With an exciting, crazy honeymoon story I guess the best thing would be to start at the first and not leave out any details. So be prepared for a long blog today. When telling a story like this one I don't even know where to begin. I guess technically the honeymoon starts directly after the wedding reception, so I'll begin there. We got this absolutely wonderful ride to
Salt Lake via a limousine! It was amazing. Just as we were about to get into the limo my dad handed me our pile of cards, which were stuffed with money from various guests. We figured we had plenty of cash to take on our honeymoon for any incidentals, but my dad said it wouldn't hurt to have a little extra cash on hand. On the way to
Salt Lake we couldn't help taking out the money and counting it! We stayed at the
Salt Lake City Plaza in such a nice suite. It had two rooms, and one of them had the biggest Jacuzzi I had ever seen. We could have fit 10 people in there! We stayed there for 2 nights…Saturday and Sunday before we caught our plane on Monday morning. We w
ent to Rodizio Grill for lunch (after we walked all the way to Little America just to find out that the brunch was closed – we were so bummed!), Arby's for dinner (not classy, I know but we couldn't resist) and stopped at a convenience store for a disposable camera (I was afraid of taking our digital to Belize) and just had a great time lounging around. We even caught a little bit of Pirates of the
Caribbean on TV!
We got up early Monday morning (5:15 am is like death for us!) and drove to the airport to catch our plane to
BELIZE! (Doug was smart and thin
king ahead and left a vehicle up at the hotel when we were up at the temple the day before).
We were one of the luckiest newly married couples – my boss gave me and Doug a honeymoon to anywhere we chose.
I wanted to go somewhere that was exotic and tropical, but I wanted to be secluded with not a lot of tourists.
Belize ended up being the absolute perfect spot.
We flew from
Houston to
Belize City, then caught a tiny 13 seater airplane (we were given permission to board the plane via our handwritten plane tickets!) from
Belize City to a small little town called Dangriga.
It was crazy to see how behind the times it was down here – we caught ourselves laughing at an old fashioned Kit Kat bar poster that looked like it was from the 50’s.
Th
e “airport” in Dangriga was a single wide run down trailer. We had a guy waiting for us to take us to our hotel, which was named Hamanasi.
It took about a half an hour to drive from Dangriga to
Hopkins, which is the small town where our hotel was located.
We drove almost the entire way on dirt roads, and where there was actual cement on the bigger “highways” there were potholes big enough that we thought they could swallow the entire van we drove in! It was so humbling to see the circumstances in which these kind people lived.
The housing was just above
that of living in a tent, yet the people were all still so happy.
We couldn’t believe our surroundings…it was so different being in a third world country.
All of the homes were so poor and didn’t have doors or windows or anythin
g.
But we thought it was kind of funny because every home you looked into everyone was sitting around watching television!
Funny how they can’t afford things like windows but sit around watching American television!
When we got to our hotel we were absolutely blown away. There was a huge row of flowers leading up to the hotel and it was beautiful!
I had done so much research on where to stay and read every review that was available, but could have never expected this.
It was the most beautiful place ever, situated right on the beach.
The ocean was the mos
t amazing dark blue.
When we got there we checked in and had people handing us colorful drinks with umbrellas in them.
The service they provided was top notch and we were treated like royalty, it was so much fun.
There were a few options for lodging at this hotel and since I couldn’t choose between them, we stayed a few nights in
each place. The first was a private cabin held up on stilts that was right in front of the ocean.
It had a balcony with an oversized hammock, w
here I must admit we spent a lot of our time.
When we first entered there were fresh flowers all over our room, as well as on our bed.
Accompanying the flowers on our bed was a note etched into a leaf welcoming us to the hotel.
It was the nicest place we could have stayed and it was just amazing.
The second place we stayed was behind the ocean-front cabins, situated in the middle of a jungle basically.
We got insid
e our bungalow in the jungle and there were so many trees we literally could not see to the next little bungalow, which gave us so much privacy it was amazing.
In summary, we had the best lodging we could have hoped for at this beautiful hotel on the ocean (we even had a lady come to our door at like 10:30 one night and wish us a good night’s rest!) Next to lodging in fanciness was definitely the food we ate.
I felt like I was eating dinner at a royal palace each night.
