Jan/Feb 2026 - You'd Better Belize It!

Belize has been on our radar for a number of years. It is a small country tucked between Mexico, Guatemala, and Honduras, with a short coastline, a lot of small islands, and is the access point for the iconic Great Blue Hole. The islands were formed from large reefs and accumulations of coral, so they're called “cayes” (or in Florida “keys”). With the reef creating calm water ideal for snorkeling and diving, the cayes are the most popular destinations in Belize, even though they are tiny compared to the mainland. As we laid out our Central American journey, we planned 3 weeks in Belize – one on the largest island, Ambergris Caye, one on a second island, Caye Caulker, and one in the interior, based in San Ignacio.

Belize General – First, let’s cover the general all-Belize items:

English! – Belize was settled as a British colony, so almost everyone speaks English, plus some Spanish and Belizean Kriol. There is a definite Caribbean accent and communication was very easy. As we traveled inland, we heard more Spanish, Mayan, and Kriol, but English was still the dominant language.

Bookings – All of our hotels, transportation, and most of our excursions were booked online with all charges in U.S. dollars.

The exchange rate is fixed at 2 Belizean dollars (BZD) to 1 U.S. dollar, so it was always easy to know how much we were spending. Most items were cheaper than we would find in the U.S., but grocery items, like breakfast cereal and imported fruits like blueberries, were noticeably more expensive.

Travel/Visa – There is no formal visa required for U.S. travelers. You get a 30-day visitor visa upon arrival at no cost. However, there is a 40 BZD ($20 USD) exit tax when you leave. Our exit point appeared to take credit cards, but most people say to be prepared with cash.

Credit cards were widely accepted. We found a few cash-only restaurants, but >90% of the places we visited took cards. When possible, we paid tips in cash - like Mexico, it seems that getting tips paid from credit card transactions is inconsistent, so employees prefer cash. We ate at a few places that closed the card transaction without asking if we wanted to tip, so it’s good to have cash anyways.

Getting cash in Belize is super-easy. There were a few bank branches in each town we stayed in, with Atlantic Bank being the highest-rated. When getting cash from an ATM, I typically received Belizean 50's, and it was very easy to go inside a bank to trade for 5's, 10's and 20's for easier cash spending and tipping. We also found that most places accepted US dollars, giving change in Belizean dollars.

Tipping – the Belizean standard in restaurants is 10%, though it felt like 15% was more typical on the cayes. In San Ignacio, we stayed closer to 10%, unless the service was exceptional. We also tipped around 10% for most of our guided excursions.

Cell phones – we didn't get local sims. They’re fairly pricey ($50 USD for 3GB of data for 30 days), so we used our T-Mobile international roaming + wifi. All of our hotels and most restaurants had good wifi, and we had no problems staying connected.

While in Belize, we learned that the government discourages franchises and non-Belizean food and shopping businesses. Apparently there's a super-high tax on foreign operations, and we were told that the only company to try to establish a location was Subway, but it quickly closed. Currently, there are no familiar U.S. chain restaurants or shops in Belize. Basically everything is locally-owned.

First Stop - Ambergris Caye

Travel – Most visitors fly into Belize City, then get transportation along the coast or take a plane or boat to the cayes. Coming from Mexico, we could have taken a bus from Chetumal to Belize City, followed by the boat or plane, but my research found another option – a ferry boat direct from Chetumal to Ambergris Caye, bypassing Belize City entirely, for $70 USD each. We pre-booked tickets on International Islanders Ferry, and it’s good that we did, because the boat was nearly full. The ferry terminal was close to our hotel, and we were told to arrive at 8am for our 10am departure. We were quickly checked in at 8am, did not receive any physical ticket, then sat for an hour. At 9am, all passengers were moved as a group to check our larger bags. At 9:30, we queued as a group to pass through Mexican Immigration. At 10, we queued as a group to board the ferry. The process was organized, but we kept returning to the same waiting area each time, and it seemed like it could be easy for a passenger to miss/skip a step. With no ticket, we presume that our admission onto the boat was based on recognition and headcount.

The boat was an enclosed twin-engine ferry. Many passengers sat in hard plastic chairs facing forward, and the rest sat on padded benches on the perimeter of the cabin. Sandy and I managed to find a padded bench, but at the back of the boat. We got to face forward and had the padded bench, but we were near the engines, and it was a bit noisy for our trip. The ferry took about 1.5 hours to travel to the town of San Pedro on Ambergris Caye. Because there's really only the one town, people will use the names San Pedro and Ambergris interchangeably.

