STANN CREEK, Belize - Regardless of the varying opinions (uproar) of how Mel Gibson's movie "Apocalypto" portrayed a portion of the ancient Maya people during the collapse of its once mighty empire, the movie generated a buzz and renewed interest in this ancient civilization that has retainted inertia long after it's late 2007 release. Adventure seekers and discerning travelers alike are flocking to Belize to visit and explore a number of noteworthy Maya archeological sites. Whether it is historically inaccurate or a single-minded historical interpretation, the movie has spurred renewed interest in the ancient Maya civilization and its thousand years of advanced agronomy, medicine, astronomy, and mathematics. Through agricultural experimentation, the ancient Maya gave the world many domesticated crops including corn, tomatoes, cacao, and avocados. The Maya are also noted for the only known fully developed written language of the pre-Columbian Americas, as well as for their spectacular art and monumental architecture. Traces of this civilization, at its height around 600 AD, can still readily be appreciated and visited in the forms of ancient pyramids throughout Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, and Belize.

Belize, often referred to as the "Heart of the Maya" due to its high concentration of Maya sites, is part of the Mundo Maya (Maya World), an international program established to preserve the rich Maya culture. The program was developed by the countries that were once part of the Maya Empire and are still inhabited by over 6 million Maya today; Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras. Dating back to as early as 1500 B.C., the Maya civilization, possibly the most sophisticated civilization in the ancient Americas, mysteriously and dramatically declined by the year 900.

Source: Free-Press-Release.com

Not only are Hollywood stars drawn to holiday in Belize, but the likes of Leonardo di Caprio and Francis Ford Coppola already own celebrity property in the nation and if you buy in, you could literally be rubbing shoulders with the rich and famous.

In this article we look at reasons to buy property in Belize including the celebrity factor!

As stated, the actor Leonardo di Caprio has real estate in Belize in fact, he owns an island off the nation's shore called Blackadore Caye where he's currently planning the construction of a luxurious hotel and eco property based project that will be operated by the Four Seasons group. As the island cost a mere 1.75 million dollars for over 100 acres of prime, tropical land in the Caribbean Sea, you can see that relatively speaking land and property in Belize are affordable or even cheap.

Of course, you may not be in the market for an island, but even if you only want a modest home in Belize you will be buying in a nation where the rich and famous love to holiday in style yet also anonymously. Not well known as a playground for the rich and famous, the country is absolutely the perfect hideaway for those who like to get away from it all which was precisely the driving factor behind Francis Ford Coppola's decision to buy real estate in Belize too.

Other reasons that may sway your decision include the fact that Belize is one of the most beautiful countries in the whole world. It is blessed with white sandy beaches, with topical rainforests, dramatic mountain peaks, rare yet abundant flora and fauna and stunning ocean views. Thanks to these reasons the country is growing as a tourism destination and growing slowly wealthier as a result. This has the knock on effect of infrastructure and amenity improvements that benefits those with properties that they reside in or let out in Belize.

Belize has been protected ecologically speaking and environmentally so it remains a pristine paradise. The celebrities who have bought in such as di Caprio are working with the nation to ensure this status remains the same. The tax status in Belize makes it very attractive, as does the fact it is an affordable place to buy, it has a stable currency, is a democracy and has a legal system based on the British.

In addition to all of these favourable factors supporting the purchase of a property in Belize, you have the fact that Belize is highly accessible from the US, the US is highly accessible from the UK, and the British pound still goes quite a long way in Belize's real estate market. So, if you want to find a home in paradise in 2009, take a closer look at the property landscape in Belize and join the celebrities buying homes in this beautiful Central American country.

Source: Shelter Offshore Investment & Financial News

DiCaprio fell in love with Belize on a 2004 trip to the Caribbean with his then girlfriend, Brazilian supermodel Gisele Bundchen. He was staying on the exclusive Cayo Espanto Resort owned by American Jeff Gram, a real estate developer from Atlanta. Di Caprio purchased the island in partnership with Gram, and the pair have partnered with the Four Seasons group to develop the island which will eventually become the Four Seasons Blackadore Caye.

DiCaprio is Hollywood's most committed environmental campaigner, he runs an eco-website alongside his fan site. He co-wrote, co-produced and narrated the environmental documentary The 11th Hour concerning the environmental crises caused by human actions and their impact on the planet. He has received praise from environmental groups for deciding to fly on commercial flights instead of chartering private jets. He also drives a hybrid car and his house has solar panels.

The Four Seasons Blackadore Caye

DiCaprio and the Four Seasons plan to turn the 104 acre (42ha) tropical island situated off the coast of Belize into a five-star resort for wealthy conservation lovers. Blackadore Caye is a narrow island just over two miles long, whose white sand beaches are dotted with coconut palms and rocky outcrops. It lies just a 25-minute boat ride from the Belize Barrier Reef, the second largest in the world, and a World Heritage Site. The island's length makes it one of the few island's off Belize's sparkling Caribbean coast with the 'length and integrity' to support the take-off and landing of private jets. This was one of the main reasons for choosing the island, as it offers extreme privacy for visiting celebrities.

The eighty room luxury hotel will feature condominium units, residential beach front villas and all the necessary 5 star accoutrements such as luxurious lobbies, a spa, bars, restaurants and swimming pools. Structures will be carefully integrated into the landscape so local wildlife and vegetation are disturbed to a minimum, and the island will be a test bed for innovative green technologies such as hybrid power systems. Several banks of solar panels will run down the airstrip which will provide power supplemented by wind power and bio-diesel. Development costs could run to more than US$30 million. The resort would be the first internationally flagged beach resort in Belize.

The island will also set aside a portion of the island as a exclusive estate, with a few exclusive villas, all with private pools and terraces as well as direct access to the beach. There are rumours that offers to purchase these private villas have already come from other Hollywood stars and celebrities, such as Robert DeNiro and Tiger Woods.

Construction is scheduled to start on Blackadore Caye sometime this year, and master-planning for the development has been tasked to the dashing Vegas hotelier and entrepeneur Andrew Sasson, founder and owner of The Light Group based in Las Vegas.

Light Group has become one of Las Vegas' great success stories. His clubs at MGM Mirage properties on the Strip (The Bank Nightclub and Caramel Lounge and Bar at Bellagio, Jet Nightclub and Bare Pool Lounge at The Mirage and Mist Lounge at Treasure Island) are among the hottest hotspots in Sin City.

Sasson is also the creative visionary of The Harmon Hotel being constructed at CityCenter, MGM MIRAGE's $8.4 billion "city-within-a-city." Set to open in November 2009, this luxury boutique hotel - a prestigious member of The Leading Hotels of the World - will redefine exclusive living on The Strip by bringing high-design, privacy, and supreme services and amenities to its sophisticated and affluent residents and guests.

