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Battling Neptune to a draw
Blog: Snarky Tofu - 17 April 2011
Oh yes, I know. Lazy, lazy travel writer I am, with over a week between posts and the last one was actually something I wrote up months ago. I have a good excuse, friends and 80 Snarky Tofu followers (I suspect there is some overlap here). You see, like Caligula before me, I can now lay claim to having battled NEPTUNE himself. And not once but twice.
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Relaxing is not something I'm good at.
Blog: Snarky Tofu - 29 March 2011
Lonely Planet Belize (fourth edition) now turned in, I am doing something called "relaxing".Having turned in all major files on Thursday, and cleaned up the minor front-end matter by Saturday, I found myself waking up on Sunday with the question "what now" hanging over my head.A line from the song "Feeling Groovy" (AKA the 59th Street Bridge Song) comes to mind....I got no deeds to dono promises to keep...
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Four Beasts in Belize
Blog: Snarky Tofu - 28 March 2011
Readers,Short break from writing, book all done. Enjoy the pix, more soon.JSB Iggy, who lives on my roof and eats fruit I set out for him.
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Scuba Diving Tips for a Family Diving Holiday
Blog: My Little Nomads - 23 March 2011
How to travel the world with kids: My Little Nomads Most emailed post: Tips and Advice for Traveling With Kids Most popular post: How To Pick the Perfect Greek Island for a Family Vacation
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Belize City: does it deserve its awful reputation?
Blog: 501 Places - 23 March 2011
I’d heard about its reputation before we decided to go to central America. I even read many articles advising those travelling in the country to steer well clear of its largest city. Dirty, seedy and dangerous were just some of the words that painted a very negative picture of Belize City. I had to go; [...]Belize City: does it deserve its awful reputation? is a post from: 501 Places
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Every Traveler’s Nightmare…
Blog: Snarky Tofu - 23 March 2011
T-3 days until deadline.This is a boxed text I wrote up on a most unusual POI (that's Point of Interest to non-guidebook writers) that I wonder if the editors will let through. I call itEvery Traveler’s Nightmare…
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No One is Sleeping
Blog: Snarky Tofu - 15 March 2011
Crickets and Geckos are competing chirps, and the moon is squeezing through narrow metal slats. I could close them, but why bother? No One is Sleeping, not in the village, not on the Peninsula, maybe not in the world, great parts of which are preparing for the cutting room floor. Why should I sleep? Dogs are grumbling, and people with them. This is not a quiet night, even though the wind refuses to howl.
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An Easy Edit
Blog: Snarky Tofu - 12 March 2011
In the final two weeks of write-up for Belize 4. At this stage in the game its almost entirely about editing and reduction. The writing is almost totally done (Where are you, Marie Sharp? Lonely Planet readers desire your wisdom), and now I need to chop bits out to keep the chapters at word count. I generally go a few thousand words over per chapter and then scale back, usually by first combining that which can be combined, then by scaling back on reviews I may have let drag on overlong, and then by deleting whole reviews.
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Terra's Design
Blog: Snarky Tofu - 11 March 2011
Last night was troubling even here in Belize, thunder and lightning and wind that left no doubt that even though they're made of concrete, the house I'm dwelling in still stands on stilts. Woke up, put on the coffee and had a stretch. Logged in for my morning information shower, and noticed immediately a series of stress flutters from back east. My ex in Korea...many friends in Taiwan....strangers from all over, all taking about the earthquake last night in Japan's. 8.9 and Hawaii on alert. Chile, Christchurch, Japan...next up: San Francisco? Los Angeles?
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Pecks of a Random Woodpecker
Blog: Snarky Tofu - 7 March 2011
What's that tap-tap-tapping on my wooden home? Lasts for 2 minutes, never more, then stops. I hear you. Things to do today: Finish coffee. No, I don't mean "finish coffee," as in "finish the cup presently in front of me" or perhaps "Finish the pot currently on the stove." I mean, "Finish Coffee", as in ...All of it. All the coffee in the world. From Nearby Guatemalan blends to the rare and elusive Taiwan cold press, and everything in between. All of it must be finished. By Me. Today. It will be a Herculean task, and I must be up for it. I need a cup of coffee.
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The Serious Travelers
Blog: Snarky Tofu - 3 March 2011
Earlier today I was breakfasting at The Snack Shack in Punta Gorda (good food, loudest blender in Belize) when two ladies on fully loaded bicycles came by. Jules & Megan, of Perth, Australian, were roughly at the halfway point on their Alaska – Argentina Journey. Their bikes had wide (not quite mountain bike, but almost) tires, front and rear panniers, bags and camping gear.
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Images from Southern Belize
Blog: Snarky Tofu - 24 February 2011
Taken in Dangriga; only shot in the bunch that isn't from Toledo.
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Five Spring Break Ideas from the Ciao Bambino Portfolio
Blog: Ciao Bambino! - 21 February 2011
The timing of school spring break holidays are all over the map this year. That’s a good thing when it comes to travel planning as it means it may not be as difficult to book a trip now for an April vacation. Need inspiration? My list of favorite 2011 spring break ideas for families ...