Once on shore, there was a man exchanging currency, either U.S. dollars or Mexican pesos, for Belizean dollars – not a formal exchange house, just a man with a wad of cash and a calculator. We then proceeded through Belize immigration and customs – both were quick and easy processes and we received the maximum 30-day stay with no issues.

Our Airbnb included transport to our apartment. Most travel in San Pedro is not by car, but by golf cart. I contacted our host through WhatsApp when we were ready, and we waited about 15 minutes for him to arrive. We got a quick tour through town on the 5-minute ride to our Airbnb.  Total for our trip: 5 hours, $140 USD for our two ferry tickets.

Lodging – Our unit was a first-floor apartment, with a king-sized bed, bathroom, small kitchenette, and a combined dining/sitting area. We had all of our normal amenities – AC, wifi, and a shared washer and dryer. After all our recent air-drying, it was nice to have a dryer, but sharing often meant waiting to use the machines.

The Airbnb was located south of the city center, with a 15-minute walk on most days, or 30 minutes if we were headed to the north end of town. The neighborhood around our apartment was a grid of sandy, rocky streets, and there was really no good place to just go for a walk. The main streets of San Pedro are paved and always busy with golf carts. Most have gas engines, so there is a constant noisy rattle, like being on the taxi ride at Disneyland.

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  No cars, just golf carts

Entertainment – Most of San Pedro’s entertainment is on the water, with many sites for snorkeling and diving. We had decent weather throughout our stay, with temps right around 80 for the entire week. We got some scattered afternoon rains, typically lasting just a few minutes, though we did get one especially long, hard downpour for about 20 minutes. Overall, the rains didn’t affect our chances to get out and explore.

The highlight of our time on San Pedro was an airplane flight over the Great Blue Hole. We booked the flight about a week in advance, which worked well. Flights on our 1^st-choice day were already full, so there is a risk in waiting to book, but we were able to align our flight with the weather forecast. We had great weather on our flight, with a few clouds, but we circled low enough over the Blue Hole that they weren’t an issue. The flight was short, but fun, and we thought it was a great experience, at a cost of $230 USD each.

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  The iconic Great Blue Hole

We took one snorkel cruise during our stay, and we managed to spot and swim with a manatee before heading to the Hol Chan Marine Reserve and a local spot known as Shark Ray Alley. We were amazed by the water clarity in Belize – it’s the best that we’ve snorkeled in over 4 years of traveling. With great visibility, we were able to see to the deepest parts of the Hol Chan area (about 30 feet). We had a good guide who surfaced often, shouted what he saw, then swam down to point out fish, rays, and even two moral eels. The tour was a bit hectic, and it was sometimes hard to keep up with what he was seeing. We had a medium-sized group and were occasionally kicked by other snorkelers, plus there’s a time limit for how long each group can stay in the reserve, so we had to swim fairly fast. At Shark Ray Alley, the tour operator stopped the boat, then attracted nurse sharks and rays with sardines. Some tourists don’t like the idea of baiting, and there are operators who will give non-baiting tours, but ours was not that. We jumped in the water and watched a very active ball of nurse sharks feeding for about 10 minutes, and overall had a nice time on our half-day tour, which cost $198 USD for the two of us.

Side note – underwater videos always have a blue tint. Typically, I use video-editing software to adjust the tint manually, which actually takes a lot of time. I recently found the “Dive+” app which does a great first-pass in just a couple of minutes. The app is on my phone, so I transfer videos from our action camera to my phone, run the app, then transfer the video files to my laptop. I used the app for all of our videos from Belize, and now typically only need to adjust the brightness when editing our videos. As an app, Dive+ has a subscription fee, only $3.99 USD per month, and I can stop and start it as we travel.

The best snorkeling is along the reef east of Ambergris Caye, meaning it’s best to book a tour, and we found very few spots to swim from shore. The beaches are public-access, but there’s not many good spots near San Pedro, instead mostly hotels, shops, piers and boats. We did visit to a spot known as Secret Beach on the western side of the caye. Many visitors make the 1-hour journey by golf cart (either rented or taxi), but we chose to go by water taxi. With a single daily departure over and back, it’s best to reserve tickets in advance. We paid $67 USD for two tickets for a 40-minute ride, and we got a 10% discount at the affiliated restaurant at the beach. The beach was just ok, and we stayed cool in the shallow water and did some uneventful snorkeling. Other than the amazing lobster tacos that we had for lunch, neither of us feel the need to return to Secret Beach.

