Celebrating a milestone birthday amidst bonefish, permit, and the largest shark in Belize.
[by Ben Romans]THERE’S A SHARK NEXT TO OUR BOAT—a big shark. Well, the biggest shark my wife and I have ever seen, which, truth be told, might seem small to others more familiar with the diversity of marine life on the saltwater flats. But to a guy born and raised in Cleveland and a North Dakota native, the long, gray fish lethargically paralleling our drift sure does seem like the Belizean version of Jaws.
But that was the gist of our week; just when we thought we’d experienced about all the Turneffe Atoll had to offer, we encountered something else amazing. Little things, like the taste of fresh papaya pancakes, blew back our hair just as much as the big things, like walking on the beach at night and seeing the red glow of a saltwater crocodile’s eyes staring into my flashlight beam.
The premise of our trip was simple— celebrate my wife’s milestone birthday in a locale where we could relax, eat like royalty, select from a variety of experiences like snorkeling and kayaking, and of course, work in a little fishing.
More than anything else, my wife just wanted to see the ocean. After a lifetime of living in the West, she wanted to see salt water with her own eyes—but it couldn’t be just any salt water. It had to be one of those scenes you can’t justify with photographs. The kind of place you can hear and feel when you close your eyes, six months after returning home. We didn’t think about it long—Turneffe Flats was a no-brainer.
I’m always amazed how easy and fast modern travel has made it for someone to zip around to another side of the world. My wife, Heather, and I left our home in Boise, Idaho, at 7 a.m., arrived in Belize around 3 p.m. the same day, enjoyed a short boat ride to…
