San Ignacio - Where to stay?

[DeputyDan]

I have signed up with my daughter to do a liveaboard in Belize this July (2009).

We would like to add three/four days to the end of the trip and do some land activities. It appears that San Ignacio is the place to go for the best variety?

Martha's Guesthouse does not appear to have A/C (we will be there in July) - is this correct?

How far is the walk from the San Ignacio Resort Hotel into town for dinner?

We will not have a car!

WHERE SHOULD WE STAY? All peanut gallery comments welcome !!!

 

[reefduffer]

I have signed up with my daughter to do a liveaboard in Belize this July (2009).

We would like to add three/four days to the end of the trip and do some land activities. It appears that San Ignacio is the place to go for the best variety?

Martha's Guesthouse does not appear to have A/C (we will be there in July) - is this correct?

How far is the walk from the San Ignacio Resort Hotel into town for dinner?

We will not have a car!

WHERE SHOULD WE STAY? All peanut gallery comments welcome !!!

We were there for a week in early March. I mostly left it out of my San Pedro trip report here on Scubaboard because it wasn't scuba-related, but you might skim it for background and general tips.
http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/belize/226065-trip-report-san-pedro-belize-2-25-3-1-08-a.html
I'm no expert on the area, but I've been there within the year, so here's what I can tell you:

We stayed at Cahal Pech Village. We walked into town twice and back once, it's a pretty long walk, but doable for healthy people with time to kill. The hill is not trivial, but it's mostly paved road. Cabs are readily available, it will cost (from memory) $5 USD for two, one way, including tip (I remember being quoted $7 Belize, or $3.50 US). You won't need a car even if you don't want to walk.

It was hot in March. I wouldn't want to do it in July with no A/C, and considering you'll be touring outside most of the day, I'm not sure about with A/C ...

I'd be willing to stay there (CPV) again but only if we got one of the detached cabanas we were in. One room plus a private screened balcony with pretty nice views of the town and countryside, it was actually pretty nice. AC and ceiling fan, hot water and electricity were reliable. But we looked at some of the main hotel rooms, and I would not want to stay there. We were told they were remodeling, so maybe they're better now.

We didn't stay in the San Ignacio Resort Hotel, but we did go there one afternoon to take the Iguana Sanctuary and herbal tours, which are on its grounds. Based on the lobby and grounds, I'd say it was probably a nicer place than CPV. It's also considerably closer to town, both distance-wise and hill-wise. A very reasonable walk for the fit, maybe half a mile, although maybe not that pleasant midday in July.

Before brain-dumping what I remember of San Ignacio, I'd recommend two things:

Barb's Belize Barb's Belize, Travel, Mayan, Ecotours, Ambergris Caye is a travel agent specializing in Belize. She provided very useful guidance. My impression is she's paid from a cut of the booking, it won't actually cost you anything to book through her. She travels there regularly and can probably answer most specific questions, and make useful recommendations to suit your interests, tastes, and budget.

The Belize Moon Book Amazon.com: Moon Belize (Moon Handbooks): Joshua Berman: Books
If you're spending the time and money to go there, this may be the best $12.21 you'll spend as part of it.

From San Ignacio we toured:
- Cahal Pech Ruins almost next door to CPV. Small Mayan ruin, worth a couple of hours given the nearness.
- Tikal - Day trip into Guatamala. Big Mayan Ruins. A very interesting long day.
- Xunantunich - medium-sized ruins maybe an hour away.
If you're there for just three days and don't want to go to Tikal but want more than Cahal Pech, this could be a good fit.
- We also hired the hotel-supplied Xunantunich guide, who we liked, for an unplanned off-the-books ad-hoc sunset tour of the Belize countryside east of San Ignacio, including the Mennonite community in the town of Spanish Lookout, where we stopped for ice cream, and I swear you could beieve you were in rural Nebraska, except for the palm trees.
- The Belize Botanical Garden a few miles west of town. An interesting afternoon.
- The Iguana Sanctuary and herbal tours at the San Ignacio Resort Hotel. The Iguana Sanctuary was interesting. The herbal tour somewhat duplicated the Botanical Garden, but we were already on-site, so it was an OK half-hour. I got to eat ants.

For food, we found some decent places to eat in San Ignacio.
I'd recommend Eva's and Hannah's for lunch or a casual dinner. Serendib (Sri Lankan food) for a little more upscale dinner, not really expensive. And Maxim's Chinese restaurant, which was as good as any strip-mall chinese place in the states. Try the conch chow mein!

I'd recommend the french bakery in the "mall" for bread and sweets, and the farmers' market near the north bridge is worth looking, maybe shopping, at.

I recall a steak house attached to the San Ignacio Resort Hotel, but we didn't eat there. CPV has a restaurant that we ate a number of meals at, including all breakfasts. It was satisfactory to good, but if you're not staying there, I don't think it's worth a cab ride to get to.