The food was so elegant and the service impeccable.
We got to eat next to the ocean in the dark by candlelight.
The type of foods we are were just
wonderful and very Belizean:
snapper rice, fried fruit, Ethiopian spice bread, potato soup, banana pie, jerk chicken, chocolate cake, pink bread, garnaches (basically fish and chips), and the list never ends.
There was something kind of funny that we noticed every
night when we were at dinner – there was a middle aged guy there with his family and you couldn’t help but take notice to them.
For all of you “24” television fans, we think that we met the real Ramon Salazar down here in
Belize!
I am not kidding this guy was one who could assassinate people and his wife was one that would help him and carry a machine gun.
We could have sworn he was a Columbian drug lord just taking off some time to spend with his wife and daughter in paradise.
If I see him one day on
America’s Most Wanted I won’t be the least surprised.
Funny that this is one thing that we remember from our honeymoon! I just can't believe we got to eat here every night - next to the ocean was absolutely beautiful!
The second day we were in Belize we used the complimentary bicycles at the hote
l and made the short trip to the village of Hopkins. We felt so funny riding these bikes – they were the old fashioned ones with the enormous seats and handlebars! But hey, they got us around so we were glad to ride them. We stopped at a little café called Inne’s Restaurant for lunch. It was very dirty with dirt floors and cardboard tables, but of course they did have a television hanging from the wall! The food was good and we had a great time, although we think this is where Doug got sick, and I’ll talk more about this later. We stopped at a little grocery store b
efore heading back to the hotel and it was so funny to see that they sold flour and baking powder in plastic sacks with the prices written on them in marker! We also bought a coconut and had a time watching Doug trying to crack it open! On our way back to the hotel we stopped at a place called David’s Wood Carvings and completely overpaid for a wood carving bowl and 
lid. We have to hand it to him though, he was a great salesman. We even walked away with a shark spine and bamboo necklace for me. Amidst the terrible humidity which added about 50 degrees of body heat we made it back to the hotel alive. That night we took a dip in the pool situated right by the beautiful ocean and took a walk up the beach.
During ou
r stay in Belize we had planned three major excursions. The first was a cave tubing trip which turned out to be an absolute blast. There was only one other couple who went with us, which made it fun to have a smaller group with our tour guide. We drove a ways out to an old dirt road, parked our beater tractor, picked up our tubes and started the hike into the cave. We must have passed 4,000 rows of orange trees (which to our amazement were green!) - this is a huge farming job down here. We finally made it to the river and loaded onto our individual tubes, and started our adventure into the old abandoned caves. The first part was incredibly scary since the tour guide turned on his flash 
light and pointed it to the ceiling, only to reveal about 1,000 bats circling above our heads. I could have passed out right then, but luckily I kept my composure long enough to make it past the bats. Deeper into the cave we were able to see so many cool things – old Mayan pottery and sculptures that dated back hundreds of years. It was absolutely crazy to think that Mayan civilizations used to live around these parts and use these old caves for rituals and things. The way they used their sculptures to tell different stories was amazing – even by shining light on the statues in different ways told different stories. The coolest thing was to hike around and hear all of the amazing stories and folklore told by our tour guide. He gave us a history of the Mayans and told us all about their fall in civilization. It was so neat to be able to see how the story of hi
story he told fit in exactly with the Book of Mormon in that same time period. It definitely reaffirmed my faith once again. And since Doug was so newly off his mission he caught onto different points of history and tied them together much easier than I could, and loved hearing him talk about the comparisons after we were done. What a cool experience. And I guess the craziest part of it all was when we got back to our room and the maid had left the window open just an inch - we found LIZARDS in
our bathroom! Needless to say I freake
d out a little bit and made Doug fetch them out. There were two of them and I was freaked out that there would be more waiting for me in my bed, but all turned out well J
The next excursion was a trip to see the old Mayan ruins in western Belize. We drove for about 3 hours to get there – it was on the complete other side of the country and unfortunately Doug was starting to feel a little bit sick during this ride. The first and largest destination was called Xunantunich. We had to cross a river via ferry in
order to get there, and along the way saw so many full sized lizards running around everywhere, especially surrounding the river. It was crazy – they were like the size of a dog and it quite honestly creeped me 
