Golpeando en el mismo Lugar.. snowmobiling into the sunset!

The previous post on this trip is here..

The original plan post seeing Northern lights was to go on a viator tour to Casper glacier to visit a naturally formed ice cave. Even by viator description, it said that this was a moderately difficult trip and only "able bodied adults" were to come for an approximate 3 mile walk on snow and ice to get to the cave. 

After the previous nights experience, San decided that Alaskan standards to rest of US standards are like US system to metric system. An "able Alaskan body" was a 6 foot 2 inch plus, 250 lbs, pure muscle body with a heavy beard  that could fight Commando or Rambo for at least a few minutes and live to tell the tale.. or something close to that.. We did not fit that description..In short, she bailed on me. 

Now for a backstory and the title of the post.

One of my favorite songs during college days was by Franco de Vita, "Golpeando en el mismo lugar", which translates to "you get hit in the same palce again and again". We have a similar saying in Tamil "patta kaal-laye padum" which is "you get hit in the same leg again".

Two weeks prior to this Alaska trip, I hurt my right knee. A knee that already was cracking from a skin issue. After coming back from yoga class, I had the mat towel etc and was trying to go through a narrow gap between the car and the fridge in the garage. License plate holders are strategically placed in cars at exactly knee height. If you bang your knee sideways on the holder, you are guranteed a horrific experience for weeks. After realizing that, promptly iced the knee. While on the couch, my daughter wanted me to do something for her. Given the bandage around the knee, didn't want to fold the extended leg on the couch and in a brilliant move thought I could just step outside of it and get down. Bad ideas come in twos. Promptly banged same knee on the coffee table, just an hour after the first hit. Sometimes a picture is worth a long paragraph.. so here you go..(the gaps have already been fixed in the photos below and credit has been given to the accident causers!)

The next two weeks were spent trying to make every effort to recover, with yoga, ibuprofen, ice, triple pillows under leg, crepe bandages, etc. just so I don't screw up the Alaska experience. 

I really wanted to go through that ice cave! 

San saw the disappointment on my face when she cancelled the ice cave tour. To make up for it, she was checking with Viator if there was some other activity that did not involved walking on ice. There were two options. A dog sled experience where huskies pulled us on the snow for 30 minutes and we got to see the kennels, which was promptly rejected for her fear of dogs. Another trip where we got to ride a snowmobile on a frozen lake and ride into the sunset in the Arctic circle. She agreed to do that and off we went.

It was a 40 minute drive to North Pole, Alaska where we met an amazing dude, Frozen Tony! He ran what appeared to be a one man operation on a weekend as he was our receptionist, trainer, and guide. 

After explaining the operation of the snowmobile and going over the warnings, he started assigning vehicles to the folks in the group. When San shook her head and said "I will be a passenger, don't ask me to drive!" and also said "Can I just drive with you?" .. Tony said "Your husband passed the test! You ride with him!" Then he realized that not all vehicles he had were two seaters. So he gave me his vehicle and said "this is mine and the controls are different but you can do this!" and went over the control differences in his vehicle. San was not exactly sure of my mobiling ability. We had 7 other folks in the group, 4 from New York and 3 from Columbia! 

Fortunately we found some gear that was large for our size but still covered us. Helmets, goggles included. In spite of all this gear, the outside temperature was -5F after 4 in the evening and we were to go see the sunset at 5PM. 

Tony was just amazing. He guided us and made sure we went from simple to complex terrain and gave enough time for everyone in the group to reach the next point before proceeding. After the first 15 minutes, I was gunning it and racing across the snow and ice at 40 mph. Turns out, I am a natural when it comes to flying over the snow on this thing! When you go at 40mph in -5F, the wind against your face makes it a lot more below zero and the water that drips from your nose becomes ice and you look like a mini walrus! San could not hug me as our helmets clash at that speed.. so she had to hold on to the mobile hand grip and hang on for dear life. Apparently she was screaming for me to go slow but I could not hear it, given the helmet and the wind in my face. 