There’s an iguana sanctuary in San Pedro that’s a bit hard to find, but worth checking out. The sanctuary survives on donations, and seems to be doing a lot to help iguanas that are being displaced by the ongoing construction and growth in the area.

Food – Since we were on an island, we sampled a lot of seafood. The Belizean lobster season ends in February, so we made sure to have it multiple times - in-the-shell, in ceviche, as a burger, and as tacos. We also had conch multiple times – fried, as ceviche, and most-popularly, in fritters. Our best meal was at Elvi’s, where we had grilled lobster and coconut chicken curry – actually the best curry of our entire time in Belize. We also enjoyed the conch fritters and fish empanadas at local-favorite El Fogon. One international favorite is Patz Deli, run by an American immigrant, serving a mix of U.S. and Belizean breakfast items, plus drip coffee (most local shops have Americanos, but not drip coffee).

I can’t talk about Belizean food without mentioning Marie Sharps. This local hot sauce is the sensation of Belize. There are a number of varieties, it’s available in almost every restaurant, and the traditional version is exported all over the world, including the U.S.!

Since we had an Airbnb, we bought coffee, cereal, milk, and fruit for breakfast, as well as a few snacks. Overall, groceries were pricey, maybe 50% higher than we’re used to paying.

The water in San Pedro is not potable, so we got all of our drinking water from a garrafon in our Airbnb, the same system that we’re used to in Mexico. For the first time in 4+ years of travel, our host replaced our empty garrafon rather than us having to buy our own. They’re only a few dollars, but it was a nice perk.

Expats – We saw and met a lot of international visitors during our week in San Pedro. Most of them seemed to be on vacation, but we got the impression that many were longer-term residents. Overall, we found Ambergris Caye very easy for travel, and everything is geared towards visitors and vacationers.

Costs – Ambergris Caye was a medium-cost place to visit, and quite affordable as a Caribbean beachy destination. Our Airbnb cost about $112 USD per night, which we thought was reasonable given the amenities and its island location. We averaged $76 USD per day at restaurants, which was higher than we expected. Most meals ranged between $40-55 USD (including tip), though our lobster meals were between $90-100 USD (including tip). Our one-week mostly-breakfast grocery cost was just over $100 USD.

Ambergris Summary - We enjoyed our time in San Pedro and would return for a short vacation, but we don’t see it as a good long-term base. As a small island town, options and infrastructure are limited. We also found San Pedro to be quite noisy, and just too busy with golf cart traffic.

Second Stop - Caye Caulker

As we researched Belize, we found that Ambergris Caye is the most-developed island location, but that many people also travel to the smaller cayes. There are some completely uninhabited, but good for a day-trip beach visit, others with a few small homes, and even some with jungle-getaway-all inclusives. We chose Caye Caulker – it’s easy to access from Ambergris Caye and has a small town with a decent variety of restaurants and hotels, but no paved streets. We liked the idea of comparing the “touristy experience” and the “laid-back experience” to see which we preferred. Caye Caulker is divided in two by “The Split” – a channel between the northern half, with a few destination hotels and lodging, and the southern half, where the town is established. People can take a small ferry to cross The Split, but we chose to stay on the south side to be closer to restaurants and entertainment.

Travel – It’s easy to move between the cayes by boat. We booked tickets on the 11:30am San Pedro Water Taxi through their web site, but many others walked up and bought tickets just before the sailing. Our San Pedro Airbnb host took us to the water terminal about 30 minutes before departure, and we were easily able to get a golf cart taxi in Caye Caulker for the short trip from the port to our hotel. Total for the relocation: 1 hour, $56 USD ($50 for two ferry tickets, $6 for the taxi).

Lodging – Our pre-trip research didn’t find many good Airbnbs. Most were south of the town center, close to the small airport, but not close to many restaurants or shops. Instead, we looked at hotels, finding that most were small, independent, and without many reviews. We ended up choosing the Coral View Hotel for its good reviews and mix of amenities. We upgraded from a standard room (with double-bed) to an oversized room with a balcony and king-sized bed. The only negative was that the Coral View did not provide coffee or breakfast, so we had to venture out early each morning. Since we weren’t able to do laundry, we had planned ahead and traveled with clean clothes from San Pedro. We did find one laundromat in town, and peeked inside as we walked by, but were not impressed. If we return to Caye Caulker for a longer stay, we would need to find a reliable way to do laundry.

