October 26
Life in the jungle: Today did not go as planned. I woke up to no water and when I listened carefully through the window, I could hear the river pump running dry. After almost three years my water situation is FUBR. The flooding has dropped a few inches from yesterday. After feeding the chickens it started to rain. After the rain stopped, I headed to the village for groceries while Andy troubleshooted the pump. On the way home I got stuck in the rain. Arriving home, I worked a bit and got a good part of my scorpion post posted.
Andy thinks we might be in big trouble with the pump. After the rain stopped again, I went back up to the village for PVC supplies to attempt pump and waterline repairs. I got home just as it was getting dark so the chickens never got fed this evening. This afternoon I also received a request for hosting a cyclist. That might explain why the pump crapped out on us. It always does that when guests are expected. More rain all night.
Flooding on the road
October 27
Life in the jungle: Being Sunday I started my morning with a nap. After breakfast, I continued working on my scorpion post. I also worked on troubleshooting the water pump. Still with no luck or water. Mid-afternoon I got a message from the cyclist. Telling me that he planned to arrive this evening. I wasn’t expecting tonight, now I had to prepare the room for him and clean the house. He arrived in the dark. He is from Poland and has biked part way around the world so far.
There was rain last night and this morning. No rain this afternoon. Flood waters in the yard have risen again marginally.
October 28
Life in the jungle: The flood waters are as high as they have ever been, therefore I do not anticipate any further rising. It was kind of a slow morning with all this flooding and being stuck in front of the computer. I spent a couple of hours trying to improve my SEO on my scorpion post except after numerous grammatical improvements the SEO grading did not improve. So, I gave up and this morning posted – How to Scorpion-Proof Your House & other Arachnids found in Belize. Then I posted the Belize blog post Part 111.
There was some light rain in the morning. Andy miraculously fixed the pump. We have water again. It appears the trouble was a clogged impeller. When the river drops, we will have some things to figure out and fix on the intake pipe to the river. I am just thankful for running water. I wrote the Belize blog post Part 137. Therefore, I am only 26 blog posts behind. I am slowly getting caught up.
My guest pushing his bike down the road
A Central American Wood turtle on the road
October 29
Life in the jungle: Rain last night. This morning the yard is flooded at its highest level ever, and I feel like it might actually be in forever. The patio stone driveway is mostly covered in water, and sections of the greenhouse even have water including a small section of Andy’s apartment bathroom floor. This is really bad! In all my years I never imagined the flood waters being this high.
This morning, I biked to the village with my Polish cyclist guest so he could borrow and return to me a pair of rain boots to help get down the road. The road had more water pouring across than I had ever seen. Getting to the village we came across an extremely skinny dog. For a moment I was even tempted to reach out to it, but as quickly as I thought that, I knew Pepper would never accept her. I did not make eye contact with it, and fortunately my guest didn’t either, though at first, the dog walked towards him. I could tell this dog would have been like Pepper – one pet and then there would be no getting rid of her.
Heading home I felt bad, and looked back to the village a few times feeling guilty that this dog was not going to live much longer, I knew that Saucy would accept her but Pepper never would. Unless she miraculously shows up at my gate I can’t help her.
Before we left for the village I posted my scorpion-proofing post to the Belize Facebook groups I follow. Based on the number of website views it received it’s a pretty popular post. After lunch, I should have spent time editing my bike ride book. I took a nap in my hammock even though I knew I would be disappointed in myself for doing so.
This evening, I discovered a true mystery. Two duck eggs from the chicken coop that I noticed at lunch were missing this evening. I feel if it was a Black-tail snake, the snake would have remained in the coop hiding so it could remain dry from the flooding.
A Lizard eater snake (Mastigodryas melanolomus)
October 30
Life in the jungle: I headed to the city for my permanent dental crown. I was not impressed. I blame the company that made the crown, not the dentist. The dentist had to do a lot of grinding for it to fit and even though he color-tested the tooth against my existing teeth color, the color is way off.
I never got rained at all today. My forearm is really sore, I got bit by a spider sometime in the latter part of last week just below my right elbow.
A pullet that I didn’t discover outside last night was killed, probably by an opossum. Every night when I close the chicken coop doors, I have to catch straggler chickens roosting outside the coops. Today, there were three duck eggs and a chicken egg. I thought for sure yesterday’s egg-stealing culprit would strike again. No change in flood water levels.
Flooding everywhere
October 31
Life in the jungle: My arm pain was noticeably less first thing this morning. My mouth is even feeling much better. There was on-and-off rain today, and flood levels have not changed. I went to the village to check on the new cabana materials I had ordered the other week. Getting home I did some minor cleanup around the chicken coops.
After lunch, I did some month-end computer and phone photo organizing. My big plans were to get back to my bike ride book editing. Except by the time, I was about to start editing my arm was sore like last night. I am pretty frustrated with myself at the moment. I suspect my arm is sore from the bike ride to the village and the little bit of computer work I had already done (resting my forearm on my table while I type). I need this arm to get better, my arm is noticeably swollen and I even feel a little sick. I did some research this evening that suggests that I might have a Staphylococcus infection (short-form staph), not a spider bite.
My Staphylococcus infection
Belize Part 136 (Oct 12 to 19)
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.
