#funny how my personal email account that i've had since back when you needed an invite to get a gmail account

[mittensmorgul]

>.>

[sally-annesstories]

Day 30 - San Ignacio, Belize

(Due to unforeseen circumstances <aka my phone broke!> there has been a delay in posts. I've now added the posts for those daysbut some days are missing photos till I steal them from others/get access to iCloud! From this day I have a new phone though. Happy days!)

Full day in San Ignacio!

1. Not having a phone has become too annoying and it's time to fix the situation! I decided to settle in the midpoint of not buying a super fancy phone (and paying in excess of 2k NZD) but also not buying the cheapies of 100NZD. A phone is my contact, my camera, my map and more on this trip. There was a Samsung with a 13mp camera for about 450NZD which seemed ok. A guy Nick offered to come with me and barter (he enjoys bartering, I do not). It was quite good, he was really polite about it and I ended up with circa 40NZD off and a SD card added in! I was a happy camper with my new phone.

2. A group of us had not attended the optional activity today (cave tubing) - me because of phone and them for their own reasons. Instead we'd heard you could go to the river and swim. There are also some good ruins in the area but I've been to a number of Mayan ruins of late so want queuing for these just yet! We walked to the markets and picked up some fruit, then to a bakery for snacks before reaching the river bank which we'd planned to walk along. We wanted to get to The Split which is where the two rivers meet however after walking on the riverbank we realised it was not possible this way. Back to the main drag we split in two, half taxiing and the other half walking. I was wearing jandles so elected to taxi with 3 others! Once we made it to The Split we did a bit of exploring before sitting to chill. I didn't hop in, instead using the time to figure out this new cellphone. While I've always had an iPhone (although was pretty late to the xxx phone party), actually Android hasn't been all that hard to figure out after all.

3. A couple of girls taxied back after only an hour but I elected to stay at the riverbank which was nice. The guys that walked eventually arrived and while most of us sat on the bank a couple swam. At around 1.30pm we decided to walk back to town. The walk back wasn't so bad though I'm glad I only did it one way in these jandles. I feel like my step count though has been relatively low these days without a phone. About an hour later we were back at the hostel.

4. A lazy afternoon was had. I mainly did admin sorting phone, getting useful apps and logging my accounts on. After I'd done this I gave dad a call as mum said he was at home. Was good to hear his voice! I had messaged the family since leaving but never a phone call so this was cool. Maybe I'll do a group snapchat call like we had when Amanda and I were in Italy last year (mum/dad were new to snapchat and one day they called out group and everyone answered!). A couple of times the sound dropped on my end. I'd read this could happen on the phone but also the wifi connection could've been sketchy so anything is to blame!

5. At 6pm everyone was back and i was famished as were most. San Ignacio is a small town a group of us ended up going to dinner to the same place we'd been the night before. Laura (from Ireland) and I were both deciding between nachos and a burger so we got them both and shared! Great decision making. Back at the hostel I emailed the Spanish school I'm looking at attending in Guatemala teaching bed much later than others at 11pm. Maybe not my wisest call given my alarm is also set for 4.40am!

Tally:

Bad things that have happened on the trip: 4

Countries visited: 2

Useless items I now need to carry for 6 months: 2

(Hopefully tally doesn't come across as negative! I've found this all a wee bit funny. How much of a muppet can one person be!)