We didn’t see any visible distinction between neighborhoods on Caye Caulker. By that, I mean that the entire community was blended, with hotels, restaurants, businesses, and local homes interspersed across the island. Restaurants, bars, and tour agencies were certainly clustered towards the eastern side of the caye but we would walk past local homes and shops wherever we were exploring.

Entertainment – As with Ambergris, the main entertainment on Caye Caulker is the ocean. One major difference is that we found the shore to be much more open and accessible compared to San Pedro. Many of the beach bars had piers with lounge chairs, steps, and even tables anchored in the water! Our reliable favorite was Sip N Dip, surrounded by clear, blue water near the famous Split. We spent multiple afternoons there, where we relaxed, watched people fish in the shallow water, and spotted numerous fish, rays, and even a nurse shark.

Another favorite destination was Salty’s. We went here more often for dinner than for entertainment, but they often had evening activities scheduled. They had trivia one night, though we arrived late and just played off-the-record for our own enjoyment. We did see a number of other bars with evening activities, though we didn’t make much of an effort to attend.

In addition to spotting marine life from the piers, we were also able to see a lot from shore. Most exciting was the local tarpon – huge fish, 4-5 feet long, protected by law from consumption, and known for leaping from the water to snatch sardines from your hand. Of course, we had to try this multiple times, dropping 5 BZD ($2.50 USD) for a cup of sardines on 5 different occasions. The fish usually leapt from under the dock, giving a huge surprise and a bit of an adrenaline rush. It’s our #1 recommendation for things to do, especially at the bargain-basement price.

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  Feeding the giant tarpon

Just down the shore from the tarpon is an area known as Stingray Beach. A large school of rays swim through this shallow area, and a nearby hotel feeds them about an hour before sunset. It’s a fun way to get up-close and interact with the friendly rays. The beach supposedly has some seahorses as well, but we couldn’t find them no matter how hard we searched. Our final fish story – we happened to see a small squid swimming right next to the shore – a pretty rare sight.

As with San Pedro, we took a snorkeling trip from Caye Caulker. It was advertised as a 7-stop, full-day tour with a few extras, such as lunch, drinks, and GoPro videos. We met at 9am, and began with a trip through The Split to look for manatees on the west side of the caye - unfortunately, no sightings. Next, we approached the shore and fed the tarpons right from the boat. We then went north to Coral Gardens, on the edge of a shallow reef and some sea grass. The result – lots of colorful fish on the reef and a few turtles in the grass. The tour company left us unguided, letting us decide how much time to spend in each area. Fourth, we went to Hol Chan – the same general area as our San Pedro tour. We saw a similar collection of fish, no moray eels, but instead a huge eagle ray! There were less clouds in the sky, so better light and visibility in the deeper areas. Overall, it was a bit repetitive, but different enough that we still had a nice swim. Fifth – another trip to Shark Ray Alley. Since we swam with the nurse sharks the week prior, we decided to observe the feeding and ball of activity from the boat this time. Again repetitive, but different and enjoyable. Next, a traditional Belizean lunch on the boat with our guides and other tourists. Our 7^th and final stop - a shipwrecked barge that has been there long enough to become a great reef feature, covered by colorful plants and swarming with fish and a few nurse sharks. Unfortunately, by afternoon the waves had picked up and we weren't able to stay at this site very long. On our way back to shore we made another unsuccessful manatee search before arriving around 3:30pm, worn out from our full-day tour.  I had originally found the tour through Viator, but stopped by their office to ask some questions, then ended up confirming the tour through WhatsApp and paying directly, rather than booking online. Our total cost was $202 USD for the two of us.

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  Eagle ray in Hol Chan, courtesy of our guide's GoPro

Another side note - the guide's GoPro videos were very nice! We got about 30 short clips of their raw footage with nothing edited. Overall, the quality of the videos is much better than our imitation action camera, and I think we'll be upgrading to a GoPro soon.

The weather in Caye Caulker did put a bit of a damper on our 1-week stay. A cold front came through mid-stay, bringing strong winds, whitecaps, and it was cool enough that we needed light jackets. We avoided the water on these days, but still made time for the tarpons and rays.

