WHAT: A hike through the Belizean jungle of the Cockscomb Basin Wildlife Sanctuary (almost named Jaguar Reserve) WHERE: The sanctuary is located right in the middle of Belize. The reserve can be entered from the main Belizean highway, 6 km west of the Mayan Village Center (see map below) HOW MUCH: Admission to the reserve is $10,- BZN or $5,- USD. The costs of the drive towards the area depends on what your method of transportation is (hitchhiking, bus, taxi). Taxi's are more or less $80,- BZN back and forth. HOW LONG: There are a LOT of trails so you could basically hike there the entire day. We chose to do three trails
I really loved Hopkins, a teenytiny village in between the big Belizean tourist hubs of San Ignacio, Caye Caulker and Placencia. It was Belize at its best for me.
Although I didn’t want to stay too long in Belize (cause way more expensive compared to Mexico, Honduras or Guatemala), I just kept on prolonging my stay in Hopkins. In fact, I even though it was difficult leaving the lovely and tranquil Funky Dodo Hostel itself (and their excellent wifi).
So to keep myself entertained in between the writing, I did a bit of exploration in the area. If you’re in for a fresh breath of air ánd like hiking then The Cockscomb Basin Wildlife Sanctuary also known as the Jaguar Reserve is the best place to go to from Hopkins. Less touristy than the nearby Mayflower Bocawina National Park (at least, that’s what they told me in Hopkins), the Cockscomb sanctuary or reserve (both words are used) also is Belize’s most famous jaguar sanctuary. To top it all off, Cockscomb is one of the biggest protected areas in the country.
Although the name suggests otherwise, the chance that you run into an actual jaguar is (fortunately?) very slim. But yes, obviously there are some around. If you’re really on a quest to see one, it’s best to go during the very early mornings. The park is basically open all day, although it is required to pay a fee at the entrance (which opens at 8am). But you could do it on the way back as well.
Nevertheless, for me it wasn’t so much the jaguars that attracted me to visit Cockscomb. There are lots of other animals to be seen at the reserve. Think of an enormous amount of birds, tapirs, deers, snakes and lots of lovely exotic plants and flowers. But it’s especially the supposedly excellent preserved trails that lured me in.
Together with two other female solo backpackers (it’s always great to meet mind-like people) we left Hopkins at 7am with the north bound Dangriga bus. A $2,- BZN ride later, we took another southbound bus (again $2,- BZN) towards the second junction, right along the Maya Center Women’s Group.
Everyone is required to stop at this Maya Center – the green building at the corner – to check in and buy the ticket ($10,- BZN or $5,- USD). However, now that you have your ticket, you’re still not at the actual entrance of the park! There’s another 6 km to be conquered from here before you reach the second park entrance. Don’t throw your ticket out either. They’ll check it again at this second entrance.
Back to the first stop.
The Maya Center Women’s Group is also a huge gift shop, but unfortunately all of the items on sale are a bit pricey compared to the gifts in Guatemala. Still, it’s worth to check it out if you’re on your way back home and still need to buy that one particular gift for your niece. Plus, it feels like you’re supporting the entire village with everything you purchase in here.
The road towards the second entrance is very wide and open and suitable to all types of vehicles, but filled with potholes. So drive with care if you’re going there with your own rental car (or follow the saying; don’t be gentle, it’s a rental).
For those who don’t have a private vehicle, if you’re there early in the morning you’re still able to catch a ride. Either with one of the other visitors or with one of the rangers that are driving to work.
We were waiting for a bit at the Maya Center Women’s Group and then decided to take a taxi to the second entrance, but unfortunately they charge a lot of money for a the 6 km one-way ride: $40,- BZN or $20,- USD!
When we arrived at the center, another (almost empty) car popped up five minutes later. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. So I’d say just be patient if you want to save on transportation.
Right in front of the Cockscomb Welcome Center there’s a very convenient map that’ll help you to figure out what to do for the rest of the day.
In the little building next to the welcome center there’s some extra information about the jaguars in the area. Worth a quick stop.
And there are some weird artefacts around too.
Look at this creep for example! ↓ That’s how I prefer them, those aggressive fer-de-lances (terciopelo)! Like a freakie in a bottle. I do wonder how they caught it though…
If you have no clue where to start your day in the park, don’t despair. The rangers will tell you all about the trails and will give you heads up with what’s out there to see.
We decided to do three trails in total. Firstly, the trail to the river overlook – where you can tube all the way back again towards the visitor center -, secondly the trail to Ben’s Bluff overlook (with a waterfall along the way) and last but not least a teenytiny jungle stroll towards a small crashed airplane.
