Pictures from our last weekend in Belize

Francis Wilson's favorite beatitude is "Blessed are the flexible, for they shall never be bent out of shape." We found out that our whole team was wonderfully flexible, even to the point of spontaneously changing the group plans and deciding to cross the border into Guatemala on Sunday, to spend the day at Tikal National Park. Tikal is the site of a very large Mayan city, large portions of which were excavated by archeologists in the 20th century. The largest temple there is Temple IV, where George Lucas positioned cameras to shoot part of the scenery in Star Wars. The photo below is Mark and Lydia standing near the top of one of the smaller temples, looking out over a plaza and surrounding buildings.



Our guide, Danilo, talked about a shift in how he and others are describing the Mayan civilization. He said that for many years, archeologists made conjecture about the Mayans from our western 20th century perspective. But more recent scholarship and observations are bringing a new perspective, more from the point of view of the Mayans themselves, and he talked quite a bit about what the ancient Mayans can teach us. He called himself a "cultural guide" rather than a tour guide.

Belize is home to many different kinds of butterflies. We got close to some of them at Tropical Wings, a local butterfly farm and museum. They also had a tarantula, which our guide said was harmless. Some of us let it sit on our hands - Yikes! And the beautiful jaguar came up close to us at the Belize Zoo on Friday.