I'll emphasize something from my March trip report, especially for San Ignacio: I took $50 USD each in $1 and $5 bills, and $200 in $20 bills. Saved all sorts of hassle messing with Belizian currency for tips, cabs, street food, ad-hoc tours, etc. USD are legal tender at a regulated 2:1 exchange rate.

Hope that helps.

 

[hopefulist]

At least some of Martha's rooms have air conditioning. Here are 2 more to consider:
The Aguada Hotel & Restaurant Just over the bridge in Santa Elena, buses, restaurant and pool onsite and buses and taxis (or walk a bit) to get into San Ignacio proper
Casa Blanca Guest House, San Ignacio, Cayo, Belize, Central America Centrally located in San Ignacio

Definitely do an overnight to Tikal if you can swing the time and expense. It's one of the most phenomenal places in the world and when you spend the night in the park you get to explore during the cooler evening and early morning hours when you practically have the place to yourselves and the wildlife is active and abundant. Xunantunich is only about 6-7 miles from San Ignacio and can be done without a guide; there's a nice butterfly place in the same village (San José Succotz) just before you cross the Mopan River on the left called The Trek Stop/Enchanted Wings. If you're adventurous check out the ATM cave tour, a full day through several tour shops in town ( PACZ tours Belize homepage and Belize Adventure Tours - Belize Jungle Tours - Belize Tours ). If you're not feeling quite so adventurous consider visiting the Chechem Ha cave - both have jungle hiking and caves with Maya ceremonial sites, pots, etc.; ATM has a more strenuous hike, swimming/wading in the cave, and crystalized sacrificial victim skeletons.

My photos (with travelogue links on the main pages of the collections) are here if you're interested: hopefulist's collections on Flickr

Happy trails and keep us posted!

 

[Damselfish]

We (4 of us) did the same thing last July, week on a liveaboard followed by some nights in San Ignacio - A/C being an important criteria. We also came to the conclusion that staying near San Ignacio was the best compromise on location. It's difficult to get good or consistent info on all the places to stay around there and pick the right one. We asked lots of questions of various places through email. There are a lot of places that are not air conditioned, including most of those off the grid, including some of the nicer places. Some are closer to some activities and a lot further from others, or way off the beaten path and a long way to anywhere.

After a fair amount of research we wound up at Maya Mountain Lodge which seemed like a good compromise of location and other stuff and we were happy with it. It's one of those little places that the personal touch of the people really makes or breaks your stay. The cottages were rustic but adequate and clean, and our A/C worked well. There were a few simple things that would have been really nice, like better lights and decent size towels. It also would have been nice if the dining area was at least screened in with more fans. The owners were great, we wound up just letting them plan all our tours and transfers and they did whatever they could to make sure things went well and we were happy. The first day, the owner Bart even drove us around San Ignacio then dropped us off there, pointed out where things were as well as restaurants he recommended as being good (and safe for non-locals.)

We weren't too excited by the town itself. When we were deciding on a place to stay it seemed like it would be nice to be someplace where we could easily walk around to places in town when we wanted, find our own tours on the spot, eat out, etc. In reality, we spent a few hours there that first day, walked around, saw the farmers market, had lunch at a local place recommended by Bart (can't recall the name at the moment but was cheap and good) - and we'd had our fill of San Ignacio. Just not a place we saw any reason to spend more time, especially compared to the other things to do.

Our original plan was to eat out more so we didn't originally plan to take the meal plan at Maya Mountain, but in the end we ate all our breakfasts and dinners at there after that first lunch. (Lunch was always supplied on our tours.) We were afraid with a set menu the fussy eater in our group wouldn't be happy. As it turned out their food was surprisingly good and if someone didn't like something they were very happy to make something else. And they had a 2 for 1 meal plan in July, so pretty cheap for what we got.

We didn't get to look closely at too many other hotels. Only drove past SI Resort Hotel, looked nice enough. I did spend a fair amount of time exploring Jaguar Paw. The lobby and dining area (inside and air-conditioned!) looked nice enough but it's really in the jungle with cottages tucked along stone paths and the whole place felt a lot soupier than where we were staying. It also didn't look as well cared for (or maybe it was just the jungle trying really hard to win.)

After seeing even the main roads, never mind some of the routes we covered on tours, there is no way I'd want to be driving around there. And cabs in and around town are cheap.

We did Tikal, a very long day, and definitely HOT in July. If you want to do that and staying there overnight is an option I'd definitely consider it. I don't like heat much and while it was hot it wasn't as bad as I expected other than Tikal. Probably helped by being in the water on most days. We did cave tubing (on a day with no cruise ships) and that was fun, and nice and cool in July once you were past the hike part. Also cave canoeing, a last minute addition and a lot more interesting than we expected - also another nice hot-weather activity. We went kayaking on the river which was fun too, easy whitewater at the time we were there after a lot of rain. Our friends also did the ATM cave and the zipline near Jaguar Paw and enjoyed both. (Supposedly there is a better and cheaper zip-line place in Guatemala on the way to Tikal but the weather didn't cooperate the day, it was pouring when we left so didn't get to do it.)