On June 1, 2008 Zabeel Investments of Dubai which is controlled by Dubai's crown prince, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum bought a 50% stake in the company. Working in conjunction with Zabeel, Sasson is in the midst of expanding his reach beyond Las Vegas and bringing his vision to a global audience. Looking toward the future of his soon-to-be international brand, Sasson's innovative and bold ideas have positioned him to be one of the biggest power players in the hospitality industry.

Architectural design for the project is being done by boutique architectural firm Three in Dallas Texas, headed by Gary P. Koerner, and James Hyatt at the Valley Crest Design Group Studio. Blackadore Caye development will revolutionise the tourism industry of Belize and reestablich Ambergris Caye as a high end luxury destination. Land values in the area are set to rise dramatically ones the construction of the Four Seasons resort is under way.

Source: Private Islands Magazine

Real estate in Belize has increased in value at an impressive rate in the past five years. Investment by Canadians and Europeans, accompanied by potential upcoming direct flights from Europe, is likely to increase the area's popularity further. Americans who cannot afford to retire in the U.S. are considering Belize as inflation rises at home, and investors may have an opportunity to jump on board before the Belize real estate market takes off.

Located in Central America, Belize is slightly smaller than the state of Massachusetts and is bordered by Mexico to the north, Guatemala to the west and the Caribbean Sea to the east. There are an estimated 301,270 people residing in Belize, and the population is growing at a rate of 2.207 percent, according to the CIA World Factbook. English is the official language, though Spanish is more widely spoken. 76.9 percent of Belizean residents are literate.

Belize was the British colony known as British Honduras from 1854 to 1973. At that time the country's name was changed, though it was not officially granted independence until 1981. Territorial disputes between Britain and Guatemala were the primary reason behind the delay, and land disputes between Belize and Guatemala continue. In 2005, both countries signed a Framework for Negotiation and Confidence Building Measures, under which they continue to meet regularly in efforts to end the dispute.

The government is a parliamentary democracy and recognizes Queen Elizabeth II as the head of state. The Queen is locally represented by Governor-General Sir Colville Young. Sr. Prime Minister Dean Barrow took office as head of government in February.

Belize has a gross domestic product (GDP) of $2.444 billion which is growing at an estimated rate of 2.2 percent as of 2007, according to the CIA World Factbook. Agriculture makes up 21.3 percent, producing goods such as bananas, cacao, sugar, fish and lumber. Industries such as garment production, food processing construction and oil account for 13.7 percent of GDP. Services, including tourism, make up for 63 percent. The local currency is the Belizean dollar (BZD), which is worth roughly half of the U.S. dollar.

Why invest in Belize real estate?

Real estate values in Belize are on the rise. "[The value increases are] averaging about 20 percent a year across the board. If you get into some beach lots, for instance, they're going up about 25 percent minimum per year," Patrick Doyle, sales and marketing for Caribbean Property Consultants (CPC) Real Estate Solutions, Ltd., said. And with $1.00 BZD equaling $0.51 USD, many Americans are turning toward the country in search of an affordable retirement. The exchange rates are even more attractive to Canadian and European vacationers and retirees.

"More Canadians and Europeans are investing in our beautiful part of the world than ever before," Ricardo Cardenas, regional vice president of RE/MAX Latin America and Caribbean, said in an e-mail interview. CPC's website, from which the company derives 80 percent of its business, received 8,000 hits last month from Canadians alone, according to Doyle.

Direct flights from Europe are anticipated to be established within the next year. "When [Europeans] can fly over and back for $700 to $800 they're going to look and buy. Get in ahead of that," Doyle said. Several cities in the U.S.-including Atlanta; Charlotte, N.C.; Dallas; Houston; Miami and Newark, N.J.-already offer direct flights to Belize.

Foreign citizens receive the same property rights as Belizean citizens and there are no restrictions placed on foreign buyers. The system is based on British property law. Additionally, there are no capital gains taxes or inheritance taxes in Belize, according to Doyle.

All transactions and documents are conducted in English, the official language, which simplifies the negotiation process for American and other English-speaking investors. However, it is still recommended that investors seek the help of a reputable agent and/or attorney when dealing with transactions and contracts in a foreign country.

Purchasing real estate in Belize

Investors can get in touch with local real estate agents to receive listings of available properties, but many properties are for sale by owner rather than by an agent. Because three-fourths of available properties are not officially advertised, investors may have the best luck if they visit Belize and just "start asking around," according to Belize First Magazine.

Northern Belize has traditionally been more popular with foreigners, but the southern part of the country offers more traditional beaches and lower prices. "Ambergris Caye and the town of San Pedro are really quite popular and busy, [with] tourism bustling all the time. And it's fine, but a lot of people are looking for what they imagine as a Caribbean property, which is tranquil and real quiet and aquamarine out front. That occurs in the southern part of the country," Doyle said. Dangriga Town, located at the mouth of Stann Creek along the coast, has "beautiful beaches" and lower prices than more popular regions in the north, he said. Placencia, located on a peninsula in southern Belize, is another area to consider, according to Cardenas and his associates.

Fees and other expenses for purchasing property in Belize will likely come to approximately 6 to 7 percent of the purchase cost, according to Doyle. This breaks down to about 5 percent for stamp duty, 1 to 2 percent for legal fees and approximately $200 or $300 for registration and courier fees. Annual property taxes in Belize are extremely low, coming to only $25 or $30 a year on many properties, Doyle said.

Potential problems

Working with a reputable agent and/or attorney is of utmost importance when purchasing investment property in Belize. It is particularly important for investors to thoroughly research potential brokers before conducting business, because no license is required to be a real estate broker in Belize.

"All you need is enough money to print business cards, and, presto, you're a broker. Selling real estate is a popular first job for expats in Belize, and some do it on the side without a work permit. Quite a few hoteliers, dive shop operators and taxi drivers peddle real estate to tourists on the side," according to Belize First Magazine.

And investors should never agree to purchase Belizean property sight unseen. Although, in general, Belize is a straightforward country in which to do business, it is still possible to encounter scam artists or agents who are simply unknowledgeable. Cardenas and his associates said that investors should be safe conducting transactions in Belize as long as they confirm that those with whom they do business are trustworthy and are sure to "walk the land" before making any purchases.

The December 2007 issue of International Living displayed the headline, "Belize: buy before the Europeans!" That may turn out to be good advice. Belizean real estate values could be poised for profits, especially if those direct flights from Europe come into play next year as anticipated. Investors hoping to get into a market ahead of rising property values may want to consider casting their eyes on Belize.

"In Central America, Costa Rica took the lead in selling real estate to foreigners about 10 years ago; people that bought then have enjoyed great appreciation and many benefits," Cardenas said. "If you missed that opportunity, you owe it to yourself to research the current opportunity that Belize is offering to foreigners; you can buy now and ride from the beginning the positive wave of real estate investment."

