Amazing Quest: Stories from Belize | Somewhere on Earth: Belize | Free Documentary

[Music] [Music] today somewhere on earth invites you to discover belize this slip of land tucked between guatemala and mexico on the shores of the caribbean is the tom thumb of central america half the territory is covered in jungle and its shores are home to the world's second largest barrier reef in the far south of the country we'll meet cash a ranger by profession but first and foremost an islander revisiting his childhood spent between land and sea he shares with us his love of the port honduras marine reserve isabel a wildlife veterinarian has devoted her life to taking care of the animals from one end of belize to the other she'll take us off the beaten paths to visit her patients whether they're hiding in the jungle or swimming in the sea they're a varied assortment of surprising creatures [Music] melito's passion for a river has taken the shape of a voyage every month he travels up the sibune river to make sure that it's not in any danger this final link in a natural corridor from north to south is his pride and joy the focus of his life this river has given me more life than i that and i think that i have because i've been through many things you know and i could be dead by now well i'm i call myself dead man but you know what the river said no i'm not ready for you yet go on you got a mission to you know to accomplish so i'll give you another chance so man from then i i love the river even more for a long time belize has been shrouded in mystery avoided by the conquistadors it was not until the 17th century that pirates crossed the reefs and landed on these forbidding shores a vast expanse of solitude stubbornly resistant to human presence isolation is an intrinsic part of the country's identity there are countless sanctuaries reserves and protected areas [Music] in this realm nature makes the rules we're just a few kilometers offshore in the port honduras marine reserve declared a protected area in 2000 it offers a myriad of eyelets covered in mangroves these plants form a rampart against erosion and are also a haven and breeding ground for a wide variety of animals they call this spot the nursery of the caribbean cash knows this maze like the back of his hand he's been roaming through here as long as he can remember i had a very special childhood it's something i'll never forget i grew up on an island i used to walk on the mangrove i grew up having fun just watching birds walking on the mangrove that was a good feeling i used to watch the different species living in holes in the mud the crabs and other fish living in the mangroves i mean we're away from the city it's so quiet so peaceful you can't get better than this area back in the day there was a lot more people they want education jobs they want to uplift themselves but if you want to stick to nature this is the place to be you know within port honduras there's spirit here spirit there that will help you it helps you to have the courage to stay cash is the youngest of eight siblings his mother a fisherwoman supported the whole family she has passed on to him her experience and lore of the islands when we were growing up we had exciting moments i used to always run away from my mom and she'd think i was going out fishing or going out somewhere yeah sometimes i got a whipping it was freedom in some way i think growing up like that did help us actually keeping us away from all the negative things from bad influences that we have around us that's the good part of it my ideas everything was free you know like today everything was free going on the sea you pick up.com you catch a fish you catch a lobster nobody to tell you no you can't do it no but it's good it's good it's not one way because everything is done so we have to protect the areas as my life when i reach that island peace joy especially see the water you know clear no more beautiful i don't know it's something very great and i feel nice about it and i proved to be official [Music] [Music] before laws were enacted to preserve these waters port honduras had long been over exploited in the 1970s fishing with nets was widespread in the zone it was urgent to take action in order to save this haven sheltering so many species with this idea in mind cash became a ranger he lives alone on this spit of land lapped by the waves to the east we have honduras to the north we have mexico and if you go along the coastline and follow it you will find chaturmal it goes right up to the mexican waters the barrier reef joins with the mexican barrier reef so this is the gulf of honduras all of this that you can see around here here we're at abalone this is the ranger station within port honduras here we're in the tower and from here we can do tower surveillance to monitor the area within the area i love the sea and that's the reason why i'm a part of this right now being a ranger what you can do within the reserve you can fish to eat and to sell but you're not allowed to use certain methods within the reserve the reason why i really love the job i'm doing is because i spent all my life here and i also want to take care of what is ours if we don't take care of it we will not have it for the future [Music] in his free time cash likes to trade his rangers boat for a dory the traditional craft of the keys as the islands are called in belize [Music] fort honduras is now protected but lobster fishing is authorized a few months a year no need to go very far you can catch them just a few meters off the beaches many men who sought refuge on these