appeared to attck me in the night.
Happy Easter
Sunday from Paradise everyone!
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