El Cruce, Guatemala, 19/1-2007
Route: Chetumal - Corozal - Belmopan - San Ignacio - Melchor de Mencos - El Cruce
My original plan was to go to Belize city and stay there the night and cross the border to Guatemala the day after, but a plan should be changeable.
I got to the border around nine I think. At the border crossing I first met a guy that told me where to go, and it was therefore quite easy to find the imigration/emigration (for me) and then the importation/exportation (for Scotty). At the exportation I met a travel guide from Belize City, which recommended me to skip the whole Belize city if I did not have anything special there to see. He told me that Belize City was an unsafe place to be, and that tourists were often targets. Also in Belmopan it was not much to see, but he could recommend San Ignacio. I therefore decided to skip Belize city and go to Belmopan.
I then crossed the border. Fumigation of Scotty, imigration of me, and improtation of Scotty. In Belize they speak English so this was no problem. I then headed south.
The first thing that struck me was that Belize must be very poor. The houses, if you can call some of them houses, was very simple and moste of them needed paint. The next thing that struck me was that if you had something of valuable in Belize, you had a tall fence with barb wire on top of the fence. This was not what I had expected at all.
The roads in Belize has lower standard than the roads in Mexico, and for one strange reason they are using miles per hour as speed isted of kilometer per hour. The roads were scattered with sugar canes, and most of the traffic I saw in the beginning was lorries eighter empty of full of sugar canes. It was a sugar factory close to Orange Walk I think, so after passing there it was less canes on the road.
The weater was not to good eighter. It rained quite heavily at times, so this was my first day I needed to pack my stuff so it would not get wet.
Half an hour drive from Belmopan I stopped to take a picture. Suddenly I heard the crackling of a KLR. It was David from Wales. He was riding a red KLR650, 2004, bought in Los Angels and were heading to the Guatemalian border. We decided to travel to San Ignacio together and have some food at Eva´s resturant and then see what we would do.
After I had gotten some food at Eva´s, we headed to the Guatamalian border. Emigration and exportation from Belize was easy. Then it was fumigation, imigration and then some hours waiting to get importation of the bikes. I have to admit that the officer in the custom (importation) were some of the most slow people I have ever met, and the one that was going to import my bike in particular. It ended up with him crashing his computer, and another taking over, and then it was dark and pouring down.
The road from the border almost to El Cruce is gravel, and combined with rain you get mud. And now we are not talking mud, we are talking MUD!! Some places it was 30 cm deep and we had to cross small rivers with muddy that crossed the road. Some parts actually was not to bad, but some places I really thought that here I will not be able to ride. It was also dark when we did this ride, and therefore it was difficult to spot some of the pot holes.
We got to El Cruse and found a cheap place to stay. The standard was not very good. No warm water and the house was more like a shed. But it had mosquito net and that was good.
My original plan was to go to Belize city and stay there the night and cross the border to Guatemala the day after, but a plan should be changeable.
I got to the border around nine I think. At the border crossing I first met a guy that told me where to go, and it was therefore quite easy to find the imigration/emigration (for me) and then the importation/exportation (for Scotty). At the exportation I met a travel guide from Belize City, which recommended me to skip the whole Belize city if I did not have anything special there to see. He told me that Belize City was an unsafe place to be, and that tourists were often targets. Also in Belmopan it was not much to see, but he could recommend San Ignacio. I therefore decided to skip Belize city and go to Belmopan.
I then crossed the border. Fumigation of Scotty, imigration of me, and improtation of Scotty. In Belize they speak English so this was no problem. I then headed south.
The first thing that struck me was that Belize must be very poor. The houses, if you can call some of them houses, was very simple and moste of them needed paint. The next thing that struck me was that if you had something of valuable in Belize, you had a tall fence with barb wire on top of the fence. This was not what I had expected at all.
The roads in Belize has lower standard than the roads in Mexico, and for one strange reason they are using miles per hour as speed isted of kilometer per hour. The roads were scattered with sugar canes, and most of the traffic I saw in the beginning was lorries eighter empty of full of sugar canes. It was a sugar factory close to Orange Walk I think, so after passing there it was less canes on the road.
The weater was not to good eighter. It rained quite heavily at times, so this was my first day I needed to pack my stuff so it would not get wet.
Half an hour drive from Belmopan I stopped to take a picture. Suddenly I heard the crackling of a KLR. It was David from Wales. He was riding a red KLR650, 2004, bought in Los Angels and were heading to the Guatemalian border. We decided to travel to San Ignacio together and have some food at Eva´s resturant and then see what we would do.
After I had gotten some food at Eva´s, we headed to the Guatamalian border. Emigration and exportation from Belize was easy. Then it was fumigation, imigration and then some hours waiting to get importation of the bikes. I have to admit that the officer in the custom (importation) were some of the most slow people I have ever met, and the one that was going to import my bike in particular. It ended up with him crashing his computer, and another taking over, and then it was dark and pouring down.
The road from the border almost to El Cruce is gravel, and combined with rain you get mud. And now we are not talking mud, we are talking MUD!! Some places it was 30 cm deep and we had to cross small rivers with muddy that crossed the road. Some parts actually was not to bad, but some places I really thought that here I will not be able to ride. It was also dark when we did this ride, and therefore it was difficult to spot some of the pot holes.
We got to El Cruse and found a cheap place to stay. The standard was not very good. No warm water and the house was more like a shed. But it had mosquito net and that was good.
posted by Øyvind Thiem at 7:39 PM
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