Source: NuWire Investor
Author: Cali Zimmerman

The fellow in the plane seat next to mine had the look of a successful middle-aged broker, and smiled self-consciously as he told how he'd come to acquire a 100-acre fruit farm and a house in Belize.

On his first visit, he was sucked in by the Caribbean culture of the British protectorate.

"The people are extremely friendly," he said. "They are not like everywhere else, where people just look at Americans as money."

Then, while exploring, he found a patch of tepid jungle for sale far inland near the Guatemalan border for a steal. Not exactly coastal paradise, but an adventureventure. Thrilled, he made the down payment using traveler's checks, wiring the rest later.

He started planting fruit trees, and bought a house in the city, too, all for a fraction of stateside values. So my next question - whether he thought Belize is more like Costa Rica now or Costa Rica past - was fairly foregone. "Much more like Costa 20 years ago," he said.

Like everyone else, I came to Belize for the water, fly rod in hand, but would soon fantasize about buying my own escape hatch to paradise.

If you fly fish, you have to go to Belize, the way surfers must see Pipeline and golfers must play Pebble. And yes, I'd leave with memories of shallow flats more alive with fish than I'd ever seen. But what makes you want to stay are mental snapshots of friendly smiles and a place unspoiled. Of rainforest hikes, beachside hammocks, island hopping to tranquil bars, ice-cold cocktails under palm trees, pastel-painted boats waving as you pass. Hiking Mayan ruins and secluded waterfalls, unnamed caves and jaguar preserves. Empty beaches surrounding lagoons full of water clear as glass, thriving with sea turtles and manatees animals endangered nearly everywhere else on the planet. Lagoons that open up to the second largest coral reef on earth.

Belize is a step back in time to the pristine. Like Costa Rica, only with a population of 274,000, not four million.

Not that the fishing was off. It almost never is. In fact, catching your first of the three prized flats species (tarpon, bonefish and permit) in Belize is practically considered cheating by some fly-fishers.

I wanted a permit, the huge, blunt-faced phantom fish of the flats, a powerhouse creature as unstoppable when hooked as they are difficult to stalk. I'd fished for years in the Florida Keys, where hunting for the spooky permit is akin to searching for unicorns, and seen only one.

Ah, Belize. Five minutes after we stopped the boat on day one, our guide, Lloyd, was pointing to silvery permit fins flashing in the sun as they fed in two feet of water. I could not believe my eyes. We had shots at four permit schools in half an hour, before switching to bonefish.

Ten minutes into his bone fishing career, my partner nailed a nice three-pounder on the fly. That was just a teaser. The next morning, miles offshore, in just 12 inches of water, the first permit I cast to chased my crabfly nearly to my rod tip. We saw 70-plus total (enough to cause full apoplexy), while turtles, spotted eagle rays, boxfish, huge schools of jacks and stingrays cruised past.

We caught too many fish to remember them all. Lloyd, a local legend, is always booked, most likely because of his deep passion as much as fish-finding skills. Most guides instruct your casting in a mellow soft voice, like they're talking to pre-schoolers. But Lloyd is still freaked out about catching fish, and his voice gets higher and faster the closer you are to the target: "Right there. No! Right there! No-no! YES! RIGHT THERE!"

Life affords few second chances, but this amazing, tiny, English-speaking country, with a Caribbean soul and a lovely Spanish accent, seems to be one of them. Venture to the best parts of the gorgeous Caribbean with an eye toward real estate and it's possible to feel like maybe you're a little late. In Belize, you soon feel you've been granted another chance.

And not just for land. There is luxury to be found. Purple flowers lined the walkway to my luxury villas at Chabil Mar, an intimate-sized upscale vacation lifestyle development widely regarded as the most luxurious on the mainland. The gleaming rich indigenous-wood floors, doors and furniture give the spacious rooms the feeling of being in a giant yacht cabin.

New villas sold quickly, and can now be reserved for vacations. Dianne calls Belize the "land of opportunity, where anything is possible," and it is hard not to agree. Each night, I threw open the French doors and let the ocean breeze and sounds of the waves fill the high ceiling of the room, walking out on the balcony at dawn to see the sun climb out of the ocean a hundred feet away. Doves cooed by the infinity-edge pool, which appeared to spill over into white coral-sand beach.

Now Dianne is taking her vision across the street to her newest project, The Peninsula Club, a 10-acre intimate development surrounding an new 88-slip inland marina across the street from Chabil Mar and a hundred yards from the world famous Turtle Inn, Francis Ford Coppolla's five-star Bali-inspired resort. With only 35 homesites facing the marina (nine have sold in just three months) and a marina side 16-unit Villa project appropriately called The Riviera, prospective buyers who want a piece of this paradise should move quickly before it's all gone.

This ambitious vision has been a dream of Dianne's since she came to Belize for the first time in 2003 from her native British Columbia, Canada.

"I love the people of Belize and the laid-back lifestyle the country offers, but the services side of vacationing or living here was behind most of the rest of the Caribbean," she says.

So in this tiny piece of peninsular paradise, she seized the initiative and is building the mainland's first true retail and services center. The masterplan offers a full service marina, marina village with boutique retail shops, restaurants, bank, dive shop and much needed medical clinic with helipad. Better still, it's only a three-minute drive to the Placencia landing strip with flights to the international airport each half hour during peak season.

How did it all hide away this long? It is less than two-and-a-half hours by air from Houston or Miami to Belize and its 200 miles of coral wonderland. Time it right and you can dive with whale sharks, the largest fish on earth. I settled for snorkeling amid waving purple sea fans and blue-green parrot fish, which nibbled at the coral with a loud chunk-chunk-chunk. Jumping in the water is obligatory after a morning of hunting bonefish around Ragged, Douglas and Saltwater Keys, in the Water Key Range.

So is reconsidering your departure. The service was superb at Chabil Mar, where the concierge bumped back my small plane charter to allow another day of adventuring amid hundreds of palm-covered islands.

Back on the plane home, the soon-to-be ex-pat broker told me Belize is still a secret, unknown. In fact, the whole country was outraged, he said, when sportscaster Bob Costas, in an Olympic broadcast, introduced athletes from "the island nation of Belize."

Oh, well, might as well be. It's not an island, of course, except in the unknown, escapist sense. But it won't be so for long.

"Roads are coming, prices are going up," Wright said. "But it's still off the radar of most Americans. You ask and they don't where it is."

Source: Luxury Living International
Author: Skip Knowles

"IF the world had any ends," Aldous Huxley wrote in 1934, Belize - then known as British Honduras- "would certainly be one of them. It is not on the way from anywhere to anywhere else. It has no strategic value. It is all but uninhabited."

