A Journal, with Pictures

Our return starts in Zan­cu­d­ao lodge with ear­ly wake up, we must eat break­fast ear­ly and be on the boats by sev­en A.M.,because the tides are unusu­al­ly big and we could be strand­ed if we leave lat­er. Weath­er looks good and we are off to the air­port. John and Peter have the flights orga­nized with the group leav­ing for the flight through Mex­i­co leav­ing first and the Key West con­tin­gent will go last to Belize City to overnight before the last legs.

The one hour and twen­ty minute flight to Liberia, Cos­ta Rica is rou­tine and we are refu­eled and through cus­toms in a rea­son­able time and off for Belize City. We have a good view of the vol­cano’s around Man­agua Nicaragua, but in bro­ken clouds over the moun­tain’s and scat­tered into Belize. We see the sec­ond largest Bar­ri­er reef in the world on approach.

Refu­el, tie down the air­plane and our han­dler Rudy has us through cus­toms and into a cab for our hotel in short order. We show­er, time for a cock­tail before din­ner. Its Fri­day night, hap­py hour, with a very loud band, and this must be the place because its loaded with locals. We find a qui­et spot to have our drink before din­ner then have a ear­ly din­ner at the hotel. Next morn­ing we are back at the air­port and Rudy has our flight plan filed, we clear cus­toms quick­ly, and are in the air by 8:00 AM local time. We start to notice some elec­tri­cal anom­aly’s on climb out and for a moment we think we may have to turn back. We cross check and con­vince our­selves that we are get­ting a false fail­ure indi­ca­tor, a lit­tle more adven­ture to end our trip. The weath­er is good and we get a good look at Cuba on our way by, while talk­ing to Havana Center.

We have decid­ed if we can clear cus­toms quick­ly in Key West we are going to refu­el and fly on to Hilton Head since the weath­er fore­cast Sun­day is not good. We make the fast turn around and are back in the air and three hours lat­er touch down at our home air­port, tired but hap­py to have com­plet­ed a great adven­ture togeth­er. We cov­ered thir­ty five hun­dred nine­ty miles in eleven flights over an eight day peri­od. We reward our­selves with big grilled steaks and a good bot­tle of wine.

As we enjoyed our din­ner and dis­cuss our trip, we con­clude, life is so much bet­ter when you embrace adventure.