First impressions of Belize:
The humidity slapped me in the face the moment I stepped off the plane.
The roads are really rough but everyone drives crazy fast anyway.
The rain is super unpredictable.
This country is beautiful.
My first day at the site was just orientation. We learned about the site history, how things work, and who would be in our site teams. It was a pretty laid back morning. The camp is so rustic in a wonderful way. It actually feels like you're at summer camp. We live in cabanas, these tiny little tin houses with two beds and some shelves. I got lucky enough to get assigned to one without a roommate. Not sure how that happened... I took pictures of the whole area, but won't have a chance to upload them until later. It's so picturesque all around -- hills and trees surrounding the camp. The view from the roof of the main building is absolutely wonderful.
The afternoon of our first day we were taken to one of the archaeological sites for a tour. Before we left they asked us if we liked roller coasters -- because next thing we knew, we were in the back of a pickup truck holding on for dear life as we sped down the rocky road, through a few cow pastures, and to the edge of the jungle. This is when it hit me where I was, what I came here to do, and the excitement of it all. Once you got over your initial fear of falling out of the vehicle, the ride was pretty spectacular.
From there it just got better. We trekked through the jungle, one of our leaders using a machete to cut a path through the trees. (The site hasn't been excavated in a few years so it's pretty overgrown now.) We got to see some really cool archaeology and have a little adventure. We even heard some howler monkeys! I was disappointed we couldn't spot any, but I still have some time.
Today was our first day actually going to our respective sites and doing some real archaeology, but I'll get to that in another post.
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