The Lodge at Big Falls

by Rob Hirons
(Big Falls village, Toledo District, Belize)

Pool at The Lodge at Big Falls

So many of our visitors use the word “paradise” within their first few minutes of arrival at the lodge that we have finally been persuaded that we really do live there.Although we may have to correct a few misconceptions for the first time visitor about the jungle being hot and steamy and full of biting creatures.

Our lodge is on a small 30 acre property that was formerly a farm, and we were able to build and create a tropical garden on former pastures sloping down to the river bank. The well-drained terrain and our mown grass reduce the habitat for breeding insects and restricts the mosquitoes to the surrounding tall forest.

Being well inland we have a much wider daytime/night-time temperature range so that hot days are followed by cooling evening breezes. Cool days and low night-time temperatures during the four months from November until the end of February, make visiting at that time very comfortable, especially for visitors who may be concerned about the heat.. And we use fans instead of air-conditioning in our thatched rooms because we really do not need it… except for a couple of weeks at the end of the dry season in May, when we can be praying for rain and a drop in temperatures.

It is a perfect climate for growing all the exotics that guests from further north may be familiar with as fairly small house plants but which grow in abundance as perennials in our moist warm air.

We will have to admit to a higher than average rainfall that residents of the American south west would die for, but once again, in this case like Camelot, the majority of rain falls at night-time, and loud stormy nights can be followed by sunny mornings when the trees drip until the sun dries the leaves, the steam rises from the ground and the world goes back about its business.

Waking up on their first morning at the lodge visitors’ ears are assailed by the often loud and raucous calls of the jungle birds keeping family members in touch as they pass through the tall trees. Parrots, which do not by the way shout “Pretty Polly!”, are among the loudest, as well as Aztec parakeets, chachalacas and brown jays. No alarm clock is required.

Experienced birders strolling the grounds may see between 40-50 species before breakfast and in May 2008 eighteen different species were nesting within a 100 feet of the main lodge building and visitors observed the courtship flights of hummingbirds and doves.

In mid-morning, strolling along a forest trail, you may be overtaken by a passing blue morpho butterfly or find a crowd of lemon yellow phoebis phileae butterflies on the ground that scatter around you as you pass. A pauraque (night hawk) might rise from the leaf strewn path its camouflage making it invisible until you nearly step on it. Columns of army ants cross your path at speed on their way to overrun their insect prey cowering under the leaf mould.

In the afternoon you could be diving into a deep green jungle pool below a waterfall overhung with foliage of a thousand shades of green. You will often have these places to yourself, when the rest of the world seems a world away and you fancy yourself in paradise.

www.thelodgeatbigfalls.com