Belize it!

Hello everyone,

We've returned from our trip to Belize and we had a B-last

First one is a pic of Sander and I breaking our second international law. The first is that technically I guess you're not allowed to travel to Belize without the expressed written (and notarized) consent of whatever parent doesn't come along. So I'm standing there at immigration when the guy asks, "How many?" "Two," says I. "Who's that?" says the nice man, "my boy" I say proudly. "Where's his mom?" "Colorado." "Do you have a notarized paper saying he can be here?" And this is where I stare blankly at the nice man who can now deny me entrance and make us sit in a room for a long, long time. "Um, no sir" I say, using my best manners and trying my best to not look like a kidnapper, but since I've never met or seen a kidnapper I'm not exactly sure what I'm not supposed to look like. All of which is very confusing to me, until I realize that a kidnapper surely looks nervous, and now I look nervous, but a good kidnapper probably knows this and tries to look calm, so a good cop would know this and probably be looking for calm, so I try to strike the right blend of "hey I'm nervous because I don't have the paper, but I'm calm because he's my boy and his mom knows we're here." I guess it worked because he said, "Next time have the notarized paper." "Yes sir" I say and walk into the baggage claim area where I promptly break International Law number two.

I take a picture of me and Sander in the baggage area because I'm jazzed that we're in a foreign country. That's us in the first picture. Well, of course that's illegal, duh. So a man comes up and says, "No pictures in the baggage area, see the sign" and points off towards the distance. I have to be honest, here, even with him pointing, I still don't see said sign. But I am smart enough to know that regardless of the existence of this alleged sign, the smart thing to do is to look towards the end of his finer and say, "Oh, no sir, I didn't see that sign." So that's what I say. He just shakes his head like I'm a total moron, or maybe it was more of a "I can't believe this idiot just said he saw a sign that doesn't exist. Maybe if I say, 'those fairies over there in the magical forest are waving at you,' I can make him wave back" nod of disapproval. In any case, he didn't take my camera and we were off.

Off on the plane you see next. Neat thing about this plane? One pilot. That's right folks, the co-pilot seat is reserved for paying customers. Good business decision if you ask me. Tropic Air (the "Airline") could either PAY someone to sit there and mostly do nothing, or have someone pay them to sit there and mostly do nothing. So if something happens to the actual pilot, the guy who has the stick is some random Spring Breaker with a "Belize Kissing Instrutctor-First lesson free" T-shirt. Oh, and has Sander noted, it sounded like the end of the plane was going to pop off. But it was only a 15 minute flight, so even if the pilot passed out and the tail fell off we could probably still glide in. Right? Neat thing is that when we landed on our island, there was a family with their dog picnicking on the runway. This actually gave me great comfort. I mean if the pilots were bad and/or the planes fell from the sky, would you picnic under where they have to land? I think not.

The next picture is of Sander driving. On San Pedro Island, everyone drives golf-carts. Really cool. But, you have to be 17, and you have to sign a waver to rent a cart that notes this and says in big, bold letters, "DO NOT LET YOUR CHILDRED DRIVE THE CARTS!" and it may have also said, "WE'RE TALKING TO YOU JASON ELLIOTT OF ASPEN COLORADO, FATHER OF SANDER ELLIOTT. DON'T LOOK AROUND WITH THAT FAKE 'WHO ME?' LOOK, YOU KNOW WE'RE TALKING TO YOU!" So naturally as soon as we pulled out of the rental place, Sander says, "Can I drive." Being the good daddy that I am, and remembering the pointed waiver I just signed, said "Nope." But then we found a dirt road, and the waiver didn't mention dirt roads, so I say to Sander, "Hey buddy, ready to drive?" Sander, takes 1,000,000th of a second and says, "Yes." That's him in the pic. Don't worry that his eyes are closed, he had it covered. He was a little concerned when I told him that if the cops pull us over to "be cool and let me do the talking." "Why?" says Captain Innocent. "Because its illegal for you to drive. If we get into trouble our story is that back home, we live on a farm and kids can drive on dirt roads there. So we figured it was OK here." I admit, very flimsy, but it was the best I could come up with. The good news is that there are only two cops on San Pedro Island and apparently they don't spend much time on rural dirt roads. By the way, Sander doesn't like these pics because they are "evidence." I told him it doesn't matter because "them coppers will never take me alive!" Then he gives me the same look and nod that the guy in the baggage claim area gave me. Any way, he loved it! He drove that cart for hours, we learned how to turn, how to avoid potholes, how to drive through huge mud-puddles, reversing, and other "off road" stuff. So everyday he asked if we could rent a cart and drive "in the country." The island is something like 5 miles long, so "in the country" is essentially everywhere but the paved center of town. Anyway, by the end of the trip he was an excellent driver, smoothing out potholes, picking his line through the water and avoiding obstacles of all shapes and sizes. That an avowed law breaker.

That's the first batch, next batch is of our trip into the Jungle...