December 30
Life in the jungle: It rained all night and this morning was the coldest temperature in two years (16C/61F). And everything is very muddy. This morning I tried uploading videos to a social media scheduling platform again but the upload speeds were too slow. I did a little research to discover that the weather can affect internet speeds. I am extremely frustrated. I need to be able to use a social media scheduling platform badly.
I scheduled seven goal coaching blog posts to Substack, Medium, and my website this afternoon to at least get ahead on that content. I am currently posted until January 15th. I also wrote my Belize blogs Parts 105 and 106. No more rain today but overcast and very cool all day.
December 31
Life in the jungle: It’s Sunday the weather is really nice compared to yesterday. I needed to be outside in the sunshine. The first part of my day was cleaning my chicken coops. After lunch, I went to the ponds and planted five pineapple tops that should have been planted days ago. I also collected coconuts and did some chopping. No rain today.
New pineapple tops and established pineapple tops
Today is New Year’s Eve Day. 2023 was probably 1000 times better than 2022. It makes me wonder what 2024 has in store for me. But strangely it makes me wonder if I didn’t work or push myself hard enough this year. As the saying goes – No pain, no gain.
January 1
Life in the jungle: It was a slow morning. I am still working out my routine with Andy living here. I feel that I am not being efficient with my time. I am falling behind on chopping and I want to do a two week bike tour as soon as possible. [That is yet to happen even a year later.] Starting tomorrow I start setting my alarm to 6 AM again.
Even though it was a late start this morning I did a little chopping in the coconut field just so I could say that I did something outside. After lunch, I worked on my social media scheduling platform again. I think I finally figured out a system. But it takes about 10 minutes for a single video to upload. On the positive, this gives me time to edit a backlog of upcoming videos while my computer slowly uploads the next video.
I also posted Mastering Your Mornings: Streamlining Decisions for a Productive Day to Substack, Medium, LinkedIn, and my website. Today was a coolish day with no rain.
Saucy & Pepper
January 2
Life in the jungle: I set my alarm for 6 AM but hit the snooze alarm a few times. My allergies were bad all of a sudden last night and I didn’t sleep great. But I still got an early start to chopping in the coconut field. After lunch, I went up to the village for groceries and paid my internet bill. I was pretty exhausted after getting home. I confess I took a nap. Overall good weather today.
January 3
Life in the jungle: This morning I went to Belize City. I can’t even remember the last time I went to the city, thanks to Andy making regular city trips. My lack of recent visits made for a hectic day. I didn’t even get everything I hoped to complete finished. Overall, the temperatures were reasonable in the city.
I also posted Unlocking Success: How Great Opportunities Often Disguise Themselves in Impossible Situations to Substack, Medium, LinkedIn, and my website. I was pretty exhausted getting home and didn’t accomplish anything in the afternoon. I felt pretty lazy about that.
Split-leaf Philodendron flower
January 4
Life in the jungle: These recurring cool morning temperatures are causing me to hit the snooze button a few times. But I think I am getting used to getting up early again. First, I cleaned the chicken coops and then chopped in the coconut field. The coconut field chopping is almost complete. After breakfast, I measured out and figured out how I planned to solve the mud issues in the front yard. Between Andy’s dirt bike and pouring the apartment cement floor (a few weeks ago) the main property entrance area became a huge mud disaster this past rainy season. And with Andy’s dirt bike and the daily traffic out of the greenhouse (once in operation) will mean another mud disaster next year again. I think the plan will be to make patio stones (again). I estimate we will need at least 300 stones to cover the area. I also think we will have to build a lean-to off the side of the greenhouse entrance for Andy’s dirt bike.
In the afternoon I posted a social media video to four platforms via the scheduling platform I want to use. Now that I am more familiar with the platform, I want to start timing myself (per video). It took an hour and 45 minutes to upload the first video because one upload kept canceling out. While uploading the one video I edited five and a half future videos. So at least I can multitask this job. The second video took an hour and 15 minutes to post to the 4 platforms and I was able to edit three and half future videos. The weather was nice today.