out. I had never seen a reptile that big and close before. Eek! Getting to visit these old Mayan towns was absolutely amazing. A short hike from the main road was the old city of Xunantunich and it just blew me away. I cannot even imagine how people who lived so long ago had the means to build such large structures that have lasted for so many years. They have found certain secret rooms and vaults in these places which have given clues to different rituals done in these temples which is just amazing! It was so neat to think about what it would have been like to live in this age amongst these people and what their lives would have been like. We climbed to the top of one of the Mayan temples and from there we could see the fence line that divided Guatemala from Belize, which was really cool. We also traveled to another Mayan site about 20 miles away (I forget the name of this one), but it was also absolutely covered with old Mayan architecture. We got to visit this visitor’s center as well, which showed a lot of the Mayan history and told the story about an old jade Mayan ritual mask that was worth millions and was owned by an ancient king. It was once housed at the very place we stood, but a few years ago it was stolen in the middle of the night, killing two guards in order to capture it. Makes me wonder where it is now…
The last big adventure we had been waiting so long for was our scuba diving trip! We got all certified so we wouldn’t miss out on the wonderful diving that is available here in Belize. This is where the trip gets interesting. We got all fitted with gear and were on our way. Even the boat ride to take us to our diving spot was fun! We drove out about 30 miles and stopped to prepare for our dive. We looked around and all we could see was water. It was a pretty terrifying feeling! But at the same time it was absolutely beautiful. Our first dive was along the barrier reef in Belize. I couldn’t have imagined how cool it would be to actually dive in the ocean. There were so many colors it was crazy! We saw so many cool things. We dove down and swam along the edge of about a 200 foot cliff right underneath the water. Our deepest dive was 60 feet down and I was amazed at how easy it was to get so far under the water. This dive lasted about an hour and then we came up with the rest of our group. We boarded the boat and drove to this fun little island in the middle of the ocean. Literally, it was only like 50 feet across the entire thing, and we stopped there for a drink and to rest a bit. We then got back on the boat and drove to our next dive, which was the last of the day. We dove down only about 40 feet this time, but it was still just as amazing. We saw a nurse shark, a sting ray (which was really crazy because when we turned on the TV about 2 days later we found out that Steve Irwin, the crocodile hunter, had been killed by one on the same day we were diving and it kind of freaked us out), and tons of colorful beautiful fish. It really was such a neat experience to see all of those wonderful things below the ocean. And here is where the craziness begins. We made all of our safety stops (for all of you divers, you know what I mean) and made it to the top in one piece. We were in a group of about 10 divers and we all came up about 20 feet from the boat. Well, all of the sudden I see Doug start vigorously swimming towards the boat. Honestly, I just kind of stayed put because I was tired from all of the swimming! The boat got closer to us and I saw Doug trying to get up in the boat. He climbed about two rings up the ladder, stopped to try and get his fins off, and all of the sudden fell backwards into the water. I could tell he was really struggling and I kind of made my way over to him. The guides in the boat (there were about 3, as well as 1 in the water) told him to take off the fins on his feet in the water and then get up in the boat. He was still struggling and couldn’t do it. By that time the guide in the water had made it over to Doug and took off his tank and fins. Even after that Doug could not climb into the boat. So all 3 of the guides inside the boat pulled while the one in the water pushed him into the boat. When Doug got in he wasn’t breathing very well and collapsed to the floor of the boat. I was getting into the boat at that time and was wondering what the heck was going on. Honestly, at this point I didn’t think it was anything serious. I just thought that Doug was winded (we all were from diving) and that he just needed help into the boat. Well, as I was watching all 4 of the guides tore Doug’s wetsuit off the top of his body and started checking his heart beat and how he was breathing and stuff. All the while Doug started yelling that he couldn’t breathe and his chest really hurt. One of the guys ran to the other side of the boat and got out an oxygen tank and breather. They put it on his nose and mouth to give him 100% oxygen and at this point I started to freak out a little bit. I was lying on the seat just above Doug on the floor trying to ask him what was wrong. Then I overheard one guy say to the other, “you better get on the radio.” And just like out of a scene from a movie, the guy got on and the radio didn’t work! He tried talking to someone on shore, but the response was delayed. Luckily he got it working and then I heard him say, “You’ve got to hurry! When we get to land this man needs an ambulance.” Ok, so at this point I started crying my head off. I was so scared…I didn’t want to be made a widow after only being married for a week! It was really scary because Doug started thrashing his body all over – and as you all