Pool time and market day in Corozal, Belize

Last Updated on October 31, 2024 by Ellen

My husband’s uncle came to visit us in Corozal, and I get the chance to spend time with a new family member. Uncle Ray is with us a few days and then he will travel more around Belize, and then he returns to The Happy House before heading back to the Riviera Maya in Mexico.

Pool Time

Uncle Ray’s home is in Northeast Ohio, where the temperature is predicted to be a balmy seven degrees in the next day or two. Understandably, he was pretty happy to spend time at the private pool with lagoon view at the Happy House.

Throughout our travels, we will sometimes have a place with a few bedrooms, like now. We have a three bedroom house, so it’s the perfect time for family to visit us and get away from the cold winter in the states. We’ll try to give as much notice as possible when we make these kinds of arrangements for future family visits abroad!

Sugar Cane Burning

We had some pool action because of sugar cane burning.

Sugar cane is a major crop in northern Belize. The leaves are razor sharp, and workers need room to maneuver in the fields. So growers set a controlled burn to clear a path for the harvesting. The burns don’t last long, but they cause what’s called “black snow.” That’s basically ash falling from the sky.

Usually, the wind blows in our favor and doesn’t blow the ash into the pool. But when we’re not so lucky, and ash lands in or near the pool, these days the Happy House has a pool boy to tidy things up.

Sometimes on the roadways, you’ll see trucks overloaded with sugar cane sticks. And sometimes those trucks drop a few sticks – especially when it’s on a back road that’s not paved or not paved well. Drivers give cane trucks plenty of room, and drive slowly over the sticks.

My spouse wants to get close to a burning, so I may update this if we go in search of the fire.

Our Market Trip

Visitors to Corozal will get the best produce at the market on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at the waterfront, a few blocks east of the town square. Growers send their goods on trucks that park by a small dock. We went with Uncle Ray on a Friday.

We were advised it’s best to get there early, and we arrived around 9:00 a.m. and we still found some good stuff. (Someone said the selection is much greater as early as 7:00 a.m.)

For example, tomatoes were $1 USD a pound, peppers $1.25 USD, grapefruit four for $1 USD. Apples are pricey – $.50 or $.75 for Granny Smith because they are shipped in from Washington! We skipped those.

We stocked up on other goods, in addition to all of the wonderful goods our friends gave us from their organic, off-the-grid farm, including sweet potatoes, custard apples (my new favorite fruit!), okra and more.

If you miss the wholesale market day in Corozal, you can find produce every day in the main market behind the bus station, just north of town square. But note, this is retail, and you’ll pay a little more.

After the market, we walked a few blocks to Al’s Cafe. We had coffee and fry jacks, which are deep fried dough like bread. It’s actually tasty with some jelly. Al’s came recommended to us as a local place that’s got good eats. We’d go back to try more, if the occasion arose.