islands managed to survive thanks to this abundance [Music] the horizon where one can lose oneself and vanish from sight baileys has been a sanctuary for a number of people shipwrecked by history pirates fugitives but also slaves from africa their descendants still perpetuate their music this is the garifuna community singing is their way of invoking their ancestors [Music] when i was a kid growing up i used to hear it i guess the drums put spirit in you and you get moving that's the reason why i just love it [Music] [Applause] is [Music] you [Music] but today's modern world needs landmarks and sentinels on hunting key facing the barrier reef dandu ensures that the lighthouse is always functioning [Music] i hear you clearly if we do have problem with the lighthouse uh it will take about two or three days before your arm i can get help our navigations really needs uh the lighthouse this is the end of the barrier reef and boats came in from guatemala honduras and belize through this channel that goes out to the caribbean so this is the most important lighthouse here in belize it's a way of life i feel more free you know i go where i want to i do what i feel like you know go swimming go diving then when i'm here you know i feel like i'm somewhere the barrier reef wow it's beautiful you know it's more than a treasure it's um it's a heritage i mean i want my great grandson my great-great-great-grandson to come and enjoy what i'm enjoying today dandu has known cash since he was a child today he's waiting for him impatiently because he needs his help to keep up the lighthouse time is short for nightfall is approaching and the wind is getting stronger hey gosh why you will bring from my man why i have a battery here for you you said you have to change it because you have a problem yes man give me a lihan man now i need help on the right man yes ma'am thanks man yeah if we're happy with this when i was a kid we used to go to the lighthouse and we would dare each other to see who was brave enough to climb up there and the one who'd get up there would say yes i'm a man and you are just kids that made us feel good sometimes we would drop down and go hiding from the guys that took care of the lighthouse because if they saw you they would yell at you and say you can't go up they see you they were real on you and you can't go up so you take them so we took those chances as kids you know it's something that we really enjoyed that's rain clouds between honduras and the mountains when i go and meet other people from the reserve it's like a home and a small place for everyone we help one another and everything you need something you get it from me i need something i get it from you that's the way it works all through the islands so we look out for one another [Music] you can't just go anywhere and trade the same way we do here we work together with a community spirit [Music] here on the outer limits of this mint green expanse isolation brings people together the elements forge an identity the soul of the belize islanders [Music] a space outside of time the san ignacio region in the west of the country near the guatemala border is a paradise for those in quest of the absolute jungle as far as the eye can see here everything is a call to adventure [Music] those are some old teeth [Music] tapers are a mixture of horse and rhinoceros it's a very old animal and it's actually the only one in its group there's four different tapir species worldwide uh but this is the central american species and it's also the national animal of police so [Music] isabel a franco-german veterinarian landed here eight years ago with her backpack and her very young child she came to work with the wildlife and is committed to protecting endangered species here in central america she has found a way of life that corresponds to the ideals she has kept from her somewhat bohemian childhood there are many highly motivated people like isabel and belize working to maintain the equilibrium between the wildlife and the environment on the land in the sea and in the lagoons now [Music] chris sherry and vince take care of american saltwater crocodiles hold on the most common species in belize these reptiles are usually left to live in peace here but in some regions where human activity is more intense the cohabitation can be quite problematic all right go ahead and go can you believe this somebody has chopped this animal's tail off for me yeah it's disgusting they get about 17 a pound for this for him to come so quickly for chicken he's obviously been fed used to humans obviously someone coerced him up to uh come to the bank gave him some chicken but then lopped his tail off so we're going to bring them up north and let them go and let them be a crocodile where there aren't any human beings around and no one to feed them or chop at them and he'll do just fine because his natural diet is fish or raccoons not chicken so [Music] such severe wounds show that this great predator can also be a victim and in cases like this one it's isabel who takes over [Applause] good how you doing good trip yes hello glad to be here i'm glad you could make it yeah so that's the guy you caught last night yeah this is him and um we're glad that you're here with us too because uh its tail has been amputated uh by machete and um so it's great to have a vet here and to help us assess the uh severity of it releasing a crocodile back into the wild is always very moving the worldwide population of american crocodiles is estimated at 15 000. belize is one of the last places where their habitat is still protected [Music] well this is an exciting moment we're about to release this girl back into her natural environment without human disturbance so it's quite exciting personally as a wildlife veterinarian with a passion for wildlife rescue and rehabilitation this is about as good as it can get to be able to bring an animal back out into the wild i get to do it all the recovery time that's pretty quick that's a very healthy animal usually the recovery time when they've been held overnight like this one has can be quite slow sometimes up to five minutes the profession is often very rough and very difficult but for example the moment of getting to release an animal that we've been able to heal back into the wild or an animal that we have bred and rehabilitated to go back out that is truly the biggest reward and makes me feel like we achieve some sort of harmony [Music] [Music] belize is a really small world there is about 340 000 inhabitants and six major cities uh our capital is belmopon with the last count was six thousand people living there which made it the smallest capital in the world and it really adds to the lifestyle in belize it makes it everybody knows everybody and it's all like a small village the whole country is [Music] we're about to drive through barton creek which is a mennonite community the mennonites are a religious group that came from the protestants and they originated in europe and they left europe about 250 years ago because they're basically pacifists they did not want to join the military and they have moved a little bit all over the world i grew up in the countryside in germany and then in the countryside in paraguay for two years which for some reason has left a lifelong impact of wanting to go back to the simplicity of life that we had there where i could take my horse to school we came to belize and we stayed i can really not see myself live in a city in a concrete jungle [Music] at all there's very very few things on this planet that would take me away from here and it would have to be closely related to conservation nature is my church that's where i go to get new energy and recharge [Music] [Music] the tamanda was found as a baby after a flood she was orphaned there was no mother around and she was flushed down the river so they raised her from a baby with a goal to release her once she is ready to be released [Music] they are very specialized animals and they eat ants and termites and it takes five or six hours per day for them to get enough time to get enough food so they're very labor intensive we're just looking to see what she does basically if she looks like a normal tamandua and if she can find her food and that looks pretty normal i love the daily challenges it never gets boring you have to constantly improvise and figure out how to deal with a new situation compared to a normal veterinarian and normal veterinary practice where after a couple of months you've seen most of what you're going to see every day and it gets boring quick my work does never get boring and if you ever had to restrain her we would actually grab her by her front legs because that's what she would use to defend herself so what you saw a little earlier where she did this that was really good to see because we want her to not like humans [Music] mission accomplished and isabel is already back on the road vince and sherry have called her in again this time the crew is planning a night rescue [Music] we're going to try and capture the two crocodiles that have been deemed problematic and or because of future development from this area down south and once we uh capture both crocodiles which we believe to be a mating pair we're going to by boat bring them up north and we'll probably come out here and go off onto these mangrove areas where there's no people no development we can't go that far anyways we're gonna that's all the further we're gonna be able to go well the further up you go the better off it's gonna be but you go too far then you're gonna you don't wanna get you don't wanna enter mexico how far is mexico it's only about 20 miles actually belize is a paradise for people like me wanting to work in conservation because we still have 60 of the country covered in native forest we have a humongous biodiversity here and a lot of the problems that i saw in the us or in other places before was illegal trade and once we see a wild animal in europe or in the us there's no way we can bring it back so one of my goals or missions in life was to work on site in one of these developing countries where we still have biodiversity and nature left [Music] [Music] all the eye shines you see that are orange and this color uh we know that is a crocodile staring at us right now he can hear us smell us see us sense us [Music] right here her head's right there okay wait wait she's coming up she's coming up [Music] all right that sucked good job this is from a croc fight oh it's a hell of a gash she will heal rather quickly crocodiles have enormous capacity to heal and um it's really as much as it's not it looks like a big gash it's a minor wound for her [Music] and adrenaline is working on me too believe me if she starts moving and shaking and i fear that chris is losing control i will be out of this area within a split second [Music] living intense experiences in close contact with the wild kingdom here in belize isabel's dream comes alive again with each new day [Music] here in the midst of the maya mountains is the birthplace of a river renowned for its purity the siboon it winds its way through a dense jungle and melito has made it his