The most popular trail by far is the Tiger Fern Trail. Again this trail is leading to a waterfall (or actually two of them) and an overlook. The Ben’s Bluff trail we were about to do was a light version of that one. The Tiger Fern Trail is quite steep and will take something like 4-5 hours back and worth.
The trail to the river overlook
We were having a lot of luck that day. Apparently the rangers were doing their seasonal bird banding, so as we set out foot we immediately could join these activities.
Every half an hour one of the rangers checked all of the fifteen giant nets to see if they’d been able to catch something. Back at the station he noted down all the information regarding the bird before he banded and released the little fellow again.
During our round only one bird got trapped in the nets ↓ but still it was really fun to experience this process!
Continuing our way to the river overlook, just 100 meter down the road we encountered this gorgeous creep. One of my travel companions accidentally almost stepped upon it. ↓
It was the size of my hand more or less and very furry.
I always thought that the bites of a tarantula were pretty harmless, like the sting of a bee or something. At least that’s what somebody told me in Costa Rica, but back in Hopkins one of the locals warned me that you actually can get very, very sick of their poison. Damn.
Anyway, I was happy the spider didn’t jump on me when I took that shot, because I know they have a habit of doing that as well. Lessons learned.
Another ranger told us this tarantula is often seen at the beginning of this trail, so you might want to take precaution. Closed shoes are in order anyway as snakes are around too. Or just avoid the entire road altogether :).
Anyway, albeit a bit wary after this unexpected meeting we continued our way towards the river. We didn’t came across other surprises apart from quite a few lovely butterflies: both many postman butterflies and blue morphos.
River tubing costs an additional $15,- BZN or $7,50 USD (you can pay it at the second welcoming center) and bring a lot of bug spray too if you can, as you’ll be eaten alive along the river.
There are a lot of birds around the river too, so to hear them singing alone makes it worth the trip!
The trail to the waterfall + Ben’s Bluff
Now that we’d seen our (unexpected) portion of wildlife we hiked out along our second trail of the day: Ben’s Bluff. The path was rather muddy and a little steep, but we reached the waterfall way sooner than expected.
Even though the biggest part of the path was shaded, we were still very happy to dip into the little base of the waterfall. ↓
It was absolutely lovely. Blue morphos and dragonflies were flying around as we were floating around.
After this cooling-down moment we were ready to hike the last bit up to the top. The sun was shining bright by now and the mosquitos were ready to suck the life out of us too.
The views were definitely worth the 30-minutes hike up. It had the feeling we could look all the way into Guatemala from up here. Perhaps we did. But for sure we were able to see Victoria Peak, the second highest mountain in Belize.
The trail to the plane wreck
It was 2 pm by now and though still quite early, we were pretty much done for the day. There were very few visitors around on the day of our visit, which was great in a way, but also meant that it would be difficult for us to catch a ride. Luckily one of the rangers – the bird banding guy – was on his way out and when he saw we were struggling a bit how to get out of here, he asked whether we wanted to join him on the quad. Hell yeah!
We were with three and he already had another guy on the quad, the road was full of potholes and yet he managed to zigzag along the forest with five persons on his quad. What a hero.
Along the way, hero-driver let us off for a second next to a tiny trail. Running through the forest (as we didn’t want our quad ride wait for too long) we suddenly spotted this overgrown plane next to the river. ↓
The plane was amazing. The guy who crashed it, survived the fall and just walked out off the forest again. You really wonder how he was able to land it in such a dense forest.
This was our quad ride by the way. ↓
Honestly I think this ride was even the best part of our day! Such an amazing experience to drive with these Belizean guys straight through the jungle on this tiny vehicle.
Hero driver dropped us off at the beginning of the Maya village. As the chocolate shop was still open (next to the entrance building, they have great morning and afternoon tours as well!), we bought whatever was left on the shelf.
I really liked the dark chocolate with ginger ánd the chile chocolate. Both worth a try-out, as any of the other funky bars probably.
All fuelled up we were ready for our last hitch.
Although I was a little scared of hitchhiking in Belize, we were now with three people and the road felt pretty safe. Also, in our Funky Dodo Hostel back in Hopkins they had told us that hitchhiking is safe and common in Belize.
In the back of the truck together with a big pack of oranges we had the luck to go all the way to Hopkins. But even if you’re left at the junction of Hopkins and the main road, I’m pretty sure you can easily catch another ride back into town.
That was it, our Thanksgiving adventure! I hope you have a wild day at Cockscomb yourself as well one day!
Here’s where to find that beautiful Belizean jungle:
