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Belize: Caracol

Caana, the main pyramid at Caracol, is 43m high
Caana, the main pyramid at Caracol, is 43m high

The journey to Caracol, Belize's most impressive Mayan ruins, used to be one of the most intrepid four-wheel-drive journeys you could take in this part of the world. Tucked away in the thick rainforest near the Guatemalan border in a remote corner of western Belize, the ruins were discovered by chance in 1937 by a wandering horseman called Rosa Mai, who was out looking for mahogany and cedar; the remains of this once bustling metropolis had lain undisturbed in the rainforest for 1000 years, ever since the Mayans had abandoned the city following an extended drought. Although the British and Americans surveyed the site and took a few choice finds for their own museums, the site – which was by this point buried beneath a millennium of rainforest growth – was only excavated properly from the early 1980s on. For those who managed the journey in those early days, it was a proper wilderness trek, and it's no picnic even today.

El Barrio
El Barrio
A poisonous jumping viper
A poisonous jumping viper, which we bumped into in the main plaza

End of Transmission

The view south from the top of the main pyramid
The view south from the top of the main pyramid

The drive to Caracol passes through the Mountain Pine Ridge Forest Reserve, and I have to say I fell in love with the place. As you drive south from San Ignacio and into the reserve, the landscape is all tropical rainforest, like most of the rest of the country, but after you pass through the reserve entrance, the vegetation suddenly changes, and within a couple of minutes the dark canopy of Belize's secondary rainforest is gone and the pine forest starts. This sudden change isn't due to altitude – though the reserve is at a refreshingly higher altitude than the sweatier plains below – but to a change in soil composition. The ground in the Mountain Pine Ridge area is a deep red from the large amount of iron oxide in the soil, and this increased acidity means that traditional rainforest can't grow, and instead only a handful of plant species can survive, including two species of pine and a small number of scrub plants, such as fire grass.

The plaza on the top of the main pyramid
The plaza on the top of the main pyramid
The rainforest encroaching on a temple in plaza A
The rainforest encroaching on a temple in plaza A
The army escort: don't leave home without it
The army escort: don't leave home without it
Bullets by the side of the road
Bullets by the side of the road
Pickup truck to the rescue
Pickup truck to the rescue

The Ruins

A carved mask on the top of the main pyramid
A carved mask on the top of the main pyramid

Amazingly, half an hour later a flatbed truck puttered into view, and thanking our lucky stars we grabbed all our stuff and jumped into the back. That last 20 minutes along the road was a hoot; having the wind blowing through your hair is so much more enjoyable than the savage air conditioning that drivers in hot countries insist on turning up to full, and it felt surprisingly apt to be turning up to such a remote site in the back of a flatbed truck.

One of the carved stelae, showing a captured enemy with his hands tied behind his back
One of the carved stelae, showing a captured enemy with his hands tied behind his back
The Temple of the Wooden Lintel
The Temple of the Wooden Lintel

Back Home

The main pyramid peeking through the trees
The main pyramid peeking through the trees

On the tour Diego had turned out to be a genuinely likeable and knowledgeable guide, though even his enthusiasm started to flag when we came back to the visitor centre, well after the army convoy had returned to base, to find that our replacement bus hadn't yet arrived. We were stranded until it did, so we sat and listened to the noises of the jungle as the sun slowly moved across the sky, until finally, at 4pm, a tiny Toyota RAV4 pulled into the car park.

The pines of Mountain Ridge at dusk
The pines of Mountain Ridge at dusk