December 4, 2025
Last month, I took a 5-day trip to Belize, a country which I came to realize most people have never heard of. When I was originally explaining my itinerary to coworkers, I had to show most of them where it is on a map. For anyone who is in a similar boat, Belize is a Central American country about 300 miles south of Cancun, Mexico on the Caribbean Sea.
Now, let’s dive into why I went there.
Of course, if you know me you’ll know I have a life goal of visiting every country, so basically everywhere is on my list. Why Belize?
Well, I hadn’t done a new country since my Asia trip this past spring, with my 14th country having been Singapore. I was itching to travel somewhere new, and I stumbled across the idea of doing Belize. It is the only majority English-speaking country in Central America, and has a mix of ancient Mayan sites and beautiful islands, so it seemed perfect for a short getaway. I also decided to do it with a friend from work, Dylan, who wants to do more traveling.
Long story short, we had a great time, full of both adventures and relaxation, and I’ll get to that over the course of a few posts.
But we had to start that journey with an early morning drive to San Jose, where our flight would be leaving from. We left the car in a lot called Joy Park Fly which was fairly cheap, less than $50 for the 5 days it would be there. It also had a 24/7 shuttle to and from the airport, which was empty besides Dylan and I. The airport process was easy, with not a ton of people, and we grabbed some breakfast from Einstein Bros. Bagels.
When we checked into our flight at the airport, the lady at the desk kindly informed us that we also needed to fill out an online visa form before going through customs in Belize. It wasn’t something we had to do immediately, but it was a helpful tip and we did it when we got to our gate.
Our flight boarded at a good time and we left just after 6 a.m. for a 3 hour flight into Dallas. This was the first time I had wifi on a plane, as it is free now on Southwest for Rapid Rewards members! It doesn’t make up for all the bad changes they’ve made…but I digress. It was nice to have.
We had been a bit worried about our layover, as it was scheduled at only 45 minutes and Dallas was a pretty big airport, but we landed 30 minutes early and were pretty close on the Skylink, a light rail which connects the terminals. Plus, our flight was delayed due to a mechanical issue. This worried me at first due to my recent trip to Chicago over Thanksgiving, but everything turned out just fine.
As we waited, Dylan and I noticed we were some of the youngest people on this flight – it looked like mostly retirees! They were probably going to the islands to relax – flying south for the winter!
We just ended up leaving around 20 minutes late, around 12:40. The flight to Belize City was about the same as the first flight, clocking in at around 3 hours. As we got close to landing you could really see the unique contrast of Belize’s terrain – tons of islands in the distance versus the swaths of jungle beneath us.
We landed around 3:40 local time, and it was probably one of the roughest runways I’ve ever landed on. The funny part? At the end of the strip, we did a U-turn! Philip S.W. Goldson International Airport (BZE) is pretty small, and is the only international airport in Belize, so there’s only the main runway. Most flights are to local areas, primarily the islands like Caye Caulker and Ambergris Caye, as these are major tourist spots. Caye Caulker would be the island we’d end up staying at, though we opted out of flying there. It was a bit pricier than we would have preferred, and we also wanted to take the water taxis to get a more local experience.
We deplaned outside, which I was not completely unfamiliar with, having done it in Hawaii, but it was new to Dylan. We headed towards immigration, already sweating from the humidity, and waited in a decently long line. It was funny to watch most people have to fill out the visa forms when we had done it already. Something interesting to note was how seriously they took that form. After getting our passports stamped, there was another area to get our forms checked again, where some people had their checked bags rifled through (though we just had a personal item each). Finally, when we exited that room, we got the form scanned one more time.
After all that, we finally made it outside! We were staying in the town of San Ignacio, in the western part of Belize – it would be just under a 2 hour drive. A perk of our hotel was that we could book an airport shuttle, so we met our driver, Eder, to begin our journey.
I have to admit, if we’d had a more boring driver, I probably would not have written a full blog post about this day. But Eder was a great guy, and gave us so much interesting information about Belize. First of all, he drove a truck, but not any brand I had ever heard of. It was a Chinese brand called Great Wall, with the model being the Wingle 5. Apparently, Chinese cars are quite common there!
For the first bit of the car ride, we were getting to know each other, and talking about our plans for the trip. One of the Mayan sites we were planning to visit has quite the name, Xunantunich, and Eder was impressed when we mentioned it – he said we were the first people he’d ever picked up that were able to pronounce it correctly (shoo-nahn-too-nich)!
There were three things in particular he mentioned during that first part of the drive that I found interesting. First, he pointed out signs for tapir crossings, which are actually the national animal of Belize. Second, I noticed that the signs were all in miles per hour, and Eder said that Belize generally uses imperial units like the US does, even Fahrenheit for temperature! Finally, much of the area we were driving through appeared to be marshland, but he said it is not always wet. Basically, we were at the very beginning of the dry season, so there was still some recent rain and scattered showers while we were there. The eastern part of Belize we were driving through is very flat and floods easily, so many of the buildings are on stilts.