know, Doug is no small fellow. One of the guides kept telling Doug to stay propped up on his left side, because this opens the airway so you can breathe easier. Well, Doug said when he laid like that he couldn’t breathe. There were like 3 guys trying to hold him down because he kept trying to get up. It was so terrifying to watch. And since Doug is so strong (and when your body is in shock like that, it gets even stronger with the will of survival!) he just pushed them all off of him and sat up. I just started yelling and crying, “Doug, just lay down so you don’t get hurt!” Meanwhile they were trying to keep the oxygen mask on him and he screamed saying it pinched his nose and kept him from breathing so he kept tearing that off as well. One of the guys kept telling me to try and hold Doug’s hand because he was convulsing so bad that his hands were tightening up, which squeezed his fingers into the palm of his hands, that they were worried he would break his fingers. So I held onto his hands as best as I could but he was squeezing so hard that it just hurt me so bad. Doug later told me that the feeling he had in his body was like that of when your foot falls asleep and it gets all tingly, but it was intensified with pain about 100 times that. This all seemed to happen just so fast, and it felt like we were to the shore in no time. The ambulance was there and a guy ran over with a stretcher to lift Doug off the boat. Everyone said that he was too big to be carried on the stretcher, so the guys just all picked him up and helped him to the ambulance. I was close in toe and sat with Doug in the back of the ambulance on the way to the Dangriga airport. When we got there, I was greeted by the owner of our hotel. She was an American woman and came to tell me everything that was going to happen. She said that a life-flight airplane would come to get him and he would spend the next few days in the hospital and that I would do him no good, so maybe I should just stay at Hamanasi, which would be like 150 miles away from where Doug was! She said she could keep me up to date and I would know at all times what was happening with him. I told her she was absolutely crazy if she thought that I would go back and leave Doug, and that I was going with him. I was so grateful to her though – upon hearing what had happened she went into our room and grabbed a few things she thought we would need: money and a change of clothes. And here is where taking our honeymoon money with us came in handy and served as a tiny miracle. She grabbed the stack of bills from our room and brought me the money because she knew that the life-flight airplane would not take Doug to the hospital if I didn’t have the cash to hand it to them on the spot. They didn’t take credit cards, and we would have been up a creek if I didn’t have the money. I was so thankful at that moment for my dad suggesting we take the cash “just in case.” So I handed over the enormous wad of bills and boarded the plane with Doug in the back. This plane was even smaller than the one we flew from Belize City to Dangriga in. It was hollowed out in the back so Doug could lay down and a nurse sat with him on the way to Ambergris Caye, which is where the only decompression chamber in the country was. I got to sit in the front of the plane, next to the pilot which was actually pretty cool. But I was so nervous for Doug that the 30 minute plane ride to San Pedro, the biggest city on Ambergris Caye, felt like it took 2 hours. A funny thing though – I heard Doug ask the nurse for a pillow and when she said all she could give him was her jacket to wad up he said, “you think for a thousand dollar plane ride I could at least get a pillow.” I couldn’t help but chuckle. When we landed on the so-called airstrip in San Pedro (which was actually just a dirt road surround by brush) the door where Doug was lying opened and he just threw up all over the ground. He had been trying to hold it in while we were on the plane, but couldn’t a second longer when we landed. We then made our way to the conveniently placed hospital across the street from the airport. Doug met with the doctor there and went through a quick medical exam. Just like everyone had predicted, he had decompression sickness, also known as the bends. They don't exactly know what causes this when you do make all of your safety stops and do everything right while diving. However, they thought the medication Doug took the night before might have dehydrated him which contributed to the decompression sickness. Doug was put up in the only hospital room they had and was able to take a quick shower and change into some comfortable clothes, while I made insurance arrangements. Poor Jill got a call from her son, the first of the honeymoon, to ask for her insurance information so he could get the needed medical attention! Just what a mother wants to hear, I’m sure. This is where the fun part came for Doug. He was told he would have to lay in the chamber for 5 hours while it released oxygen, simulating what it feels like to dive 60 feet under the ocean, then come back up slowly and get the needed oxygen release. When Doug entered the tiny chamber I left the hospital and went to check into the hotel that the wonderful workers at Hamanasi had set up for us. I took a quick shower and tried to compose myself and then headed back over to the airport (I keep calling it an airport, but it’s just a trailer sitting at the end of a dirt road that they use