Belize: A Stroll down Dangriga and its Surroundings

Belize: A Stroll down Dangriga and its Surroundings

by Yndiana Montes

This is a portal designed for travel professionals who really want to be in the know, though sometimes we have to go at great lengths on something more than the final reading text, which is the hotel offer as such and the fact that we had always wanted to go to Belize, especially to Dangriga –the Mecca of thousands of visitors who come looking for “life experiences” rather than mere vacations.

And Belize, perched on the right side of this Central America of ours, abutting Guatemala and the Mexican Caribbean, guarantees this niche of increasingly growing markets. The smart traveler is not only seeking sun, sand, beach and shopping, but also memories that could live out for their singularity.

Thanks to the kindhearted invitation issued by Belize’s tourism minister Manuel Heredia and director Seleni Matus –we interviewed both of them in Barbados within the framework of the Conference of Strategy and Leadership carried out by the Caribbean Tourism Organization in September- we made our dream come true: we traveled to Belize for the first time and enjoyed a formidable schedule laid out by its PR agency. As a result, we can now write somewhat correctly on the niceties of these lovely and thriving lands, and our goal is to make you get acquainted with them.

Overall Facts

With English as the official language –the main legacy out of the British colonization that came to a close in 1981 without too many shots fired- the Belizean people count on a democratically-elected parliament and belong to the Commonwealth. The country’s population diversity makes a large chunk of the inhabitants speak, in addition to Creole, such languages as Spanish, Mayan, Garifuna and Mandarin, among other tongues.

Whites, blacks, half-breeds, creoles, Mayans, Asians and Mennonites coexist peacefully and harmoniously here, thus giving rise to all possible race-mixing permutations, except the Mennonites. These don’t mix races and have their own schools, hospitals, financial institutions and towns. They still live like their ancestors did back in the 15th century, moving around in horse-hauled buggies and wearing their old-timed garments.

It’s easy for Spanish-speaking visitors to jaw it up with these noble and educated people, always willing to help tourists and proud of a place where safety is the name of the game. It’s a pity, for instance, that out of fear many of them don’t venture out to see cities that are genuine architectural gems in the region, yet this is not the case of Belize: the formerly-known British Honduras inherited from its colonizers the order, the discipline and an unprecedented dedication to nature, an attitude that rewards visitors with evergreen lush and lavish vegetation, a completely safe environment for trippers who sally forth on a shoestring. Of course, there’ll be some small areas which are a tad tougher in Belize City, but this happens everywhere under the sun.

With barely 319,000 inhabitants, Belize offers a wide assortment of options for travelers looking for other ways of life and other cultures.

Dangriga: The Cultural Capital

The peculiar annual Garifuna celebration we’ll be referring to briefly is an ode to freedom. Garifunas arrived in Belize on November 19, 1935 when some of those dreadful vessels, jam-packed with Africans who had been plucked out of their mainland and shipped to America and the Caribbean as slaves, wrecked off the coasts of San Vicente. A considerable part of them made it to Belizean territory and settled down in Dangriga, a word meaning freshwater. They seldom mixed with the Creoles and remained in their settlements for centuries. The current population is just 11,000 inhabitants.

Dangriga is located in the Stann Creek district and it captivates visitors for its simplicity. To a naked eye, it’s nothing but an African village of wooden houses, some of them rundown, hemmed in by mango trees and standing against a backdrop of majestic Mayan mountains. In these villages, musicians huddle in the every corner to beat their cedar or mahogany drums which are made by means of a special technique.

Some 105 miles south of Belize City, the nation’s cultural capital –as Dangriga is known- is teeming with plenty of what many of us are looking for: authenticity. Down here nothing is painted through rose-colored glasses just to please the travel industry, and this is the key to the beauty of the “Settlement Day” which, as I mentioned above, comes around “every year” on November 19. What people do here only serves the delight of the very community, though visitors are welcomed by warmhearted people proud of their traditions and fully aware of how important it is to keep them alive. Race-mixing triggered a culture with a language and cultural expressions of its own that, as time rolled on, were recognized by UNESCO as World Heritage. And there are also Garifunas in Honduras, Guatemala and Nicaragua, and some of them come all the way to Dangriga to join the celebrations.

We won’t delve deep into the Garifuna festivities, but we can’t fail to mention how beautiful it is to watch them recreate what happened centuries ago when they washed ashore in Dangriga; the drums, the Mass, the civil parade and other celebrations. And a must-have dish that day is the “boil-up” or “serre la sus”, a very tasty fish soup heat-dripped in coconut milk with onions and spices, served with a mixture of green vegetables and ripe bananas. Yummy! We had it at Pelican Beach Hotel, the city’s only lodging, which is famous for its rich cuisine, top-notch service delivered by its staff, a bar that plays live music on weekends and a very pretty beach.

And in Belize no dish is complete without an icy Belinkin beer, produced by the Belize Brewing Co. and that can be glugged in three different types: stout, lager and premium. The original recipe hails from Germany, but the taste has endured some changes in a bid to turn it into real Belizean suds.  

But in addition to the rich Garifuna culture, there’s also the Cockscomb Wildlife Reserve featuring over 128,000 acres and perched on the city’s southwestern end. The Blue Hole National Park, as well as snorkeling and scuba diving sites on Tobacco Caye, South Water Caye and Glover’s Reef, are designed for the ultimate delightful experience.

On one of the days we stayed there, we were taken to visit a casaba factory called Sabal’s Food Factory and we made friends with an entire family that moved us for the painstaking effort they put into their basic operation. In this area, birdwatching, breathtaking views and waterfalls in the rainforest are everywhere. And if you’re really lucky, you could even make out a jaguar… or two!

Hopkins

Just a one-and-a-quarter-hour drive from there, you get to Hopkins, a bucolic paradise for those in search of more calmness and lovely beaches. Here, the population of Garifunas, Creoles, Mayans and half-breeds are far more in their elements. Many of them are medicine men, herb healers and there are even legit wise men that hold all the secret keys to healing certain ailments by means of plants.

Lifestyle in Hopkins is never taken in strides: men carve their canoes by patiently hollowing the trees they have felled for this purpose, and of course they beat their drums on nearly every occasion. Women carry baskets full of vegetables out of their own orchards right on their heads and wear their typical dresses.

Hopkins, a lost paradise where time seems to be standing still, is famous for its tours to the offshore keys, for sport fishing –it’s possible to take charters up to the most plentiful waters with abundance of marine life- and also for its boutique hotels designed for more eclectic groups.

There’s a major, well-outfitted hotel complex here, the Jaguar Beach Resort. We stayed at the Almond Beach section of it in which each and every suite is equipped with its own bathtub of hot water out in the terrace. You just can’t imagine the feeling of taking a bath out there, under a starry sky, watching the sea and the spectacular, well-trimmed garden.

There are no other large hotels in the Dangriga area, but two worth mentioning are the Hamanasi Adventure and the Jungle Resort, also in Hopkins.

To wrap things up, we want to stress that if your customer is looking for truly unforgettable and culture-laden vacations, or if he or she loves nature and is willing to try a completely different lifestyle in the Caribbean, then Belize is out there to provide that and a whole lot more.