The Animals of Belize – part 1 – the Zoo of Belize

Going to the Zoo was a funky experience. We loved it. I loved getting way too close to dangerous animals like this guy: They called him a jaguar. What you don’t see here is the middle when I had to wait for my digital camera to get ready for another picture. (You realize, of course, that “digital” is a swear word, right?) The jaguar was so close I could have touched him if I’d been stupid enough to stick my fingers through the wire. One girl pointed at this bird, and got a nip. The entire zoo was set up so the distance between viewers and animals was psychologically minimized as well as physically. The jungle ran wild both inside and outside the cages. Often finding the animals turned into a game. We almost always found them, but only with some determined effort, and the occasional odd body position. And no you don’t get to see the pictures of me with my butt in the air while I try to find something. Sometimes, like with these monkeys I wasn’t entirely sure the “cage” would keep them in. There were hand painted signs everywhere, many of which were highly patriotic. Sign Most of the animals were clearly native. The only ones I wondered about were the white-tailed deer, which may or may not have been. I haven’t checked. All of the animals were donated, many from a movie that was made in Belize a number of years ago. Some were pets donated when they turned out to be wild. Of course the part my kids liked the best involved an iguana in a tree whose branches spanned the path we were on. We didn’t spot him until he relieved himself, raining ick down on the path three or four yards from us. The kids couldn’t stop laughing. Oh, and near as I can tell, there’s only one zoo in Belize.