The Cat Boy

They don’t shout about the boat that goes from Belize City to Puerto Cortes.  The terminal is entirely dominated by the Water Taxi Express to San Pedro and Caye Caulker and the plethora of men in their bottle-green jackets, there isn’t even a sign telling you where to get tickets for the Honduras boat, you just have to ask around until you find someone who knows.  Once I did find the right person – ‘the lady will be in the cashier 1 window, but she isn’t there yet’ – the advice was – ‘it’s the blue boat, not the green one’.  Sound. 

The morning had started with a quick coffee courtesy of the delightful Red Hut Inn – highly recommended if you happen to find yourself in Belize City and want somewhere quiet and chilled, with a roof terrace obviously, where you can swing in a hammock.  You can take your own food or walk to nearby eateries.  There is a fridge full of soft drinks and beer – help yourself and add it to your tab.

The taxi driver came as requested at 7.30am.  I shared the vehicle with one of my American friends from last night who had unfortunately left her camera on Caye Caulker so was heading back there to retrieve it as it had been found! I can sympathise, having left important things strewn across the world, ranging from someone else’s video camera in Cambodia, to my passport in Australia, to all of my clothes in Hong Kong.  So far this trip I have only left my shower gel and shampoo in the shower at Sandbar in San Pedro, but there’s still time.

The taxi driver sounded disconcertingly familiar – he is from Ilford! This surreal travelling life – you’re in a residential backstreet on the outskirts of a Central American capital, taking a cab to a port to go to Honduras, and the cab driver is from Ilford – “Central Line innit”!

I sat and waited for cashier 1 window to open – she was in no hurry.  Once she had opened, I swiftly purchased my ticket then went in search of some breakfast, enjoying coffee and scrambled egg in a little café in the long avenue of tourist places which line the path to the port.

In my head, I’d drawn a mental picture of the boat, as one does.  I was envisaging an Isle of Wight style ferry, huge with multiple levels, a massive queue of people waiting to board, a café/bar with copious snacks and drinks.  The boat arrived.  It was about as overwhelming as the underwhelming bridge – which was not overwhelming at all (that will make sense if you’ve followed the whole blog – you deserve a medal if so)

I parted with my giant orange tortoise which has served me so well these last few days and clambered aboard.  I smiled at some backpackers and The Cat Boy with whom I would later share a vehicle.  This time the staff wore white or blue t-shirts, or generic t-shirts – it wasn’t disconcerting at all when I had to hand my passport over to someone in a t-shirt he probably got from the Belizean equivalent of Primark. 

They explained that in 1.5 hours, we would be going through Belizean immigration, that our passports would be collected and that we would pay the departure tax.   I resolved to read the other half of my book for that time.  I have nearly finished it and am still waiting for something to happen.  The crossing was fine initially.  I read, observed, enjoyed the gentle spray as it brushed my face periodically.  We got to immigration and Bob Marley joined the boat, which gave it a bit more character.  The boat staff sorted out the passports – we even paid them the departure tax.  I always feel a bit nervous when my passport isn’t in my possession, for obvious reasons.  I’ve had it strapped to my waist in my trusty money-belt since starting the travelling leg of this adventure, so didn’t feel right without it.  That said, there are copies of it in at least three different places, so that would make it easier to get a replacement if needed, although it would take time and be a palaver.  I had to do that when I got mugged in Ghana – I ended up with a shiny new passport which said ‘Place of Issue – British High Commission Accra’ which was a bit of a novelty, but not the reason for needing a new passport – that was terrifying.

It was after we left the immigration point that the water became much choppier.  They had said that it might get a bit choppy, but I wasn’t worried – how bad could it be?

Think all of those dreadful nightmarish rides at Chessington, Thorpe Park, those sort of places – combine all of those stomach-churning situations into the worse possible feeling of nausea, of crashing through waves with such veracity that you feel like you’ve left various internal organs behind.  I tried to lie down, I tried to close my eyes, I tried to stand up and stick my head out of the window, nothing worked.  Sweat poured out of my every pore and I felt dreadful.  I sat with my head between my legs, I could feel myself turning green.  Usually when someone tells me they feel travel-sick, I give them a piece of newspaper to sit on, which works a treat.  There wasn’t any newspaper to hand on this occasion.

I looked up to see one of the blue-clad men kindly offering me a bag into which to vomit, which I duly did.  I thought about calling this entry ‘Vomiting in No Man’s Land’, but I wasn’t sure you would read it.  I haven’t been sick like this since my Guatemala anti-malarials had a run-in with my Rwanda anti-malarials – that was equally unpleasant.

I hasten to add that several other people were sick as well, it wasn’t just me.  I have never been travel-sick, although I did used to feel a bit woozy on the DLR.

The trip was about 5 hours – if you look at a map you can see the physical distance – it’s certainly more than the 2 inches on the map.  The underwhelming boat left Belize City at about 10am and arrived at Puerto Cortes at about 3pm.  It is a very long way and I would not do it again except in an emergency.    

We finally reached calmer waters and pulled into Puerto Cortes, then lined up for the immigration procedures.  They had one of those finger-printing machines like they do in the US, but I had just sprayed Deet onto my feet, then covered my hands in anti-bac, as one done, plus I have double-jointed thumbs like a pterodactyl, so not only did my fingers not show as having fingerprints, my funny thumbs wouldn’t fit onto the machine either! So they nearly didn’t let me in to Honduras. 

An epic six further hours of travel followed, including log-jams in the traffic of Puerto Cortes, a long-distance bus to Tegucigalpa from where I now write, having met an actual angel at the bus station.  But I’ll write more about all that in the next instalment.  That and the Cat Boy.