Almost 75 years later, Belize still feels remote. It's roughly the size of Massachusetts, yet it has only a handful of traffic lights. The two-lane road that spans the length of the country is not, in many places, paved. If Huxley were around to be a consumer of American pop culture, however, he'd find that Belize - or at least the strip of it that runs along the Caribbean Sea - has been discovered.

The Fox-TV reality series "Temptation Island" taped its first season on Belize's Ambergris Caye. Francis Ford Coppola, an arbiter of hip for his generation the way Sofia Coppola is for hers, has opened resorts there. And there is a telling moment in a recent chick-lit novel, Tara McCarthy's "Wouldn't Miss It for the World," in which an ugly American stands at a tiki bar in Belize and yelps: "Panty rippers for everyone!" - referring to a cocktail that blends pineapple juice with coconut rum.

I underlined that passage and showed it to my wife, Cree. "Uh-oh," she said.

Belize's still largely untrampled beach areas are filling with tourists for good reason. The country has the largest continuous barrier reef in the Western Hemisphere, one that's lined with hundreds of beautiful small islands, or cayes. The scuba-diving and snorkeling are world-class.

But there is a different Belize that we - my wife and I and our 7- and 9-year-old children, Harriet and Penn - set out to find: its lush interior, thick with rain forests, Mayan ruins, tiny villages, intense wildlife and (most happily, for the kids) intricate cave systems that can be explored by floating on inner tubes, while dodging bats.

We weren't disappointed when we visited early in May. Moving through Belize's backcountry feels like travel, not tourism, and the country is fiercely intent on keeping it that way. National parks and nature preserves make up almost half of Belize's 8,800 square miles. You can truly become lost here, in ways both good and bad.

WE land in Belize City on a hot morning, climb into a rental car - a battered black 2003 Mitsubishi Outlander - and head west toward our first destination, an eco and adventure lodge called Ian Anderson's Caves Branch. There is plenty to see along the way.

One observes, immediately, that there is real poverty in Belize. Leaving the airport, we drive past streets lined with shacks, shanties and small concrete houses; dead cars squatted on cinder blocks.

The poet Derek Walcott, a Nobel laureate born in St. Lucia, is right to deplore the way outsiders view these kinds of scenes in the Caribbean: "Photogenic poverty! Postcard sadnesses!" But this makes them no less real and, at times, no less wrenching. Our children, staring from the window, are quieter than they have been in a long time.

Belize's population is fewer than 300,000 and, just a few miles outside of Belize City, we realize we're in the middle of nowhere, or very close to it. The landscape quickly becomes intensely green, freckled occasionally by dusty shacks and distant fires. Hit the search button on the car radio there, and the electronic numbers will race around and around until you put a stop to them.

Civilization, when it arrives on Belize's back roads, is in the form of "cool spots"- what Belizeans like to call their outdoor bars and restaurants, most with dirt or concrete floors. It's there, on a sweltering day in a friendly cool spot, where we are first struck by Belize's headache-making contradictions.

"Hey, O.K., you want one of these?" the shirtless bartender asks. He is holding a small chilled bottle of Guinness Foreign Extra Stout - a Belizean favorite, it turns out, and known as "short, dark and lovelies." (Guinness? In the tropics?) This is not the only Anglicism we immediately encounter. Queen Elizabeth II stares from Belize's paper currency. English is its official language. And can that really be the name of the brand of cigarettes the men are smoking? Yes, it is: Colonial Lights.

Belize may be in Central America, tucked under the Yucatan Peninsula between Mexico to the north and Guatemala to the south and west, but it was a British colony for more than 100 years, fully achieving its independence only in 1981. The population here is a heady mix - you will hear Creole, Spanish and Garifuna spoken in this polyglot country - but more than a few traces of that colonial era survive, a fact that only adds to your sense that Belize has a mild to moderate case of cultural schizophrenia.

This condition plays out in Belize's native cuisine - or rather in its mystifying lack of one. Lunch at this cool spot is rice and beans (or RICE-n-beans in the Belizean pronunciation) along with stewed chicken, which is more-or-less the national dish, and one we'll be eating variations of for an entire week. It's a good thing the kids take to it immediately.

Source: The New York Times
Author: Dwight Garner

When Jim Rosenberger bought a two-bedroom oceanfront condo on Ambergris Caye, the only problem occurred when a barge carrying the Ohio businessman's possessions ran aground off the coast.

"It's not difficult" to buy in Belize, Rosenberger said. "It's just different."

Although Costa Rica and Panama get all the publicity, Belize is renowned as one of the easiest countries in Central America for foreign buyers. There are no restrictions on noncitizens owning property, no capital gains taxes and low property taxes. The country operates as a member of the British Commonwealth, with English as the primary language, and the Belize currency is fixed 2 to 1 to the dollar, providing a measure of stability to the money market.

Belize also boasts one of most liberal retirement programs in the region, the Retired Persons Incentive Program, first enacted in 1999. Under the program's terms, foreign citizens older than 45 can import their possessions duty free and gain special residence status as long as they meet a few basic requirements.

The primary stipulations are proof of pension income and promises not to seek jobs in Belize. "If they want to own a business or invest in something they can do that," said Cerafina Ross, international relations liaison officer for the Belize Tourism Board. "They just can't work for somebody else."

While there are no restrictions on foreigners owning land, local experts say it pays to know some of the local twists:

• Before a sale can close, the buyer has to pay a transfer tax, also known as the stamp tax, usually about 5 percent of the property's value. The good news: Recently the tax was lowered from 15 percent.

• As in any other country, it is essential to have a proper title to the property. It is common to hire an attorney to search title history.

• Take extra care in choosing an agent. "There is no licensing requirement, no educational requirement," said Gil Carlson, co-owner of the ReMax franchise on Ambergris Caye. "You can be a bartender or a taxi driver one night and selling real estate the next day."

• When it comes to a condo, it is better to find one with an owner-owned condo association rather than an outside management company, local agents say. "The biggest problem with condos is the management, or lack thereof," said Josh Buettner, a partner in Ambergris Seaside Real Estate.

More and more buyers are buying lots and custom building homes, agents say, but it can be a challenging process.

"It's so difficult to get anything done down here," Buettner said. "Building home requires a lot of supervision and a lot of time."

Source: International Herald Tribune
Author: Kevin Brass

A young man wearing a batik sarong and a white shirt with a mandarin collar greets me at Turtle Inn's entrance and leads me across a wooden footbridge that spans a koi-filled pond. Ornamental urns and sculptures of fish and stone turtles are hidden in a thicket of red ginger, oleander, and palm. My thatched villa on stilts is decorated with Asian artifacts and intricately carved settees. A gilded temple door leads to the bathroom, which has an outdoor shower in a pebbled garden. A screened veranda overlooks the impossibly blue sea. If I didn't know better, I'd think I was in Bali. Actually, I'm less than two hours from Miami, in the small Central American country of Belize.