for an airstrip) to wait for our baggage to arrive. Again, Hamanasi helped us so much by packing up all of our things and sending them on the next plane out to us. I was so nervous because I had to give them the security code to our lock box in our room. This held our whole lives – credit cards, passports, money, our wedding rings (we couldn't wear anything while diving), and a million other important documents, including our airline tickets home. When I finally greeted the plane with our luggage I took it straight back to our hotel to make sure everything was accounted for. Of course it was not. I couldn’t find any of our valuables. Of course all of the clothes and stuff we don’t care about were there, but our valuables were missing. I immediately called the hotel and asked where they had stowed it, to which I got the reply “we packaged it up safely in the brown cardboard box.” I didn’t have a brown cardboard box! They said they’d call the airplane and see what happened and get back to me. So there by the phone I waited and a while later got the call that said that one particular box had never made it off the plane and was now headed to Belize City! I could have died right then. I told them that back to San Pedro better be their next stop, so I again waited at the trailer for our stuff to come in. By some miracle from up above I finally got our valuables back and stored in another safety box in our new hotel room. I then went to try and find something to eat since I was starving. I went into this little corner grocery shop place and obviously I looked like a tourist so everyone started asking me all of these questions. I told them that it was my husband that they just took into the chamber and everyone knew who I was! It was crazy, it was like I was famous! As soon as I walked into the hotel before too, everyone already knew who I was and called me by name, it was crazy! By the time I grabbed some little snacks, Doug was about done with his treatment so I headed back over to 
the hospital to greet him when he got out. He was just feeling so queezy and gross when he was done so we went back to the hotel and relaxed and fell asleep in an instant. The next morning we awoke and went straight back to the hospital (again, you can’t really call it a hospital, but a small clinic type thing that specialized in just decompression sickness and carried no medical instruments accept for the chamber) to get Doug checked out and hopefully done with this small nightmare. The doctor did his “professional examination” by watching Doug follow with his eyes a stick being swung back and fo
rth and decided he wasn’t better yet. So again Doug went in the chamber for another 5 hour bout of the oxygen treatment. This time I didn’t have luggage to save or arrangements to make, so I sat by the chamber’s side and viewed a television which let me watch his every move while in that chamber. Sitting with me was another worker who was there solely to push a button every now and again and make sure pressure in the chamber stayed where it should be. Besides the thin mattress that would harden up when the oxygen was sucked from the chamber and the fact that he couldn’t sit up because he would bonk his head, Doug ha
d it pretty good in the chamber. He just had to lay there and watch a movie that he had chosen which was projected onto the side of the chamber. After 10 hours of chamber time and $10,000 dollars later, Doug was finally well again! I can’t believe what a traumatic experience that was for us (and our families at home whom we called and told the news), but everything turned out just fine. And the upside to this little incident was this – we were planning on coming home from our honeymoon on Sunday, but this happened on Saturday. After someone gets decompression sickness they cannot fly for 72 hours, due to the incredible change in pressure and oxygen level in the atmosphere from way beneath the water to way high in the air. So we got to extend our honeymoon an 
extra 3 days! And since we had to fly to San Pedro to the hospital, we got to see an entirely different part of Belize, which was so radically different from the inland. After we made sure Doug was fine and healthy we just had a blast on the island. We changed to another hotel - we went from the more expensive Ramon’s to the cheaper Sun Breeze since we had to pay for a few extra nights – but it was still really nice and we loved the location – again, right on the beach. We cruised around the more-bustling town of San Pedro on a golf cart (everyone in the town did) and visited all sorts of shops. We also found the best c
ustard place that we had ever been to and ate at a place that had chickens rotating in a big oven outside. We also got to see a little bit of the outskirts when we got sucked into a little kid asking for a ride home on our golf cart (Doug got an uneasy feeling and boy did I as well, when we got out into the more poor part of town, so we headed back to the main part of town as quickly as we could). We found some of our favorite souvenirs there in San Pedro, including rings for Allison and Mackenzie, t-shirts, and a machete for Doug! We got to eat at some great little Belizean cafes and restaurants and got to drink all of the Fanta that we wanted! It was so funny, you could only find Coke from a glass bottle, some Sprite, but you could always find a strawberry or orange Fanta. Of course these drinks were never cold, but it was nice to have some soda pop!