Tony took some great pics of us and even a video clip.

Frozen Tony even had a great Pano shot on my phone which was a pleasant surprise!

There was one tricky place where he had to make us wait and get every snowmobile through a point.. then we all got back on to return. There we got to take some pics by ourselves..

Driving towards a sunset in Alaska is an amazing experience!

A video, thanks to Tony! It was not easy to drive without gloves.. so had to ask for the phone back and keep going! My knuckles were feezing and burning without gloves! 

We got back in one piece and I was clearly very happy and San was happy for me. She said I reminded her of Bond movies. She didn't know that my nickname in high school was Sundar Bond. Was happy to live up to that name after many years.

We had called a Lyft and no one showed. The rest of the group had left as they had their own cars. We had arrived in a taxi. Tony realized our issue and helped call a local North Pole taxi, who is the only guy who comes to pick up folks after sunset. We were talking to him on and off about Alaskan life for 30 minutes while waiting as he was closing shop. We got some hot cocoa during the wait! 

Would strongly recommend this adventure, especially thanks to Frozen Tony of Alaska Wildlife guide! He made this whole thing an evennig to cherish and remember for a long time! 

Finally we got the taxi to take us back towards Fairbanks. We were in for a treat before reaching the hotel..

More in the next post..

Auroravukku aroogaraa!!!

It has been a little over 2 months since I turned 50. After my 35th birthday, a bunch of people reminded me of my "mid life" point. Basic math then suggested that they expected me to live to 70 or thereabouts. A few months ago, was told that it is time to start doing things on the "bucket list" as this is a mid life point. On the one hand was happy to see that the logic of midlife had extended the 70 to past 70, but was also sad to see this bucket business. 

I am just happy on a 6 feet by 2 feet yoga mat (with at least an extra 3 feet on either side where my hands are, just to do a few yoga asanas that require stretching my hands out like an airplane). The idea of trying to list just a few things to go see or do, within a time frame seems to extend the rat race to outside of work and on to retired life and that did not sit well with me. All that said, I love to travel and will gladly experience new places. 

One thing that both me and San have wanted to see together in this lifetime is the Northern lights (Aurora Borealis). Our past plans were fails. Our friend in Iceland sees this from her window and has been asking us to visit, but we couldn't make a plan to go yet given other things that keep coming up. So we jumped at a chance to do a weekend trip to Alaska to see the lights. 

Going to the arctic circle in Feb to see the lights and back over a weekend, especially where you get two chances over two days (in case day 1 was a dud) was a good plan. We just had to take a Friday afternoon and Monday off. So far so good..

For the second time within a year we heard this statement "there is no bad weather, only bad gear!" and this time it was even more apt. We booked tours through Viator and the Alaska Wildlife guide for the two days. 

The weather in Fairbanks when we landed was -4 F. We did dress up in layers using the "32 degrees" brand we get in Costco which goes for thermals in "Northern California Winter".. ha ha ha.. The joke was on us! Northern California Winter is an oxymoron. It isn't really winter. 32 degrees doesnt work in -4 degrees. Regular new balance shoes with double socks... what were we thinking?

We landed, were picked up by the Best Western in a taxi and shortly after reaching the hotel and putting things in our room, were picked up within an hour to go 45 minutes north to more desolation. There was a heated shack where all the folks on the tour had a chair and were huddled around tables. There was hot cocoa for everyone. A TV on the wall which showed the lights from a point 20 miles north (kind of a one minute heads up) and some very passionate locals who gave us tips on how to take photos, how be safe outside etc. 

Aurora Pointe lodge does not have any living space. It is a warm room with two doors to run out take pictures and come back to warm yourself before running out again. There was also a restroom there, which was a blessing. 