For years, Belize-wedged between Guatemala and Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula-was a favorite destination for adventure travelers. Here, they found an unspoiled land of lush mountains and jungles, pristine Caribbean beaches and islands, and the longes t barrier reef in the Western Hemisphere. They also found a friendly, democratic country where an ethnically diverse population of Mayans, Mexicans, mestizos, Afro-Indians, even Mennonites, lived together harmoniously, speaking English as the common language (Belize was the former Crown Colony of British Honduras before gaining independence in 1981). Since the government carefully monitored development and had wisely designated more than 40 percent of the country as protected land, hotels in Belize tended to be low-key fishing camps, ecolodges, and scuba diving resorts. But in the past few years, this has started to change, as a number of hoteliers-seduced by the country's virgin beauty-have recognized its potential. As a result, Belize now has some of the region's most exciting places to stay, with designs inspired by indigenous Mayan thatched huts, the fabrics of Guatemala, and the exotic pavilions of Bali.

It was film director Francis Ford Coppola who got the ball rolling a decade ago, when he transformed his 70-acre family retreat in the country's western mountains into Blancaneaux Lodge, after deciding he couldn't afford the staff necessary to keep the place for himself. The fact that Coppola had no experience operating a hotel didn't stop the daring director, who is known as much for his failures (One from the Heart) as for his successes (The Godfather). Blancaneaux fell into the latter category, and Coppola discovered that the hospitality business suited him. "Running a resort is like making a film," he says. "It's wanting to please people through a dramatic presentation." Indeed, it was the desire to entertain that led to Coppola's latest project, Turtle Inn, 130 miles from Blancaneaux on the southern Caribbean coast. "Belize is famous for its beaches, but it didn't have a beach resort that I felt compared to Blancaneaux. So I said, 'Why not open a sister resort on the sea?' "

Initially, Turtle Inn was modest. Taking over an existing small hotel, Coppola hired Bali-based architect Made Wijaya to update the property. Few guests got to experience it, however; less than a year after the hotel opened, in December 2000, Turtle Inn was leveled by Hurricane Iris. Coppola decided to rebuild from scratch and brought back Wijaya, who engaged a team of Balinese stonecutters to work with their Mayan counterparts, sculpting walls, friezes, and pathways. "I made the hotel more elaborate, more luxurious than before-as I have a habit of doing," Coppola says. He also hired massage therapists from Thailand to administer treatments in authentic rice houses (which he had shipped over from Indonesia).

Turtle Inn reopened this February, and despite all the exotic trappings, it is not some Southeast Asian theme park. Rather, the hotel takes inspiration from around the globe, while still being true to its Belizean setting. In the kitchen, Italian chef Antonio Fecarotta (recently of San Francisco's Café Niebaum-Coppola) not only re-creates Coppola-family pizzas and pastas, but also makes his own distinctive dishes based on local cuisine. Caught-that-day mackerel is roasted with lime juice, olive oil, and white wine in a wood-burning oven; lettuces and vegetables are grown on Blancaneaux's organic farm.

Ultimately, Turtle Inn's most powerful draw is its location. There's some of the world's best diving and fishing right offshore. A half-hour boat ride away is the Monkey River, in a primeval jungle that's home to more than 50 species of birds, as well as colonies of howler monkeys, whose Jurassic Park-like roars belie their small size. Nearby Placencia gives a taste of the Caribbean circa 1968, with its hippie cafés and funky guesthouses. The ideal way to get to the village is on one of the resort's fleet of wildly painted retro bikes. It's those kinds of stylish details that are making Turtle Inn the talk of the region.

About 30 miles north of Turtle Inn, an unpaved road leads to another man's vision of paradise: Roberto Fabbri's 18-month-old Kanantik Reef & Jungle Resort. A labor of love for the Italian businessman, who had spent most of his life selling yachts, Kanantik is a compound of 25 modern Mayan huts that are the last word in rustic chic: thatched roofs, plank floors, handcrafted log furniture. Nearby is a small pool, a tower for bird and game spotting, and pavilions for the bar, dining, and reception areas. The rest of the land has been left wild. "Kanantik means 'to take care of' in Mayan, and that's what we want to do for our guests," says the tanned 62-year-old Fabbri, who pads about in bare feet and khaki shorts, hair slicked back, making sure that his dream runs flawlessly.

Fabbri came to Belize eight years ago and wound up spending six years building Kanantik. "I didn't even know what a nail was," he says. "But I learned everything, from plumbing to how to fix the telephone lines." Fabbri spared no expense, assembling an impressive collection of "toys," including a 42-foot high-tech Newton dive boat and a 32-foot Newton fishing boat.

With so many aquatic possibilities to choose from, travelers might easily miss one of Belize's greatest natural wonders: Cockscomb Basin Wildlife Sanctuary, just 10 miles from Kanantik's front gate. This 128,000-acre preserve is known for its resident population of some 80 jaguars. Most Kanantik guests are escorted there by Florencio Shal, a Belizean of Mayan descent. Like many staff members, Shal has been with Kanantik since the beginning, helping first to clear the land and then to build the resort. "Many people in Belize hire foreigners," Fabbri laments. "I want Belizeans to do the job." Fabbri is always looking for ways to incorporate native culture into the operation of the resort. Though the dinner menu is Mediterranean, lunch features regional specialties such as coconut soup and mashed plantains. And at least once a week, the bar's lounge music gives way to the drumming of a local Garifuna group. The Garifuna are descendants of African slaves and indigenous Carib Indians, and their distinctive music has evolved into something called punta-rock; Belizean groups like the Punta Rebels have achieved success on the world-music scene.

When Roberto Fabbri and his business partner came to Belize in 1995, they had millions of dollars to create Kanantik. When Mick and Lucy Fleming arrived in 1977, they had about $300. The young couple had heard that a parcel of land was available for homesteading in western Belize's mountainous Cayo District, near the Guatemalan border, and wound up leasing it for vegetable farming. At the time, neither had any idea that their back-to-the-land adventure would become one of Belize's most prestigious eco-resorts: the Lodge at Chaa Creek.

"We had a lot of help," Lucy says of their early days. "Backpackers worked on the farm. Eventually we built some cabanas and started charging four dollars a night." Today, Chaa Creek-with its landscaped gardens and liveried staff -looks more like some grand colonial estate than a model of environmental correctness. "We've evolved with our clientele," Lucy points out. "Many of them are baby boomers who are still adventure travelers at heart but who now want grown-up comforts." Those comforts include a lavish European-style spa and Chaa Creek's cushiest accommodations to date: two new treetop apartments. Built amid fig and quamwood trees, these minimalist tri-level spaces each have a hot tub with a view of the Macal River.