After about 15 minutes of driving, Eder asked if we’d like to get some snacks, and took us to a small supermarket. We were a bit famished, so we agreed. Fun fact: he told us that most of the local supermarkets in Belize are owned by Chinese or Taiwanese immigrants, and we definitely confirmed that throughout the trip!
The supermarket itself was quite different to what Dylan and I were used to. It was not air-conditioned, with only some fans inside – there was only one area with coolers for all the drinks, meat, and anything else that needed refrigeration. There was even some chocolate in there to prevent it from melting! Eder specifically suggested for us to get drinks as well – apparently you can have alcohol in Belize while in a car if you’re not the one driving! Dylan got the local beer brand, Belikin, while I grabbed a Smirnoff. We also grabbed some waters and snacks – Dylan got some plantain chips and I got yuca chips (Zambos Yuquitas) which ended up being pretty tasty.
While we were inside, we actually heard 4 different languages – English, Spanish, what sounded like some sort of creole, and what we think was Russian! We were already starting to see glimpses of the diversity of Belize.
We also got our first Belizean money, colorful bills and shiny coins with Queen Elizabeth II on them. Belize actually used to belong to Britain, but gained independence in 1981 – it is now part of the Commonwealth (Canada is another good example). The more modern bills have phased out the queen, now displaying Belizean national heroes, but we got a mix of both types.
After grabbing our refreshments, we continued our drive. Eder continued to tell us about his country, mentioning a few more interesting tidbits. First of all, there are basically no chain stores or restaurants at all throughout the country. No Walmarts, no McDonald’s, primarily just locally-owned businesses and Chinese-owned supermarkets. The only one Dylan and I saw throughout the entire trip was an Ashley Furniture Homestore in Belize City. Definitely wouldn’t have been my first guess!
Another thing he mentioned was the Mennonite population in Belize, a group which is somewhat similar to the Amish in Pennsylvania, though with some differences. Many of them moved to Belize to escape mandatory military service, as they are pacifists, and overall to seek more religious freedom and build their own communities.
As we continued to drive west, the elevation started to get a bit higher, and the population density increased. The highway was only two lanes, and often went through towns. Rather than having stop lights, there are instead many, many speed bumps and roundabouts throughout the country. We only saw two stop lights during our whole time there, once in San Ignacio and once in Belize City!
We also kept seeing bus stops and passing buses, so we asked about them. These are the local “chicken buses,” and they are often what the locals use. They are pretty cheap, but not very reliable. Eder said it is not uncommon for them to break down, in which case you’d need to wait an hour or two for another bus to come along. We even saw one broken down on the side of the road during our drive!
In regards to transportation, many Belizeans don’t even have cars, though plenty have motorbikes and “carpool.” Sometimes they’ll even try and fit 4 people on, which has led to a lot of fatal crashes. The government has considered legislation to limit it to 1 person, but that would inconvenience many people who ride with others, especially since gas is very high-priced, around $6-7 a gallon while we were there!
While costs in Belize might seem low to Americans, average wages are far lower there. We noticed many Christmas decorations there, and Eder says they love to celebrate it regardless, but just save on electricity by turning them off at night.
Overall, traffic was not too bad. The main area where we were slowed down was when we passed the capital, Belmopan. This is actually smaller than Belize City, and Eder said it really isn’t worth visiting – there’s mostly just some government buildings there.
As we closely approached San Ignacio, we first drove through the town of Santa Elena. These are twin cities, with a combined population of about 12,000. They are also fairly close to the Guatemala border, less than 10 miles down the road. Eder says he even goes shopping with his family in Guatemala quite often, as goods are cheaper there!
Once in San Ignacio, Eder told us about a few locations and recommended a couple restaurants. In particular, after we told him we’d have some free time that Saturday, he said we should visit the local market – that’s the day many of the farms send fresh fruit, and it is a hub of activity on weekends.
After this, Eder dropped us off at our hotel, and we gave him a tip. We were staying at Cahal Pech Village Resort, a spot overlooking the town at a pretty high point. It was a pretty sweet view. If you want to see my full review on it, I talked about it in my Belize budget post – you can check that out here.
Check-in was a fairly easy process, and we headed to our room to drop off our stuff and admire the view for a bit. Then we headed back downstairs to get some dinner – there is a restaurant at the resort called the Cooling Rack.
Dylan enjoyed another Belikin, while I got a mojito that was alright. The food was delicious though – I got the Pepper Bomb, a bell pepper stuffed with potatoes and topped with cheese and meat. It also came with some sort of fried dough with chipotle sauce on it. These were not the famous fryjacks of Belize, but were still quite good. The food was definitely pricier than the local spots as we’d come to learn, but we were satisfied.
After that we headed back to the room and got ready for bed. The AC was great to counteract the humidity – we actually got too cold at a certain point! The only bad thing was the shower drain – it seemed to be clogged pretty badly, so we could only shower for a few minutes before having to wait for the water to drain so it didn’t overflow.
Regardless, we were excited for our first full day in Belize – a day to explore Mayan ruins and the town of San Ignacio.
Nice read/