The outside temp by 11:30PM when we reached the point was -9 to -10 F. Once there, one of the folks who work at the place runs in and says "It's happening" and also tells us "look at parking lot side" or "back of cabin side".. and all the photographers and models run out in a straight line to try and find a vantage point on the snow to take a few pictures and run back. You are lucky if you get even a few pictures. Nothing to do with the aurora.. it does its thing. Your face, fingers all freeze once you are out for more than 4-5 minutes. At that point, cannot find the button to click the photo. Forget trying to change any shutter speed or ISO settings.. You have to set it up inside the room, run out, click, run back in. If you walked further into the snow with New balance walking shoes and double socks which are already wet, good luck to you!

We did maybe 10 such runs in and out between 11:45 and 2 AM and got a bunch of shots. Here is another thing. You can get great shots of the Aurora, as it is pitch dark outside. The timer is usually set to 4 to 6 seconds to get these shots. The lights keep dancing around. It gets interesting if you have to be in the picture also! We literally have to "light paint" ourselves. I did this for the most part by using my iphone flashlight and taking it out of my pocket and shining it in our face towards the end of the 4 seconds, or if lucky asking another photographer to shine it on us just in time. Depening on their experience and how much their hands are shaking, it becomes an interesting photograph where you can see others folks in the background getting lit up as well. 

All said and done, wear snow boots if you go. Then you can wade further in the snow. Have double gloves where the inner one can still be used to touch screen controls (capacitive gloves apparently). Wear the right puffy jackets. If you have a camera with touch screen controls, even better! My camera is 12 plus years old and it was a challenge to use the set button to go to different parameters to adjust! 

One day to fly in, see the lights. If no lights, see them second day. That was the plan! We got lucky and were treated to an amazing light show by mother nature, the same night we landed. Once the moon came up at 2PM the shack closed. 15 minutes before that the lights were almost too faint and the buses and vans started leaving one by one. We were the last ones out of the place and we got to see the moon rise over the Aurora Pointe.

The highlight pictures are here.. 

We did not see any kids on this trip! Some teens who worked at the hotel but that was it. Mostly bearded men.. and a few women! Interesting demographic in this place!

this was the view inside the Aurora Pointe.. photo of me and my valentine... grow a beard they said..it will come in useful in Alaska they said... my beard wasn't Alaska grade.. my face still froze!

This was what we drove through to get to Aurora pointe..it was a very black and white world we were driving through till we entered the room..

The rest of the pictures are in this slideshow gallery!

It was a long day for us and we were happy to reach the hotel room by 3AM and just crash.. we used hand and leg warmers but still couldn't feel our toes and fingers and we woke up at 9AM and the sun was not out yet!

Finally a short video of our experience...

Our next day was equally adventurous and will write about it soon..

A drive on Ice field Parkway

On day 2 of the Banff trip, we were booked on a bus tour to see the Athabasca Glacier. Will write a separate post on the Glacier itself. This post is about the what we saw on the almost all day drive to the place. 

The previous post on this trip is here..

We started at 8AM. We did not know they had a pickup point right outside our hotel. We could have got more sleep! Instead we parked downtown and paid dearly for it. The bus had 23 people plus the driver in it. By the end of the day we were all introduced to everyone and we all got to talk at the various stops. It was an international crowd, folks from BC Canada, Brazil, Australia, UK, Belgium and the two of us representing the US!

The driver was a local 20 year old kid, doing this as a summer job. Hindsight being 20/20, we realized at the glacier that we could have just driven to the Glacier ride point in our rental car in an hour and 15 minutes with stops on the way and saved a good 2 hours to do something else. While it is true that there is only one company that is allowed to ride the monster trucks on the Glacier (Columbia IceField), you don't have to go in a bus from Banff to that place!! You can directly go there and get tickets. 

That said, we still enjoyed being passengers, interacting with strangers and stopping at all these points that the kid stopped the bus at, which we would not have otherwise seen. (he took us to vista points that were not the main parking lots.. which helped get great shots with no crowd in the background!). So from that point, it was a big plus. The only time we could have saved was for waiting for 23 people getting in and out of the bus at every stop instead of just the two of us. The kid did a great job of entertaining us during the drive! 