Not that the resort has forgotten its humble beginnings. A vital part of the operation is the Macal River Camp, a compound of 10 wood-and-canvas cottages with no electricity; solar-heated showers are in a separate building. The camp gives guests a chance to rough it the old-fashioned way, at $50 a night per person. "A lot of our guests do a few days at Macal and then treat themselves at the lodge," Mick says.

Always fine-tuning their 23-year-old "work in progress," the Flemings are currently redesigning Macal's tent-cottage interiors and Chaa Creek's newly created farm. Tended by a couple from southern Belize, the 33-acre farm grows organic produce and fruit for the hotel; Chaa Creek guests are urged to visit and see the farming techniques pioneered by the Mayan culture thousands of years ago. The Flemings also encourage the people of Belize to check out Chaa Creek. The place is often crowded with schoolchildren on field trips,taking nature hikes and bird walks and visiting the resort's Blue Morpho butterfly farm. Chaa Creek has a powerful effect on everyone, with its simple pace and its natural setting, which allow visitors to stop and savor the sounds of the jungle, the gardens and their endless varieties of flowers and scents, and the night sky, loaded with stars.

Probably the best-known and most developed area in Belize, Ambergris Cay is the largest of the country's 200-plus islands. In San Pedro, the only town on Ambergris, a white picket fence separates the tiny airport from sand streets lined with pastel clapboard houses. Golf carts and bicycles make up most of the traffic. The beach is a hodgepodge of dive huts, barefoot bars, and cafés on stilts over the water. The 1998 opening of Cayo Espanto, a private island to the west with just five villas, has done much to change Ambergris Cay's image. At the super-luxe resort,eight minutes by boat from San Pedro, a pith-helmeted houseman orchestrates every detail of your stay: meals cooked to order, spa treatments, diving and fishing excursions. Despite being the area's most expensive resort, Cayo Espanto has become a big hit. Indeed, its success seems to have provided the impetus for some of Ambergris Cay's other resorts to upgrade their properties-and hike their prices.

Three years ago, Victoria House, barely two miles south of San Pedro, was an unpretentious beach hideaway. Today, its 35 casitas and suites have been redone in a tropical plantation style-louvered windows, netted canopy beds -by Houston-based Lancaster Hotels & Resorts. There's also a new beachfront pool and, nearby, a glamorous dining room with slipcovered chairs and columns with palm-frond frescoes. Chef Amy Knox-recently imported from the Colony in Sarasota, Florida-is already making a name for herself in Belize with her chunky bouillabaisse and seared snapper "towers."

Mata Chica, the creation of French fashion photographer Philippe Berthomé and his Italian makeup-artist wife, Nadia Taricco, is also expanding. The couple lived and worked in Los Angeles for a decade, then sailed the Caribbean for two years before settling on Belize as the ideal place to begin a new life-and create a boutique resort. Mata Chica is five miles from San Pedro and accessible only by boat. When Berthomé and Taricco opened the 14-room property in 1996, they started off small, concentrating on the restaurant, Mambo. Housed in a huge palapa, where log columns support a spectacular cathedral ceiling with a dozen spinning fans, Mambo quickly became the top restaurant on Ambergris Cay, thanks to Taricco's Italian dishes and Berthomé's selection of Euro house and lounge music.

But Mambo was almost too popular. "We became known as a restaurant-and we didn't want that," Berthomé says. So he and Taricco paid more attention to the hotel, using their Hollywood and fashion-industry contacts to spread the word about the hip compound of pastel bungalows. The celebs began coming-Bryan Ferry, Cameron Diaz, Derek Jeter. Two years ago, Berthomé added three posh villas at the rear of the property. These have proved so popular that he is now building 12 more, in a separate compound, La Perla del Caribe, a half-mile up the beach from the original hotel.

Berthomé insists that the addition of La Perla del Caribe will not affect the low-key character of Mata Chica. "I go to work in my bare feet," he says. "I take my daughter to school by boat. Sometimes dolphins follow along. When my daughter is late, we say the dolphins held us up. I don't want that to change."

Source: Travel & Leisure
Author: Richard Alleman

So much depends upon a red poison dart frog.

We have been in Panama only a few days, but already we're wise to the promise and peril a little jungle bling can bring. It's no secret that the country longs to tap its abundant natural resources to compete with neighboring Costa Rica on the toucan tour circuit, but Panama's campaign to become the next eco-Eden still feels a little unpolished.

On our first night, my wife, Ruth, and I find true conservation visionaries, like Raul Arias de Para, the gracious bankerturned bird-watcher, whose radical Canopy Tower guesthouse (see No. 10), which sits above the Canal near Panama City, is a converted U.S. Air Force radar station. And yet a few nights later, at Gamboa Rainforest Resort, a $28 million hotel selling itself as the ultimate luxe bio-reserve, we're issued green wristbands (a tag-and-release program, if you will) that let us indulge in Jungle Burgers ("broiled for the predator") from the 24-hour room-service menu in our air-conditioned suite. While watching HBO. If we want nature, I'm sure the guest-relations manager will have a bellman whisk it to our room.

For several years, I've been researching a book on the world's most inventive earth-friendly getaways, and I keep running into the same sticky mix. One hotel's idea of ecotourism is another's ploy to cash in on conscience. Some eco-sensitive retreats ask guests to reuse towels and insist they've saved the world. Others can't seem to do enough to serve the three-tiered mission of responsible tourism: positive impact on the environment, on the local culture, and on the traveler.

The great joy of treading lightly, even as I shoo scorpions in Belize, clink across glaciers in Canada, and brave puddle jumpers through the Australian outback, comes from eschewing the conveniences we usually take for granted only to discover how rich life can be without them.

Make that rich and eclectic. No two eco-hotels are exactly alike, and of the hundreds around the world, the following 25 stand apart not only because they engage in responsible tourism, but also because they merit distinction in one of four categories. Some are unusually stylish, others pay special respect to the local wildlife, some are pillars of a threatened culture, and a few are remarkable merely for their existence at the far reaches of the world. And they all help solve the Zen-like riddle every conscientious pleasure-seeker must unravel: How can you indulge without being self-indulgent?

Which brings us finally to that intriguing little red frog. It's our last night in the jungle, and Ruth and I are gazing eye-to-beady-eye with the tiny critter. Small as a quarter, it is a curious thing with shiny strawberry-colored skin. Its poison secretions are so rich and novel, a host of biochemists are trying to figure out whether they can be useful as medicine.

