In our last blog I said we had made a long journey back to the states and a bike ride cross country not long ago from New Orleans to Kansas. From there in the US we went back to Guatemala and the Pamela Ann our boat and our old slip there but we needed to come back here to Belize to sell the rickshaw I built to get around up here. We also have use of a shop here and we were doing some work on our boat but not any more if we do what the customs woman here has said we have to do. The woman there at customs insist we import our boat here now. We ask her but how do you put a value on our boat and it being home built and why do we have to do that if we leave ever 90 days like the rules say. The rules have changed she said and if your here over 30 days you’re living here, you are no longer a tourist. We have people here that can come out to your boat and tell us what your boat is worth then you must pay us 20 percent of that value to import your boat. She finally gave us an extension for 30 more days but wrote on the Official Paper, “Last extension, ever!” We have 19 more days here in and Belize is over for us looks like. Remember we live on social security and paying that kind of money is just not possible. We are spending our finale days here working on our boat and doing things here in Belize. Lobster season is in and nothing is cheap here but we did splurge a little and went out for supper here Friday night. We didn’t do anything for our anniversary or Pam’s birthday so I said “Buy something good.” We had the house special, lobster. It was really good and I was surprised. Another reason we don’t eat out here is the food is just not that good here to us. It’s always rice and beans and a little meat mostly pork or chicken boiled someway or it’s tortilla something. Breakfast tortilla dinner tortilla or tortilla with beans and rice for the evening meal. Beans and rice is cheap here but not chicken or pork so if you order from where the locals eat it’s a little piece of meat and a plate full of rice and beans. The rice they like here is cooked with coconut milk and I really don’t like it or the way they eat it most is they cook the beans and rice separate and then cook them together a little. Maybe this is why they love hot salsas. I think if I had to eat pancakes “every meal, every day” I would end up putting hot salsa on my pancakes. An old man told us a long time ago that living on a sail boat and traveling you need to take your world with you ,your music ,your food and make your boat your world because you will miss it badly if you don’t. I could sure eat a big grilled steak from the US tonight but Pam is cooking what we call a gambler’s steak bought frozen at the Chinese store. The Chinese run all the grocery stores here in Belize. Sometimes it’s just Okay and sometimes it’s just not. Most of the time we don’t eat beef down here in the Caribbean. Beef can get really bad down here but chicken is a better gamble. Pam and I were both raised on farms so we carry a corn grinder to make our on grits, a meat grinder to make our on sausage . We are running out of sage and can’t buy it fresh here and good sausage needs sage. Ever think about surviving in the cold woods of Alaska? Maybe try living down here where it’s always hot and any shopping is always and adventure.
A very good meal.
If you can read Creole you know what it says on this Chicken Truck
Getting Rickshaw ready to sell.
schoonerpamelaann 