There was a much bigger plus. He stopped when he saw a car slow down in front of us (I would not have) and we got to see a bear walk by us, up  close and personal.. that was the highlight of the drive.

We also had lunch at a nice quiet picnic spot next to the river. 

This drive on Ice field parkway is very scenic. We go all along the bow river all the way from Banff to Jasper National park. The drive in the car would have taken 2 1/2 hours, but we started at 8 and reached at 12:30 including all the photo stops. 

The spots we could not stop at on the way up, we did on the way down. 

First stop: The Lake Louise Village visitor center. This place had a bunch of places to get breakfast and coffee and it was the first rest stop after an hour plus of driving. Every place had a long line. We were lucky to get some breakfast in the Trailhead Cafe, where the line was at least moving! San had a Vegan Samosa which she rated highly!

We started all smiles.. a good sign. This was in the parking lot waiting for the bus. Did I mention we were early? This is also a "warmup selfie" !

Next stop: Herbert lake

We walked through spruce and aspen tree lined trails to the lake (this was our first of many such lake shore visits over the next 48 hours!)

the path ends and voila... the shades of green and blue and the transparent water hits you!

Next stop.. lunch at Coleman creek..

Next stop (more like slow down..) BEAR!! Unfortunately we could not open the windows in the bus.. this is the best I could get with the SLR from the other side of the bus through a tinted window.. it was an exciting thing for us to see this bear walk along the freeway!

at this point I would like to mention that we were expecting to see a lot of animals on the drive.. but the only other non human creature we saw during that day was this ground squirrel at the lunch stop near the river. 

Last but one stop was a waterfalls across the mountains.. there was a family of four from Belgium. The couple and their two daughters exactly 3 years older than our two girls. Their girls helped us take a lot of photos. This was a good shot of us.. no falls, but I love this picture .. so it goes in the blog!

A video that captures all these stops including the "bear sighting". 

If you want to do things fast, just go by yourself from Banff to Jasper. (then again, you might save an hour tops.. given you have to get a pass .. the bus already had a pass and was waved in).  If you want to just sit back, relax and meet folks and go at a slow pace (if you have more than two days to cover the place), then take the bus tour from Banff. It is actually a decent experience.  They also give you a packed lunch, water bottles etc. (Veggie option included, which again was rated highly by San). 

We enjoyed the drive and the group of people we ended up with!

Now that I am able to sit at a laptop and write longer posts, going to get back to the routine! The next post on the actual Glacier walk tomorrow.. 

The stone sepulcher aka craziest thing we have ever done!

The previous post on this Belize trip series is here..

The main attraction we were going to see on this trip was ATM (Actun Tunichil Muknal), a hidden cave created by an underground river which the Mayans used as a sacred place. 

We had heard that the Indiana Jones movie was inspired by this place. Not sure if that is true. Even after reading accounts of other people going through the 4 hour wading/ swimming/ hiking through this cave system to see the large sacred chamber where there is a crystallized fossil, we underestimated how challenging it was going to be!

ATM is in Western Belize. So it was not the usual 1 hour drive from the resort. It was a 2 hour drive to the meet up point for ATM guides. We left the resort after a breakfast at 7. The kids had just done the Altun Ha climb and walked the Zoo the previous day. So it was no surprise that they complained about a 5:30 wake up call. The resort staff are not used to folks going from there to ATM. Apparently most folks who visit ATM stay in San Ignatio, another small town in Western Belize with a population of almost ten thousand. ATM pick up point (called Pooks hill) was 45 minute from there.  The resort staff were up and ready for us and served us breakfast. Then off we went. 

The area was called Belmopan and was full of crops. Reminded us of driving towards Monterey when we see lush green fields and similar landscapes.