Food – One major difference on Caye Caulker was our need to find breakfast and coffee each morning. Unlike the 9am opening times we’ve seen in Mexico and Portugal, Caye Caulker caters to early risers, with many places open by 6 or 6:30. Most of our breakfasts included scrambled eggs and at least one fry jack – a puffed pastry somewhat like an unsweetened sopapilla. Sometimes the fry jacks were small and stacked on the side like toast. At Errolyn’s, we got two huge fry jacks stuffed with eggs, bacon, and cheese – we easily could have shared just one – for 16 BZD ($8 USD).

I already mentioned Salty’s - they have a solid menu and good chef, with our favorites including lobster tacos and conch ceviche. Our favorite sunset restaurant was Pelican’s. The food is decent, prices are reasonable, and, it’s one of the few spots on the island with a western view. Chef Kareem’s is a great local restaurant. They actually have two locations – a lunch/bbq trailer on the main street, and a sit-down location a couple of blocks away. We chose the restaurant for its larger menu, tables, and chairs, and got a tasty local meal with a lobster burger and jerk chicken for 70 BZD ($35 USD) plus tip.

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  Stuffed fry jacks for breakfast

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  Sunset at Pelican Bar

By far, our best meal on Caye Caulker was at La Palapa, where we dined on rolled/stuffed chicken and grilled red snapper with jerk sauce. And by “dined”, I mean that the restaurant had tablecloths and wine glasses. We enjoyed our meal there, but decided that we weren’t on Caye Caulker for fine dining. Our meal (with wine) set us back 140 BZD ($70 USD), a one-time splurge during our visit.

Expats – Our impression of international visitors in Caye Caulker was similar to San Pedro - lots of tourists, most seeming to be on vacation. We can’t say for sure, but we felt that there were more long-term residents in San Pedro vs. more vacationers in Caye Caulker. Similar to San Pedro, visiting Caye Caulker was very easy and they cater to travelers.

Costs – We expected comparatively higher costs in Caye Caulker due to its smaller size and more limited infrastructure. Overall, our expectations were correct. Our hotel (with deluxe room) was pretty spendy at $159 USD per night, which we thought was higher than it should have been given the lack of amenities. Offsetting the higher lodging cost, we were surprised to find most restaurants to be less-touristy and lower-priced than in San Pedro. We averaged $23 USD per day for breakfast and $43 USD per day for dinner, for a total of $66 USD per day, which is about $10 USD less than we spent in San Pedro (surprising, considering San Pedro was dinners-only). Those numbers include our two splurges – seafood at Salty’s and the fine dining at La Palapa. Living in a hotel, we didn’t buy any groceries during our stay.

Caye Caulker Summary - We had a great time in Caye Caulker and preferred the quieter town and laid-back lifestyle compared to San Pedro. We both agreed that we could easily have stayed for another week, or even longer, and I’m pretty sure that we will return at some point. However, just like San Pedro, the small island town with limited services and infrastructure wouldn’t be a good longer-term option for us.

Final Stop - San Ignacio

Belize may be known for its marine activities, but the majority of the country is rainforest and highlands. As we planned our trip across Central America, we also wanted to visit the interior of Belize and San Ignacio made sense as our third stop. It's a highly-traveled destination along the route from Belize City to Guatemala, and there are a few Mayan ruins and a number of natural sights (caves, rivers, etc.) in the area.

The weather during our time in San Ignacio was warm, but nice. Temps were generally in the mid-80s, skies were a bit overcast, and we didn’t get any rain.

Travel – Relocating from Caye Caulker to San Ignacio was fairly straightforward. First, a water taxi to Belize City. These taxis run 5-6 times per day, so we reserved a spot on the 9:30am boat through their web site, at a cost of $25 USD each. As with our prior trip, we probably could have bought tickets on the spot. The trip took about an hour, getting us to the mainland around 10:30am. We had done our homework on shuttle options to San Ignacio, and those run once per day, at 12:30pm. We bought those tickets in advance on GetYourGuide for $20 USD each. The shuttle bus was an oversized van, with a row down the middle, and towed a cargo trailer with everyone’s bags. The bus was pretty full, so reserving in advance was probably a good idea. We left the city a little late, but had no delays on our ride, and arrived to San Ignacio around 3pm. Overall, we were pretty impressed with the smooth roads in Belize and the general safe driving we saw on the drive (reasonable speeds, safe passing, etc.) Total for our relocation: 6 hours, $90 USD.