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Heading South with Botfly Boy
Blog: Snarky Tofu - 19 February 2011
It's been a week between posts, and a long one at that, long on travel, long on strange drama. The last week of research before the sit down, stay still, write and edit to be done (partially, at least) in the jungles of the Toledo district, where there is little outside of farm chores and the occasional interaction with scorpions to distract me from the work at hand. My friend Dave is traveling with me, heading to the farm to begin an extended stint as an intern. Getting into the mood, he has already become infected with a botfly and is determined to carry it to term.
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Saturday is Vertigo in Hopkins
Blog: Snarky Tofu - 13 February 2011
Hopkins is one of my favorite spots in Belize. A Garifuna town extending along the beach, a mile and half from north to south. Children walk around selling cookies and buns their moms have baked from baskets, dub reggae and punta rock plays from King Cassava, waves on the beach. I jogged a mile today to visit a Swedish / Spanish woman called Emma who rents motorcycles, my excuse was to borrow a pencil or something but really I just wanted to chat. I'd met her yesterday, and she seemed interesting, vital, alive, simultaneously mirthful yet not without a hint of Scandinavian stoicism.
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Flower Wars: Is Your V-Day Bouquet Destroying the Jungles of Belize?
Blog: Trans-Americas Journey - 11 February 2011
The dense and protected jungles of Belize are many shades of green. To the untrained eye the verdant tones run together in a blur of lushness—one plant virtually indistinguishable from its neighbor. But the growing number of Guatemalan slipping into the under-patrolled border regions of Belize see things differently.
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It’s A (Very) Small World
Blog: Trans-Americas Journey - 10 February 2011
So, we just spent two days at Cotton Tree Lodge in southern Belize near Punta Gorda (we will be telling you more about Cotton Tree’s big plans for chocolate in this region soon). While at Cotton Tree Lodge we met two funny, smart and interesting couples from Alaska–one of our favorite places on the planet. One of them, Rick, looked a bit familiar to us but we didn’t think too much about it. Until… Rick mentioned that he and his wife have a cabin near Cantwell, Alaska.
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My Trip to Paradise: Coco Plum Cay, Belize
Blog: Vagabond3 - 5 February 2011
I’m fresh off the plane from a week-long vacation with my girlfriend in Belize. And this wasn’t just your run-of-the-mill vacation either — we spent our 7-nights at Coco Plum...
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Mumblings from El Remate
Blog: Snarky Tofu - 1 February 2011
I cannot even write about past events at this point, even when paid to do so. This is a Bad Thing for the professional writer who relies on remembrances for lucre. Perhaps I should clarify. By past I mean anything beyond last month; I have many, many people and events fighting for my limited writing time, in between the endless travel and bread and butter writing of The Dream Job, memories with shelf life like flowers, or like fruit. In short order, the colors all fade unless I capture them in time.
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All Night Sino-Indian Intestinal Battle
Blog: Snarky Tofu - 30 January 2011
File this under useful information if you like - India and China are not friends, not on the geopolitical stage and not in my guts. In San Ignaciao, and presumably going to leave for Guatemala in an hour, despite having spent the night violently ejecting a bad mixture of Palak Paneer and Vegetable Chop Suey, consumed in too-rapid succession at two different eateries in town.
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Monkey Extraction
Blog: Snarky Tofu - 28 January 2011
Deep in the heart of Belize's Cayo District, just outside of Barton Creek Cave lovely assistant Misty had a run in with a Spider monkey. How much suffering has been caused by failure to let go, to release? A rhetorical question, pertaining more to the Buddha's noble truth than to this instance in the jungle. Still, Misty nearly lost an earring and an irreplaceable ear-chunk. The bewitching braid will never be the same.
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Vandalism and another birthday in Belize
Blog: Snarky Tofu - 24 January 2011
The Answer is 42. To the big question, the meaning of life, at least according to the late Douglas Adams, and also the number of times the Earth has gone around the Sun since the day I was born, 42 years ago today. I am sitting in a tire shop in Spanish Lookout, a place so well ordered (it's a Mennonite town, you see) that it sticks out in Belize like a pyramid of human skulls in downtown Manitoba. Why Spanish Lookout, and why a tires shop? The research armadillo became the victim of horrible vandalism on Friday night, along with three other vehicles in San Ignaciao.
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Squatter in Jungle Luxury
Blog: Snarky Tofu - 19 January 2011
For reasons which I am too tired to even try to fathom I find myself a squatter in a luxurious mansion in the middle of the jungle, alone in a fully furnished two story three bedroom house in which nobody lives. Except for an armed guard who speaks no English called Jose and two Mayan Potlicker dogs, there is nobody around for at least a mile down a potholed road.
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Spotting marine mammals: an exercise in pointlessness?
Blog: 501 Places - 19 January 2011
The boat rocks gently, engines off as the ten or so passengers stare intently at the surrounding water. Cameras are poised, ready to snap the moment when the prey emerges. Suddenly there’s a shout: “Eleven o’clock!