Once we reached the pick up point, our driver handed us off to an ATM guide. This guy Manuelo or Manny spoke 5 or 6 languages, had a mix of Polish Jewish, Mexican, Mayan, etc. etc. mixed ancestry and was born and raised in Belize. For some reason he spoke with what sounded like a Ukranian Russian accent! 

To the kids, he remined them of Madras thatha (my dad) because of his jokes. He had to tell us he had just cracked a joke!

It was only 7 miles from the pick up point to the Tea Kettle Village (there is no village as far as I could tell.. it is two sheds where you could sit and have lunch and a parking space with one really good restroom with changing rooms and a shower) and the road was not paved.. there was 3 to 4 feet of water at places and the vehicle had to cross it. Manuel joked "don't worry, this vehicle knows how to swim. if not, tourists know how to push!". 

A video of the bumpy ride... the TKO plantation was all teak and Mahogany introduced by the British. On one side was Valencia oranges. 

The Belizians call the Teak and Mahogany an investment for their grand children. It apparently takes 50 years to 80 years for these trees to mature and their wood is extremely sought after. The kids in Belize are also taught to carve these woods.. you see wood carvings sold everywhere!

We had two other couples on the trip from that leg. One from Spain (where the lady was a swimming instructor!) and another from Colorado.. the guy was 6'4" and that had its advantages and disadvantages on the tour. 

Manuel informed us that there was no photography unfortunately at ATM because many years ago, a tourist dropped his lens on one of the skulls and broke it! So some idiot had to spoil it for the rest of us.. I cursed that guy on sacred ground and moved on.. 

We got our safety gear (we were used to the lifevest and miner helmet combination by now) and got a crash course on what we were to expect. Most of Manuels don'ts ended with "you will die!" and much later we realized he wasn't joking!

The the couple from Spain suggested we at least take a picture before the start, given the cameras were going to be left in the vehicle. We got a good picture! Think after this the next smile was 4 hours later..

ATM is a "shock and awe" trip. You walk for 5 minutes from the parking lot and you see a river that is going quite fast and there is a rope tied across it. You can swim across, but if you are not a good swimmer.. you have to hold the rope and pull yourself to the other side as you float. I managed to do that after gulping some water at the deepest point. San was lucky. She declared "I no swim" to Manuelo and he literally pulled her across to the otherside as she was floating facing the sky.  It should not have been that difficult for me.. but the water was very cold and the thermal shock is what got me. The kids swam, the tall guy mostly walked and had to swim for maybe a few seconds. 

Then we kept walking through the jungle and reached antoher river, this time it was 2 to 3 feet deep but was slippery. So we held the rope and walked across. The little one swam across!

More walking and a third river crossing.. by now we got used to the routine. Then some more walking and we came to a stop. We were at the cave entrance. But there was a catch. You have to almost go underwater to reach the cave entrance. How the Mayans figured this out itself was beyond me. I got some help from the guide this time as well and once we reached the cave entrance, it was pitch black. The lights came on and we were told that given our swimming grades were F for San, D- for me and an A- to A+ for the rest of the folks on the team, we will be following Manuel and everyone passes on the information from him to the person behind as we move along. 

It was the most challenging thing we have ever done. You walk, wade, swim against the river as you go into the caves and there are some places where there is barely enough room to squeeze through rocks. To add to this, you are not allowed to touch the walls on some places because they have stalagtites or stalagmites growing and sweat from our skin will make those stop. So we would get instructions like "right side only" or "left side only"  and in some places the water level would go from 3 feet to 8 feet abruptly.. so we would get warnings for those. 

After going through this for an hour and a half, we reached a point where there was a near vertical rock climbing. Then we knew why socks was mandatory. You are not allowed to wear shoes and go up as it was a "sacred place". You were not allowed to go barefoot as it would damage crystal formations. So you go with wet socks. There was a ledge where all 9 of us assembled and removed our shoes. We had to wait for the previous group to get down and then we climbed up. 