And that makes our stay at the nearby ecolodge nothing short of magical. Because not only is Al Natural a glorious place to sleep (see No. 20), but it's also providing jobs to the local Ngobe-Bugle Indians, which in turn benefits the economy, which thereby keeps resort developers at bay (at least for the moment). All of which helps protect the fragile Central American ecosystem for the hoppy red frog. And that's good news for all of us, because this particular amphibian isn't found anywhere else on earth.

Source: Travel & Leisure
Author: David Hochman

THE TURTLE INN LOOKS NOTHING LIKE KURTZ'S COMPOUND IN Apocalypse Now, and getting there isn't as complicated or treacherous as Willard's river journey. Yes, there are a number of natives slavishly devoted to its owner, who is referred to as "Mr. Coppola" by one and all, but there are no bodies on sticks. Where Kurtz made a friend of horror, the Turtle Inn makes a friend of beauty. Still, director Francis Ford Coppola's newest resort in paradisiacal Belize on the Caribbean Sea does owe a certain debt of inspiration to the Philippine setting of one of his most famous films.

"Whenever you leave a place you like, you have a desire to hang on to some part of it," Coppola says from his production office in Brooklyn. "So [after I did the movie] I started looking for places as beautiful as the Philippines but closer. In 1981 I read that British Honduras was becoming Belize and I became intrigued. Then I read about the high literacy rate and the fact that everyone spoke English and Spanish, and I went on a trip with my son."

Once there, Coppola trekked to the jungle highlands and bought an abandoned lodge called Blancaneaux, which he opened to the public in 1993 (after using it for more than a decade as a family retreat). While waiting to be discovered as the next Al Pacino or Teri Garr, hotel guests could wander nature trails, ride horses, dive off waterfalls, scribble in a hammock, and, of course, eat lots of pasta accompanied by Coppola wine. If a little more adventure was required they could hop a plane to the idyllic coastal town of Placencia for the day.

A small fishing village at the end of a peninsula resting between a vast lagoon and the sea, Placencia now boasts Coppola's second resort, the Blancaneaux Turtle Inn, which consists of seven huts on 650 feet of white sand and which Coppola bought from an America called Skip White in August 2000.

At first sight the Turtle Inn looks to be every movie star's just reward. It would be perfect as the setting for a languid B-movie sex romp or as a South American drug dealer's compound or, better still, as the place the chiseled hero and busty heroine go for the closing credit sequence, having triumphed over great odds. In fact the producers of Temptation Island approached Coppola about shooting their second season of love and loss there. He declined.

Viewed from the sea, Turtle Inn features on main house on the left (Coppola's home in the compound, available to guests when he's away), four large cabanas to the right on the beach, and three smaller cabanas raised high on stilts directly behind the beachfront rooms. A few feet away from the sea is a large, thatched dome that houses a semicircular bar framing the sea just so, and a restaurant, the floor of which is sand. Throw in some swaying palm trees, a blinding sun, and several terribly sweet employees and you've got the picture.

"It's changing all the time," Coppola says the day after returning from a quick trip to the inn for a meeting with the architect and contractor to discuss the planned development for the coming season. He's particularly excited about the fact that while the lodge is Guatemalan in design and aesthetics, the inn is more infused with Bali. "At first we did a kamikaze job to change the infrastructure and change the kitchen and build a nice bar. We tried to give it more style but keep it rustic and just get through the first season. Later we'll build a dive shop and put in a pool and bring in dive instructors." There are also plans to build some new cabanas and to put in some outdoor bathrooms.

Despite the changes, occupancy will be kept to a civilized few. "In terms of 'keys,' as hotel people call it," says Coppola, "there will be 24." At the moment there are eight.

The front cabanas (which go for $210 a night) are all airy and beautiful, while the back ones (at $150) were literally just being finished when I was there last April. Though they are no doubt spiffed up by now, the varnish hung heavy on the doors, and a hole in the grassy ceiling allowed not entirely exotic creatures to crawl in. The back cabanas were also shelter for the work gear, so all day power tools would rage like chain saws (in fact they were chain saws) as workers hurried to finish everything.

Occasionally guests have arrived to discover that there's no running water. One couple was given a bucket of yellowish water to do whatever it is one does with buckets of water in a bathroom. This is being amended, Coppola says. "We're just about to build a 35,000-pound water tank and a pump to make the showers." Certain guests, finding the lack of water a problem, received stays at the eight-year-old Blancaneaux Lodge in place of their Turtle Inn reservations. "The lodge is more finished," Coppola says. "It took years to make. So the success of the Turtle Inn is a question of how much money I put into it. Successes require more money than failures." Few men could imbue a line with such gravity.

Coppola did have some directorial angst, and there were shades of the persona he reportedly adopted during the making of Apocalypse Now when he was overheard remarking one evening, "No place of mine has mosquitoes" before either hurling a very well-made pizza to the floor or dropping it by accident. According to village chatter, the first thing the director did upon buying the inn was have it completely sprayed with insecticide, the better to rid it of anything so inconvenient as a mosquito. But as one local put it, even Hollywood people can't fight nature, and guests must now settle for mosquito nets covering their beds.

The food is excellent: all homegrown vegetables, fresh fish, and impeccably made pizza and pasta. The wine is from Coppola's Niebaum-Coppola Estate Winery, of course, and while the chilled whites fare well enough, the reds tend to suffer. "I've only owned Turtle Inn for a year, so it's very much a work in progress," says Coppola, who at 62 can still say the same thing for himself. He has just begun directing Megalopolis, which he also wrote. ("Well, I'm working on a film" is all he'll say about the project.) He's producing seven features (including CQ which is being directed by his son Roman). He's putting together the DVD collection of the Godfather trilogy. And he's running his winery and his literary journal and his other apparently wonderful lodge. None of which has stopped him from visiting Placencia more than once a month since last December.

"I have a restless, creative nature that needs to have a project. I don't know what to do with myself otherwise," he explains. "I like to build things and make them come true, like film." Curiously when he started his winery he made the same analogy.

"Some people think of retirement," Coppola says. "Me, I think I've made the transition from professional to amateur." Like the brash young man who almost decided against making The Godfather because it was too commercial, who started his own movie studio in order to get away from the deadening effect of the studio professionals, who risked everything and courted disaster, the Turtle Inn is an exercise in amateurism. And amateurism, Coppola is quick to remind me, has as its root the Latin word for love.

Source: Talk Magazine
Author: William Georgiades

Belize, formerly British Honduras, enjoys the distinction of being the most obscure country in Latin America. It is tiny: a nibble between the borders of Mexico to the north, Honduras to the south and Guatemala to the west. In the 16th and 17th centuries it was the haunt of Spanish bucaneros and English slavers, of logwood cutters and warm-sea riffraff. In 1981 it achieved independence, and today it is the last fragment of the British Commonwealth on Central American soil, the smallest sovereign state on the whole continent (pop. about 200,000) and politically the least eventful.