We absolutely loved our honeymoon and were so lucky to have spent it in paradise. We are even more lucky that Doug is ok and won’t have any long term and lasting effects from the little diving episode! We feel so grateful that we were blessed and watched out for – everyone on the boat said that if the boat hadn’t been equipped with 100% oxygen that there was a good chance Doug could have lost some brain activity. And another crazy thing is Doug told me later that he just had the strongest prompting to get over to the boat as fast as he could when we ended our second dive. We were definitely being watched over and are just so grateful to be home and alive!
ent to Rodizio Grill for lunch (after we walked all the way to Little America just to find out that the brunch was closed – we were so bummed!), Arby's for dinner (not classy, I know but we couldn't resist) and stopped at a convenience store for a disposable camera (I was afraid of taking our digital to Belize) and just had a great time lounging around. We even caught a little bit of Pirates of the 
king ahead and left a vehicle up at the hotel when we were up at the temple the day before). We were one of the luckiest newly married couples – my boss gave me and Doug a honeymoon to anywhere we chose. I wanted to go somewhere that was exotic and tropical, but I wanted to be secluded with not a lot of tourists. 
e “airport” in Dangriga was a single wide run down trailer. We had a guy waiting for us to take us to our hotel, which was named Hamanasi. It took about a half an hour to drive from Dangriga to 
that of living in a tent, yet the people were all still so happy. We couldn’t believe our surroundings…it was so different being in a third world country. All of the homes were so poor and didn’t have doors or windows or anythin
g. But we thought it was kind of funny because every home you looked into everyone was sitting around watching television! Funny how they can’t afford things like windows but sit around watching American television! When we got to our hotel we were absolutely blown away. There was a huge row of flowers leading up to the hotel and it was beautiful! I had done so much research on where to stay and read every review that was available, but could have never expected this. It was the most beautiful place ever, situated right on the beach. The ocean was the mos
t amazing dark blue. When we got there we checked in and had people handing us colorful drinks with umbrellas in them. The service they provided was top notch and we were treated like royalty, it was so much fun. There were a few options for lodging at this hotel and since I couldn’t choose between them, we stayed a few nights in 
each place. The first was a private cabin held up on stilts that was right in front of the ocean. It had a balcony with an oversized hammock, w
here I must admit we spent a lot of our time. When we first entered there were fresh flowers all over our room, as well as on our bed. Accompanying the flowers on our bed was a note etched into a leaf welcoming us to the hotel. It was the nicest place we could have stayed and it was just amazing. The second place we stayed was behind the ocean-front cabins, situated in the middle of a jungle basically. We got insid
e our bungalow in the jungle and there were so many trees we literally could not see to the next little bungalow, which gave us so much privacy it was amazing. In summary, we had the best lodging we could have hoped for at this beautiful hotel on the ocean (we even had a lady come to our door at like 10:30 one night and wish us a good night’s rest!) Next to lodging in fanciness was definitely the food we ate. I felt like I was eating dinner at a royal palace each night. The food was so elegant and the service impeccable. We got to eat next to the ocean in the dark by candlelight. The type of foods we are were just 
wonderful and very Belizean: snapper rice, fried fruit, Ethiopian spice bread, potato soup, banana pie, jerk chicken, chocolate cake, pink bread, garnaches (basically fish and chips), and the list never ends. There was something kind of funny that we noticed every
night when we were at dinner – there was a middle aged guy there with his family and you couldn’t help but take notice to them. For all of you “24” television fans, we think that we met the real Ramon Salazar down here in 
l and made the short trip to the 
efore heading back to the hotel and it was so funny to see that they sold flour and baking powder in plastic sacks with the prices written on them in marker! We also bought a coconut and had a time watching Doug trying to crack it open! On our way back to the hotel we stopped at a place called David’s Wood Carvings and completely overpaid for a wood carving bowl and 
lid. We have to hand it to him though, he was a great salesman. We even walked away with a shark spine and bamboo necklace for me. Amidst the terrible humidity which added about 50 degrees of body heat we made it back to the hotel alive. That night we took a dip in the pool situated right by the beautiful ocean and took a walk up the beach. 