Once we were up, there was this dome the size of a football field with crystals everywhere.. there was mist particles dancing in front of us with the miner helmet lamps, the ceilings were full of crystals left behind by the eroding river and the whole thing was like a natural Cathedral with Stalactice columns reaching down to their stalagmite counterparts.  On the floor were beds (naturally formed by the water).. think little pits 8 feet by 3 feet with ridges and skeletal remains in each of those pits. 

We walked for five minutes to the other side of this dome and it was time for the grand finale. There was a ladder tied to another ledge on the top with a rope. Again we waited for another group of 8 people to climb down and we went up. There was not much room up there in that litle cave within a cave but there was a crystallized skeleton there. Think of an old pickle where the sugar or salt comes out in needles.. the entire skeleton was like that. 

We saw that, got a lot of interesting theories on what "possibly" happened there... actually the whole place is fascinating, given all the artifacts and skeletons we saw there.. infant skeletons, jaguar skeletons, older people , people who were literally "offed" with a blow to their head with their hands tied behind their back and kneeling down..  you get the idea?! 

Then it was time to climb and get down. This was again challenging with the wet socks. So we come down literally on our butts by going from stone to stone. 

After having been out of the water for a good hour, we forgot how cold the water was.. so when we jumped from the last rock to the water below.. that was interesting.

Then the wading and swimming and tip toeing in neck deep water started. This time we were going with the water flow. So controlling the speed with which we went was challenging. Almost all of us had cuts and bruises on the return as we hit sharp rocks under water or got our hands cut as we tried to hold on to the walls (again sharp rocks) to slow us down. 

Finally we came to the ledge where the cave entrance was. Manuel took San and walked out. The rest swam out. I froze. My confidence level in getting out of this was low. Luckily he came back and said "you can do it. I will be here" and I managed to half swim, half wade through. Apparently things were not this difficult till 2013. Then the river flooded and water level rose a good 10 feet higher than what it is today and it also eroded and cut the path to the cave to be a good 6 feet deeper. 

We still had a 45 minute trek back and three river crossings. This time the swim instructor from Spain was my savior. That couple stayed back with me and literally gave me a crash course on swimming with a life vest on.

Once we made it back to the parking lot, we showered, changed and had lunch (not from the resort) but provided by the guides. There was no veggie option really that worked for me, but I had granola bars. The wife and kids ate salad and some rice which did not look very appetizing to me. Quaker Chewy never tasted better! 

Then it was time to go to the main road. We said bye to Manuel and were back in the resort pickup truck. Two hours later we were tired and exhausted and happy to be back at the Spa. 

It was almost a little after 6PM when we reached the Spa. It was time to go shower, change again and have a nice dinner. A lot of folks we met were leaving the resort the next morning. It was a good dinner.

Before leaving for ATM, I had asked our Spa manager if she would see if there was any spots to visit Lamanai, another big pyramid burried within the jungles.. which was an all day trip. After ATM, I dropped the idea.

The last day was going to be a day of rest for the family, exploring the resort area and getting some much needed last minute pampering before flying out.

One thing kept coming back to me. I should learn to swim better. Would have enjoyed it even more if I didn't freeze everytime I saw a fast moving river or stepped into nothing while wading in water.

This years goal is to learn to swim properly and with confidence.

ATM is definitely the highlight of the Belize tour.. a jaguar licking my forehead being a close second. If you have health issues, check with the guides before you plan this trip. Learn to swim properly before you go. Also don't bother lugging a heavy camera bag or take gopros etc. No use. Always take extra socks with you so you can do the last climb easily. (we put the extra socks inside our miner helmets). We were lucky that one of the usual guides at the resort told us to take extra socks. He had been to ATM before. 

A must see and experience place if you visit Belize!

Butts up!!

The previous post in the series on the Belize trip is here..

On day 3, our schedule was supposed to be a visit to ATM. However, the Spa manager told us that due to some conflicts we were only confirmed for ATM two days later. My heart sank and I told her that our main reason for coming to Belize was ATM and she has to make sure that we visit on that day. 