Belize has rain forest, jaguars, waterfalls, toucans and, after Australia's, the largest coral barrier reef in the world. It was also one of the great centers of Mayan civilization. Ruins -- still largely unrestored, insufficiently studied and besieged by tomb robbers -- dot the lowland forests: the pyramids of Xunantunich and Altun Ha and the vast complex of Caracol, which in the 6th to 7th centuries was the rival of Tikal, across the Guatemalan border.

For fishermen, Belize is a paradise and always has been. Its big holiday, after Christmas, is Baron Bliss Day on March 9. The festival commemorates an eccentric English nobleman who went there for the fishing, died in 1926 on his yacht in Belize harbor and left a part of his fortune to the colony -- a grateful sportsman if ever there was one. But in its obscurity, Belize gets only 1% of the tourist traffic to Central America, although word about it has begun to get out.

Nobody wants to stay in Belize City, which every guidebook dismisses as a noisy dump full of intrusive hustlers. Instead, one heads for the outer islands, such as the Turneffe Islands, that are geared up for sporting tourism, mainly scuba diving, snorkeling and line fishing; or a small plane whisks you north to San Pedro on Ambergris Cay, a thin digit of land that protrudes south from the Mexican border. To the east is the barrier reef, which runs parallel to the coast, less than a mile offshore. To the west are mangroves and shallow flats, and then the low featureless Mosquito Coast. San Pedro, in between, is a pleasant town of ramshackle wooden buildings on stilts or cinder blocks, with a few new condos.

It is supremely laid back here. The aggression level is zero; nobody bothers you. The favorite late-night game in San Pedro is called Chicken Drop: Mother Nature's own organic form of roulette. A pit is marked out in 100 numbered squares, 10 by 10. One bets on the numbers. The croupier takes a live chicken by the legs, blows sharply up its behind and throws it into the ring. The first number the chicken defecates on wins. The winning number takes all. It will be a while before the Mob moves in on Belizean gambling.

Mainly, you fish.

It is probably impossible to go fishing in Belize and not catch something. If you don't care what, hire a skiff and go trolling off the reef with a heavy spinning rod and deep-running lure. That will produce anything from an overambitious triggerfish (beautiful colors but sluggish: let it go) to a large black snapper or a larger wahoo. Or, if you are unlucky, an enormous barracuda. The latter will either break your leader in the water or do its best to bite your foot off if you get it in the boat. This kind of fishing is fun but coarse. You have to make things difficult for yourself. The next step up is to go after bonefish with a fly rod. Bones here are small, no more than 3 lbs., but they are sizzlers on light tackle. Or you can try a fly on the tarpon flats.

The right base for such ventures is a handsome and well-run lodge on Ambergris Cay called El Pescador, which has all the best guides -- and a welcoming committee of two ospreys that have built their nest above its pier and greet the arriving angler with shrill wheep-wheep-wheeps of alarm. El Pescador was built by a German, Juergen Krueger, and his Wisconsin-born wife. They started it about 18 years ago, when no sober carpenter could be hired on the cay. Much of the work, from laying cinder blocks to routing the panels in the heavy mahogany doors, was done by visiting Mennonites. The lodge is friendly, unpretentious and full of tropical Gemutlichkeit. Its barracuda seviche and fried grouper are delicious.

The flats between Ambergris Cay and the mainland of Belize are one of the wonders of the fishing world. They extend for miles: a limestone plain covered by a blue-green, seemingly endless mirror of gin-clear salt water, traversed by bluer channels and punctuated by small mangrove islands. This is the home of Megalops atlanticus, the tarpon.

Essentially, tarpon are huge archaic herring. In Florida they regularly grow to 150 lbs. (the world record on fly is 188 lbs.), but in Belize they are smaller, up to about 100 lbs. They are beautiful creatures, sheathed in scales the size of silver dollars, glittering, pugnacious, spooky and inedible: the only thing you can do with a tarpon, in the unlikely event that you catch it, ) is let it go. But as a rule you have no choice about letting a tarpon go. It just goes.

This is probably the only kind of fly-rod fishing that causes more distress in the angler than in the fish. No other angling contains such extremes of frustration and exhilaration. One hears middle-aged enthusiasts declare it to be "better than sex." Perhaps not, but the two activities have something in common: the first try is an embarrassment; everything goes wrong. With tarpon, however, it keeps going wrong.

The ideal day for flat fishing is cloudless, calm and roasting hot. The guide poles the skiff along the flats in a predatory silence, and you stand on the bow platform, with line stripped out, sweating through the sunblock lotion, ready to cast. Tarpon fishing is stalking. You must see the fish and cast to it. Hence its peculiar excitement, which far exceeds trout or even salmon fishing. "Look, look, out there, about a hundred feet, in the white spot, a big one, he's coming, ooh, thrreee of them!" You peer and scan and peer again, and see nothing. Then you do: a dark gray bar under the green ripples, ghosting along.

What the guide expects you to do is shoot the line out 60 ft. or 70 ft., drop the fly (a vulgar tuft of feathers and Mylar) some 5 ft. in front of the tarpon's snoot and start stripping it in. The fish will then charge the fly, you will strike, and it's showtime! So much for utopia. his being the real world, one of several things will happen. Flustered by the sight of the fish, which is so much larger than anything you imagined catching on a fly before, you bungle your cast and land the line in a tangled hurrah's nest far short of the fish, which glides away. Or you drop the fly on its nose, so that it spooks and heads for Cozumel. Or you get it right, and the fish takes no notice. Or the creature inhales the fly and takes off like a drag racer, at which point you find you were standing on a loop of the fly line, and it is knotted around your ankle. But, at last, when you have run out of spare leaders and foul language and are cooked by the sun, you hook one. The sight is amazing. The fish looks, a friend of mine said after striking his first one, like a silver man rising straight out of the water: an apparition.

Now your troubles have only started. Tarpon are inordinately strong. To subdue a big one on a one-hand, 10-weight fly rod takes an hour and a half and teaches you what a sore arm can be. It is like cutting mahogany, but with the additional likelihood that the tree will escape. The tarpon has a mouth like a cinder block, in which the hook seldom holds: generally, only one fish is brought to boat for every 10 that are hooked.

While other anglers lie about the size of their fish, tarponers lie about the number of minutes they had it on before it threw the hook. The fish makes long reel-burning runs, and jumps repeatedly, a thick column of mercury twisting in the spray. It lands with a smacking splash that can be heard a mile away. "Bow to the fish!" cries the guide, wanting you to drop your rod tip. Bow? You feel like prostrating yourself. And then it is gone. In five days I saw perhaps 150 fish, hooked four and boated one -- 25 lbs., a mere minnow.

No matter. The 90-pounders will still be there next year.

Source: Time Magazine
Author: Robert Hughes