r stay in 
light and pointed it to the ceiling, only to reveal about 1,000 bats circling above our heads. I could have passed out right then, but luckily I kept my composure long enough to make it past the bats. Deeper into the cave we were able to see so many cool things – old Mayan pottery and sculptures that dated back hundreds of years. It was absolutely crazy to think that Mayan civilizations used to live around these parts and use these old caves for rituals and things. The way they used their sculptures to tell different stories was amazing – even by shining light on the statues in different ways told different stories. The coolest thing was to hike around and hear all of the amazing stories and folklore told by our tour guide. He gave us a history of the Mayans and told us all about their fall in civilization. It was so neat to be able to see how the story of hi
story he told fit in exactly with the Book of Mormon in that same time period. It definitely reaffirmed my faith once again. And since Doug was so newly off his mission he caught onto different points of history and tied them together much easier than I could, and loved hearing him talk about the comparisons after we were done. What a cool experience. And I guess the craziest part of it all was when we got back to our room and the maid had left the window open just an inch - we found LIZARDS in
our bathroom! Needless to say I freake
d out a little bit and made Doug fetch them out. There were two of them and I was freaked out that there would be more waiting for me in my bed, but all turned out well J
order to get there, and along the way saw so many full sized lizards running around everywhere, especially surrounding the river. It was crazy – they were like the size of a dog and it quite honestly creeped me 
out. I had never seen a reptile that big and close before. Eek! Getting to visit these old Mayan towns was absolutely amazing. A short hike from the main road was the old city of 
the hospital to greet him when he got out. He was just feeling so queezy and gross when he was done so we went back to the hotel and relaxed and fell asleep in an instant. The next morning we awoke and went straight back to the hospital (again, you can’t really call it a hospital, but a small clinic type thing that specialized in just decompression sickness and carried no medical instruments accept for the chamber) to get Doug checked out and hopefully done with this small nightmare. The doctor did his “professional examination” by watching Doug follow with his eyes a stick being swung back and fo
rth and decided he wasn’t better yet. So again Doug went in the chamber for another 5 hour bout of the oxygen treatment. This time I didn’t have luggage to save or arrangements to make, so I sat by the chamber’s side and viewed a television which let me watch his every move while in that chamber. Sitting with me was another worker who was there solely to push a button every now and again and make sure pressure in the chamber stayed where it should be. Besides the thin mattress that would harden up when the oxygen was sucked from the chamber and the fact that he couldn’t sit up because he would bonk his head, Doug ha
d it pretty good in the chamber. He just had to lay there and watch a movie that he had chosen which was projected onto the side of the chamber. After 10 hours of chamber time and $10,000 dollars later, Doug was finally well again! I can’t believe what a traumatic experience that was for us (and our families at home whom we called and told the news), but everything turned out just fine. And the upside to this little incident was this – we were planning on coming home from our honeymoon on Sunday, but this happened on Saturday. After someone gets decompression sickness they cannot fly for 72 hours, due to the incredible change in pressure and oxygen level in the atmosphere from way beneath the water to way high in the air. So we got to extend our honeymoon an 
extra 3 days! And since we had to fly to San Pedro to the hospital, we got to see an entirely different part of 
ustard place that we had ever been to and ate at a place that had chickens rotating in a big oven outside. We also got to see a little bit of the outskirts when we got sucked into a little kid asking for a ride home on our golf cart (Doug got an uneasy feeling and boy did I as well, when we got out into the more poor part of town, so we headed back to the main part of town as quickly as we could). We found some of our favorite souvenirs there in San Pedro, including rings for Allison and Mackenzie, t-shirts, and a machete for Doug! We got to eat at some great little Belizean cafes and restaurants and got to drink all of the Fanta that we wanted! It was so funny, you could only find Coke from a glass bottle, some Sprite, but you could always find a strawberry or orange Fanta. Of course these drinks were never cold, but it was nice to have some soda pop! 
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