They have to get drivers out of the Spa to various locations.. given we were the only family going to ATM from the Spa and there are a limited number of people who go through ATM a day, our Day 5 became the new confirmed date. On Day 3, we were going to do Cave Tubing and Zip lining instead.

We had the same guide who went with us to snorkel and that was a good thing. We started at 8AM and were at the tubing place,  Nohoch Che'en reserve, by 9:30 AM. We had to rent Crocs to wear as the tubing involved carrying a large tube and wading through water on slippery surfaces. We also got a helmet with a light on it and life vests. For the most part the tubing was in shallow water that was 3-4 feet deep. Only in a few places it was 5-6 feet deep. 

There was a 45 minute hike from the parking lot to the starting point on the river where we entered the caves. During this hike our guide gave us a lot of information about the local forests, the type of plants etc. etc. It was interesting and was like listening to a talk on Ayurveda. We saw some smaller caves on the way to the starting point.

One thing that was common to all caves was the bats on the cave roof.. there were lots of bats.. and the caves smelled of the bats!

Walked past a lot of ant hills.. red ants, leaf cutter ants, fire ants.. the entire biting family was there. As long as we kept walking, we were fine.. or so our guide assured us. We learned about the various poisonous plants, snakes and antidotes available from other plants.

After 40 minutes or so we reached the river.

Then our guide tied up all the tubes (there were 8 of us in the group) and tied that to his tube and pretty much pulled us or navigated the group with the flow of the river. 

We got to see a lot of rock formations created by the flowing river and a waterfalls inside the caves. It was a two and a half hour deal and we got our butts kicked by the rocks at places.. 

Every now and then our guide would shout "butts up!" and we would have to pull our butts up within the tube. San and me had front tube seats (or the absence of it) and the kids deliberately went to the last row to avoid the camera. Was not happy with that. Someday they will look at these pictures and appreciate them.. or so I hope!

A video highlights of our tubing experience.

Here are two slideshows from the Cave tubing..

 

We had lunch at the parking lot picnic tables after a quick shower and change of clothes. Then the four of us went to Zipline while the rest of the group was asked to shop around or go for a walk in the trails near the parking. 

The Zipline was only 45 minutes with two steep hikes and 4 zip lines, but two of those went across the entire river we had just tubed across. It was my first Zip line experience. 

There were no phones, go pros, nothing allowed on the Ziiplines as you needed your hands free and your undivided attention on the Zipline. Fortunately our guide took my phone and said "I will walk to the end of the first line and take photos of you guys. So we got some photos! 

On the longest line, San got her glove stuck on the line and that automatically made her brake and she never made it to the other side. She was still a good 10 feet away. I was behind her but the guy who was clearing us could not see the other side of the river. He said I was good to go. I see a bunch of people waving on the other side and the employee asking me to brake. Had to break a good 20 feet from the other end while they threw San a line for her to be pulled up. That line was not going to reach me. 

Was basically hanging out there and the attendant shouted "Sir, can you go flat along the rope and use both hands and pull yourself towards us?".. It was not like I had a choice.. Did everyone proud by pulling myself one hand at a time all the way to the end. That was an interesting experience. Was 200 feet above a river and was doing Tom Cruise style stuff. Was not expecting that. 

After we came back, it was a quiet drive back to the Spa. There was just enough time to get a shower, get ready to join the rest of the groups for dinner. Dinners at the Spa were becoming almost like a family feast. It was the same bunch of folks we were meeting every night. We shared stories of the day from the different groups and showed pictures and videos. Got to make a lot of new friends. It was fun..

The next days plans were still being made.. but we knew what we wanted to do!  The Spa manager had to juggle some logistics to make it happen.. 

Would strongly recommend the Cave tubing even for smaller kids 6+ as long as they can stretch themselves across the tube. We thoroughly enjoyed it. The Zipline, you have to be above 40 inches tall and the last two legs were scary. So it may not be for smaller kids. 

Another day well spent in Belize!