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  Our shuttle to San Ignacio

Lodging – Similar to Caye Caulker, we only found a few Airbnb options that met our general requirements at a reasonable price. All of them were at least 30 minutes from the city center, with renters commenting about “walking up a big hill”, so we looked at hotels instead. We found the Maya Bella, right in the heart of San Ignacio, with all of our normal amenities (except breakfast – we’d be going out again). Our only negative was that many of the guests had early excursions, and we heard all the door-slamming, footsteps, and conversations as they headed out between 5 and 7 each morning.

The town of San Ignacio is quite small, with a short walking mall in the city center, about a dozen restaurants within walking distance, and an open-air market a couple of blocks away. Sidewalks were hit-and-miss, and we often found ourselves walking on the streets for short distances. We needed to have laundry done during our stay, and found a full-service laundry about 2 blocks from our hotel. We had 2 loads washed/dried/folded for 14 BZD ($7 USD) per load. We didn’t have any issues with our laundry, but we did get one extra t-shirt back, so we’re unable to say that the laundromat is top-notch.

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  Walking mall in San Ignacio

Entertainment – The most popular tour from San Ignacio seemed to be the Actun Tunichil Muknal (ATM) cave. Visitors wade through a river, climb over and through boulders in a dark cave, and visit a Mayan burial site. While it sounds unique and exciting, people talk about very cold water and the difficulty of the trip. As such, Sandy and I decided to skip this iconic tour, and instead took a cave tubing tour to Nohoch Che’en. We had a 1-hour drive, followed by a 45-minute hike, then a 2-hour float down a river on inner-tubes. Our guide led us through two caves, doing most of the paddling, which allowed us to enjoy the various formations and a small waterfall. We stopped in one cave to explore the inside of a cenote and we also saw some Mayan pottery shards. The end of our trip was a peaceful ride along an open section of river and a short walk back to our van. We booked the tour with Belize Caving Expeditions for $95 USD each, which included the van ride, tubing, and lunch.

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  Cave tubing in Nohoch Che'en

We also took a tour to the Mayan ruins of Caracol, south of San Ignacio. Access to the site is a nicely-paved highway that was just fully-completed last month. The journey takes about 1 ½ hours each way, though our guide told us that it used to take 4-6 hours when he worked at the site many years ago. We spent about 3 hours touring the ruins before heading back to our van for lunch. On our drive home from Caracol, we stopped at some natural pools for a 1-hour wade/swim. It was a nice, long day, again booked with Belize Caving Expeditions, at a cost of $130 USD each for the round-trip shuttle, ruins, lunch, and pools.

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  The immense temple at Caracol

In town, we found more sights than we expected. We walked to the small Mayan ruins of Cahal Pech, about 30 minutes from our hotel, on the top of a steep hill. The site has a small museum and a few temples and residential structures. The structures have been nicely restored and are easily accessible (steep, but open for climbing and exploring). The entire area is well-maintained, with large trees and a grassy central plaza. Touring the full site takes about 2 hours, at a cost of 20 BZD ($10 USD) per person, though we would have learned more about the site by hiring a guide.

Also in town, we stopped at the Green Iguana Conservation Project. We almost missed the sign for this site, as it’s located inside/behind the San Ignacio Hotel. Admission is 22.5 BZD ($11.25 USD) per person, and you get a small-group, 45-minute guided tour of their rescue center. A knowledgeable guide talked to us about the differences between green and black iguanas, and explained how they rescue injured iguanas and release them back to the wild if possible. The rescue also collects eggs and incubates them, increasing their survival rate. These iguanas are raised off-site, with no human contact so they can be released into the wild. We were allowed to handle some rescued iguanas and some juveniles that will remain in captivity for breeding. The overall experience was better than we expected, and worth the entrance fee to support the rescue.

Third, we visited AJAW Chocolate. They have multiple experiences, including a full-day cacao farm visit, a 1-hour chocolate making experience, and a 15-minute tasting. We chose the tasting, where we learned about Belize’s cacao industry and tasted dried beans, roasted nibs, and a local hot chocolate drink. We paid 20 BZD ($10 USD) each for the experience, and also bought some nibs and a chocolate bar after our tasting.

