Joelle & Kathryn's blog- Saturday

After a long, hard week of working in the schools, today our group had a chance to see the Savannah and Jungle of Belize.  We took an hour and a half ride down the Belize river to the Mayan ruins site. Along the way we enjoyed the wildlife of Belize.  Immediately we came across the bird known as the  'Jesus walks' bird.  The bird hops from lily pad to lily pad, as if he is walking on water.  We continued up the river until we spotted two Howler monkeys.  They began to run towards the boat and as we got closer and they actually jumped onto the side of our boat!!  The monkeys started to walk around the boat inches away from us and one sat on the open seat next to Casey! Kelly Bell offered the monkey a cracker and it walked up and took it straight out of her hand.  It was such an amazing sight! Between all of us we got a coupe hundred pictures of them and caught the whole sight on video! Continuing down the river we saw many large and small herons, a few crocodiles, and some spider monkeys.  When we got to the site of the Mayan ruins we first enjoyed a home cooked Belizean meal that was brought with us by our tour guide and then started hiking through the jungle.  We explored an old sugar mill, an old ball court, and a couple temple ruins.  Many of us decided to climb the high temple which was 33 meters in height- practically straight up! It was very steep and very scary coming down but definitely worth the view at the top.  We saw a tarantula, leaf-cutting ants, tayra (a member of the weasel family), and termites.  Many of our group ATE some termites!!  We concluded that they tasted like Pine. We came across glue fruit and a rubber tree.  We also saw 'give and take trees' which have spikes on them and hurt to touch and are slightly poisonous, but when the bark is peeled back, the tree can be used as an antidote for medicinal purposes. Allspice and cashew trees were other spectacular sights of  Belize that we encountered.  After a fun-filled day, we are back at the Chateau Caribbean to get some rest before we enjoy the sunrise in the morning and church at 7 o'clock.