This evening Andy made barbecue sauce. I am pretty sure his sauce is the best barbecue sauce I have ever had.
January 5
Life in the jungle: I started my morning in the coconut field and finished my chopping of the field. After breakfast, I was going to post reels to my social media channels but the internet was too slow. I went back to the coconut field. I started chopping stakes to replace rotted ones and reflagging seedlings and stakes in the coconut field. I use flagging stakes so the bush-hog (tractor guy) can see the seedlings whenever he cuts the grass in the field. The weather was good all day.
I posted through my scheduling platform Unlocking Success: Discover Your Strengths and Leverage Them to Substack, Medium, LinkedIn, and my website.
I found a dead spider and either entomopathogenic fungi has caused this. But it’s possibly cordyceps or possibly zombie spider fungus.
January 6
Life in the jungle: I started my morning in the coconut field replacing more old seedling stakes and flagging ribbon. That was until Pepper escaped the front yard and joined me in the field. After a late breakfast, I attempted to post short videos to social media via this scheduling platform I have been trying to use. But the internet speeds were slow again. I am so fed up. I headed to the ponds to chop so as to not waste my entire day. On the walk to the ponds, I decided to abandon the scheduling platform but post daily from my phone. The heat was on at the ponds and it didn’t take long to be soaked in sweat. I chopped about half the middle mound when I heard a bark. There is only one dog that would be barking and that is, of course, Pepper. She escaped the front yard again and tracked me all the way to the ponds.
On the way back to the house I first poked my head in the chicken coop and discovered and caught a speckled racer snake. [Unfortunately, the next day when I attempted to photograph him, he escaped on me before I got a single photo.]
Andy was determined to BBQ this afternoon. While he did that, I set my phone up to share my social media videos as efficiently as possible from my phone including categorizing all my hashtags for efficient access. Andy’s meal was so good I ate double portions which sort of put me in a food coma causing me to bed at 8 PM. Today was the hottest day in weeks.
Belize Part 106 (Dec 20 to 29)
Belize Part 105 (Dec 14 to 19)
Of Note: At this time I am currently 11 months behind in posting my Belize blog posts due to having no internet for the first 18 months of living in Belize.
Glossary of Terms
Glossary of words or people that may or may not be part of this blog post. This glossary will be at the bottom of every blog post for Belize.
Wayne – He is the son of the original owners of the farm (both owners are deceased). The original farm was two – 30 acre parcels minus two – ¾ acre parcels for my house. In 2017 Wayne sold me 40 acres of land from the original 60 acres (one 30 acre parcel plus 10 acres from the second parcel). Wayne lives in his parent’s house and has a few cows on his remaining 18 acres of land.
The ponds – I have two large (300ft long x 50ft wide x 10ft deep) ponds on my 30 acre parcel of land which is basically a jungle. I have about 60 coconut trees (mostly mature) around the ponds. In my first two years of living in Belize, I also planted about 250 assort fruit tree seedlings (Lime, jackfruit, custard apple, pomegranate, and avocado).
The coconut field – I have about 400 coconut trees planted (various growth states) on about 3 acres of cleared land of my 10 acre parcel. I have planted about 350 assorted fruit trees (lemon, starfruit, mango, soursop, cashew, lime, orange) all raised from seed since my arrival in Belize in 2021.
The river lot – my house sits on an ¾ acre lot. I have a second joining ¾ acre lot that allows me river frontage on the Belize River. I call that my river lot.
The dry – Belize has two main seasons. The rainy season and the dry (no rain). The wet is obviously the rainy season.
Chopping – using my machete to clear brush, vines, weeds, and unwanted trees. Generally, when I chop I am removing unwanted vegetation around my baby fruit trees.
Andy – A fellow Canadian who rode his dirt bike from Canada to Belize. When I offered him the use of an apartment that I recently built and the use of my greenhouse Andy decided to stay in Belize permanently and start a hot sauce company here.