We originally planned to visit two Mayan ruin sites - Cahal Pech in town plus one guided tour. As we finalized plans for our visit, we thought "When are we going to return to San Ignacio? If there's another good site, shouldn't we cross that off our list as well?" The result - one final excursion to the Mayan ruins of Xunantunich. This site is close to San Ignacio, and many travelers take a half-day guided tour from town, generally in the range of $75-80 USD. Since we had already had an in-depth Mayan ruin visit, we decided to have a bit of fun and book a tour that included a horseback ride to and from the ruins. The provider picked us up in town and took us to their stables. We had a private ride and nice tour of the ruins for $120 USD each, using a family-run operation called St. Leonard’s Tours, which we found through Viator.

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  Temple with glyphs at Xunantunich

We booked all of our guided tours less than a week ahead (during our final days in Caye Caulker), once we could see the weather forecast for San Ignacio. This worked well, and we probably could have even waited to book in town.

Food – With no breakfast at our hotel, Pop’s Restaurant became our go-to. On entry, we were very surprised to find a U.S.-style coffee shop, with padded booths, drip coffee, and large servings. We ordered separate dishes on visit #1, then learned our lesson and shared a breakfast plate on visits 2-4. Our average cost for our shared plate with 2 coffees was 26 BZD ($13 USD) plus tip.

For lunch/snacks, we heard about some great spots in the local market, though both were Salvadorian rather than Belizean. First, papusas from La Exquisita. These are basically thick corn tortillas stuffed with beans, meat, and/or cheese, before being fried on a griddle like a pancake. The finished product can be topped with "curtido" cabbage slaw and hot sauce, then eaten taco-style. We shared two pupusas for 6 BZD ($3 USD). Second, we found El Rinconcito, where we tried some salbutes and panades. Both are made with a 3-inch corn tortilla that starts a bit fluffy before being fried in oil. The result is a flavor and texture similar to the Indian frybread that we’ve had at various county fairs back home. Salbutes are served flat like tostadas, whereas panades are folded over, empanada-style. Both can again be topped with curtido and hot sauce. We had 4 salbutes and 4 panades, plus 2 watermelon juices, for 13.5 BZD ($6.25 USD) including tip.

Our most-notable dinner spot in San Ignacio was Guava Limb. It was easily the best place that we dined in all of Belize, with U.S.-level service, presentation, atmosphere, and food. You would never know that you were in the middle of the Belizean rain forest! On our first visit, we shared a Greek salad and pear/bacon/gorgonzola pizza for 73 BZD ($36.50 USD) plus tip. We were so impressed that we immediately made a reservation to celebrate Sandy’s birthday. That upscale dinner included salmon with risotto, blackened whitefish, plus wine for 168 BZD ($84 USD) plus tip. The staff was even nice enough to set aside a small Oreo cake to help her celebrate.

Expats – We didn’t get a sense for any real expat community, but San Ignacio definitely sees a lot of visitors. It’s popular with older travelers and young backpackers, and most people seemed to visit for just a few days. Notably, on our Caracol tour, we met 2 men from Croatia who were in Belize for business and wanted to explore on their only free day.

Costs - As we expected, our living costs in the Belizean interior dropped quite a bit. Our hotel was a bargain, at only $57 USD per night. Excluding the birthday dinner splurge, we averaged $16 USD per day for breakfast and $37 USD per day for dinner, for a total of $53 USD per day - $13 USD less than Caye Caulker and $23 USD less than San Pedro. Similar to Caye Caulker, we didn’t buy any groceries with our hotel stay.

San Ignacio Summary – We enjoyed our time in San Ignacio, and wish we had planned a couple more days there to spread out our activities. There was more to do in town than we expected, and we ended up touring three Mayan ruin sites rather than our original plan of two. Side note – if you only want to see one site, Cahal Pech is the most affordable and accessible from town, Caracol is the most extensive and impressive, and Xunantunich allows for a mid-sized, guided, half-day experience.  We stayed busy every day, and not taking time to relax left us a bit worn out by the time we left. We liked the town enough that we would return, though we’re not sure that there’s anything left for us to see there.

All-Belize Summary – We’re very happy that we took the time to explore Belize. It’s an easy place to visit since everyone speaks English and the exchange rate is straightforward. We can easily imagine returning to Caye Caulker, and have also heard that Hopkins and Placencia (on the mainland coast, south of Belize City) are also good towns to visit.