Tiny Town – Belmopan, Belize

With a population of around 20,000, Belmopan is one of the smallest national capital cities in the world. We still managed to find plenty to do including a tiny national park, horseback riding, and falling in love with a jaguar.

This is Tikatoo. We think we love her.

Things to do in Belmopan, Belize

The Belmopan name is a mash up of the words Belize and Mopan (the name of the area’s main river) and the city is home to Guanacaste National Park, the nation’s first and smallest national park at just 250,000 square yards. A trail winding through the park’s patch of jungle can be walked in less than 20 minutes.

You can extend your visa in Belmopan and get a delicious and affordable typical meal at Caladium Restaurant which is a great place to see the amazing cultural diversity in Belize come together as Mennonites, Garufinas, Ladinos, and expats from all walks of life have a meal.

Karen in her favorite place in the world (on a horse) during a ride at Banana Bank Lodge in Belize.

We passed through Belmopan in order to get to nearby Banana Bank Lodge & Belize Horseback Adventure, the country’s first and largest horseback riding operation with nearly 100 horses (all bred and trained on the property) and more than 4,000 acres of land including jungle, stretches of river, cultivated fields and large stands of teak.

Banana Bank, which can be booked through Hidden Trails, was created by artist Carolyn Carr and her husband, rancher John Carr who pioneered cattle ranching in Belize after settling here decades ago.

Anything that has the words “horseback adventure” right in the name is a magnet for Karen so we headed there to do some riding. With so many horses it’s easy for John and his local wranglers to match the right horse to the right rider. Our horses were well-behaved and responsive and we had a lot of fun on them through varied terrain where we were able to spot toucans, howler monkeys, and a big scary-looking snake.

The art and ag influences at Banana  Bank converge to create an eclectic lodge with a very wide range of accommodation options from two bedroom thatch-roof cabanas to private rooms, to a large dorm. All of the wood in the construction was harvested off the property and Carolyn’s art is sprinkled throughout. There’s also a large pool that was designed in the shape of the Golden Mean (also called the Golden Ratio or the Golden Spiral), an equation that helps explain natural shapes and beauty.

However, horses aren’t the only animals at Banana Bank.

Primate meets primate: Eric with one of the spider monkeys at Banana Bank Lodge.

Carolyn and John have amassed a mini-menagerie on the grounds of the lodge including two spider monkeys (one friendly, one not so much) and an enormous aviary which houses dozens of exotic birds including macaws, parrots, and a cranky little aracai (a sort of mini toucan).

Feathers. Art you can fly with.

Ever seen inside an aracari’s bill/mouth? Now you have.

Then there’s the jaguar. Tikatoo came to Banana Bank as a cub after the owners got a call from a local forestry official who said the cub had been found abandoned in the jungle. He’d heard that Banana Bank had a jaguar enclosure (it was built to house a previously rescued jaguar named Tika who had recently died). After some repairs and upgrades to the enclosure, Banana Bank gave the orphaned jaguar a home.

Tikatoo is all grown up now and she’s quite a charmer. It took about 30 seconds for Eric to fall in love and the following pictures are a mere fraction of the number of shots he took of her during our stay.

Tikatoo turns on the charm

Tikatoo turns on the charm.

Tikatoo turns on the charm.

Here’s more about travel in Belize