mission to protect it my saboon is my life and my naval string when i was born my naval string went in the saboon river so the spoon river have this thing in me that i must be there i must swim in it every day i must drink from it every day you know that's that's just you know how special cebu river is to me i used to have a job a permanent job for 10 years and i feel something in me that that's holding me back i don't really know what it was until i spend more time on the river and then i could feel all you know what this is it this is my dream right here this is what i wanted in my life to be on that river anytime anywhere i'll stick with the river i call myself as a river man by you know taking my own responsibilities going that river there's like 12 different communities along that river that needs to know what's up upstream travellers river once a month you know and i go around checking everything recently we had some floods and so i'm gonna go check out the river and see if i can see some good stuff on the river [Music] this solitary voyage has become as vital as breathing for melito meandering up the sibun he's also making a trip back in time and revisiting his culture everything in this setting reminds him of who he is and where he comes from [Music] we go visit that right now and check those big butches this saber tree is about 120 years old my ancestors are still leave something to to let me know that yes they exist back in the days and so and the other thing is not a lot of big trees is left in belize most of our big trees gone down the river cut long by lagers so when we see a big tree like this we praise it because it's wonderful to see it again you know i am mixed with the mopan maya and the mopanmai is one of the strongest mayan in belize [Music] mayans once used to use the cave for sacrificing they will come in a cave they will have a big circle a bonfire and and they will have a a little dance first one of the mayan culture thing you know and right after that they have a big sacrifice even today the mayas show great respect for their dead they still practice their rituals in caves but the forms have changed they use the cave for storage because sometimes even the areas where the mayans used to live get flooded so there's a lot of different levels in caves so they always use the highest one again in here they have a god that they call the shabalva which that they believe that you know take their their ancestors and take them you know to heaven that's why we have a secret tree that's named the seba which is a secret tree of the mayans because what happened is the roots of of that big tree is up out there in the outer world and the roots pushes down through the cave to the underworld right so when they do their sacrificing they believe that that the ancestors go through that route straight to the trunks and through the branches to the heavens [Music] the siboon is the only source of drinking water for the villages along its banks melitto plays the role of messenger for the river dwellers so is mr [Music] good to see you again to see you man yeah so what's up man not much any any any report or any news that i need to know about the river well as a city kind of filthy a bit dirty you know all right we can remember nice flood pass through this place december the last flood comes on each wheel we up on top of the bank i almost get into my mom's house about 8 inches to enter the house on top of the hill yeah oh my goodness yeah so that's why that's why you guys build your house off half of the thing no right right yeah that's a huge flood that's a big one man [Music] in this region the rains and hurricanes are continually reshaping the landscape so each expedition is a new adventure for melito [Music] ed bowles is a hydrographer specialized in river systems he's been monitoring the ecosystem of belize's rivers for the past 30 years for him the sibun occupies a choice place among the rivers on account of its exceptional purity he likes to keep a finger on the pulse of the river and capture its every mood i first came to belize in 1980 before belize was believed and i over the years i fell in love with belize as i returned and then by 1988 i found a way to move here i was working to build a research center in the mountain pine ridge and ultimately i moved from there to the university and to other jobs and also i was trying to escape the us i was i was tired of paying my taxes that would go to promote a war industry and i would rather i would rather come to a country that which doesn't promote war so what are you up to yeah same old routine man how you doing so what's the river like up there well it's beautiful man nice and you know like always all right well you got a healthy river right here too you have to check out those fish nice man come in i'll show you what i'm doing so did you do any sampling lately i'm about to get started wow i guess i wanted to get a sketch of the area okay just for the notebook so how how is this how is the forest and the spiny bamboo and stuff is that still holding on or it's still holding on but it's thin you know it needs to there needs to be more trees coming in but i see some young trees coming through all right so i think that we're going to see this this area grow to full size in a few years so you think sometimes we should be planting some trees on the side of the river i think it wouldn't it wouldn't hurt at all and we can get some students involved in that all right and evenly i could i could even put the seeds together and got some trees going in my nursery all right products do that do that and save some for the for us at the university too all right definitely now before the sun gets any lower all right and put a few rocks on the edge of that right here i'm looking for that watershed that you took me to a few years back you remember how to get there yes man you think you could take me again because i would love to get up there and do some sampling all right definitely we could we could definitely do that so it's right around this area right here man okay it's a great spot big waterfall you know how soon can we go tomorrow all right let's do it we'll be there tomorrow [Music] traveling together is a deep moment of rapport for these two men who share a fascination for the same river i feel so many emotions here there's certainly a sense of freedom of the ability just to kind of be yourself on the riverbank but there's also something about a flowing water system that just massages the uh creative uh vibes in your body it's uh it's uh the relaxation of the of the water and the and the incredible diversity of the of the fish and the uh and the wildlife associated with the river i don't know what heavens feels like but this sure feels like heaven to be and in me i when i'm in the where i'm at the smooth river i'm always you know like i'm so happy you know i don't i don't even want to go back to my house i just want to remain here and and spend as much time at the river as i could and man you know it's this river is it's just i can't stay away from it it's too special [Music] well got this is the trail that we're going to take to here [Music] nice moving stream man yes man [Music] let's check that wildfire man it's beautiful huh it is isn't that great it's more beautiful than i remember look how beautiful i like to see those like mist coming out of there oh yes man there's many places like this magnificent waterfall that are undiscovered by most people at least for the for such a small country it has so many natural wonders it takes a long time to see all of belize it's so spread out police being part of the central american isthmus is a very important part of the the movement of animals from the north and plants from the north and the south this is where they meet and so this is the second most diverse place in the world wow even better yeah oh man all right maliko [Music] so [Music] tree they're one of the best reptiles i've ever met you know because i can't play with a crocodile like where i play with iguana the males are huge and the female they're much smaller much softer you know and it's easier to play with but the big males who too big you know you hold them but it's like a big monster in your hand i love playing with them and the thing that amazed me is is that tail you know that different color that black and that orange tail oh man it's like somebody painted it first time i've seen iguana i was like scared of it but again i said man no i should be scared of that i see my brothers hold it so i said okay well it won't hurt me either so i go and i hold it too they don't bite you know wow next big one nice going out there hopefully so yeah a very nice pet i love iguanas they they're very cool really the wild things should be harassing like moving all the time but this one no you can pick him up anyway hold him like a baby take a shot you know you could do anything with him you could put him on your shoulder and this is a male by the way now we could tell it's a male by this big bulge here like it it's nice huh [Music] when i go out to town i'm miserable i see too much people i'm miserable i see my river and i see birds i see everything i'm happy and in a way in my life that's what i dreamed of to be a river keeper to get on this river and have a good time and have a life and the life that i'm looking for i have right now so i am glad and thankful for it my family is the one that that actually get me in this by tagging me along i have five big brothers and my five big brothers they're fishermen they love the sabone river my dad is a farmer from the saboon river they show me how to fish they show me how to catch iguana they show me how to catch an armadillo and some of them show me even how to catch snakes so it links up and links up and drops right to me i'm the last one of the family now i guess i have to do my part i picked this spot all the time you know because great spot and great place to fish you know you could just stand right here beside the campfire throw your fishing line in there and just catch a fish and right down there there's big tarpons there's snapper all kinds of sorts of fish down here yeah i'm on for me it's life life i think this river has given me more life than i that and i think that i have because i've been through many things you know and i could be dead by now well i'm i call myself dead man but you know what the river say no i'm not ready for you yet go on you got a mission to you know to accomplish so i'll give you another chance so man from then i i love the river even more if i can live a thousand years i'll be right here in this river never going to change [Music] this is the story of melito and of an entire country belize where the murmuring of the rivers is a message of peace to man [Music] so [Music] you

Channel: Free Documentary

Views: 810,737

Keywords: Free Documentary, Documentaries, Full documentary, HD documentary, documentary - topic, documentary (tv genre), somewhere on earth, amazing stories, amazing stories from belize, amazing quest, belize

Id: ME1tUKEZwE4

Length: 52min 14sec (3134 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 23 2022