PARADISE ISLAND vs CAYE CAULKER

ATLANTIS, BAHAMAS
Island girls usually don't stray too far away from the water, so it was natural to choose Florida & the Bahamas for vacation.

Big Sis Sharon, brother-in-law Dave, and their kids Stefan & Marlese accompanied Tyler & I for a 4 day vacation at the fancy Atlantis Resort in Nassau, Bahamas. While this joint offered a ton of amenities & geared towards adult & children alike and very artistic & beautiful, I had a hard time swallowing the prices of say, a small bottle of water $5.00 usd/ a coca cola for $7. 00 usd or a chicken soup or burger for $20.00 usd. I won't even mention the room rate, you can take an educated guess there. I have every right to groan!
Needless to say, this trip put a big hurt on my wallet, but I had an idea what I was in for.

The next time a tourist on Caye Caulker tries to moan at me that Belize is expensive, I might be inclined to pass on my credit card bill to them to show them what expensive really looks like. Sheeeshhh!

Every so often someone comes to the hostel and starts to moan about the $10. usd a dorm bed and I just want to punch their lights out cause we're still surviving on minimal everything in this Banana Republic (well at least I am) and some of us have even traveled a little to see what costs are like around the rest of the world.

Brit: "$10.00 usd is ridiculously expensive for a bed in Belize. Guatemala was $2.00 usd and Honduras was $4.00 usd for a hostel bed."

Me: "Well, you know when I was in London, I paid $22.00 pounds sterling or approx. $44.00 usd for a dorm bed in a hostel, much more than I'm charging you for a bed, why is London so bloody expensive?"

Brit: "Well, you should expect to pay that, after all that is London, a wonderful metropolis and we've got the Tower of London & London Bridge and... blah..blah..bullshit"

Me: "Well, $10.00 usd is very cheap for a beach front dorm bed in Caye Caulker, Belize considering you are on a paradise tropical island in the Caribbean and we've got the 2nd largest Barrier Reef at your doorstep and a Rainforest to rival the best in the world and Mayan Culture like you've never seen and ...blah...blah..bullshit."

You know what I'm saying?

I'm beefing with the world right now, I feel like I just got robbed on this vacation. It did not leave me feeling in the highest of spirits as you can tell. But to carry on this rant.....I've had complainers from just about every Country except the Chinese & Japanese and so I really got to like these two race of people, they make good Ambassadors for their countries.

But the Brits, & I like the Brits generally, they're partiers and pretty cool, but you of all people, even with an exchange rate of $4.00 bzd to 1 pound approx., you still find the time sometimes to complain about your two & a half pound bed cost smelling the freshest air you could never get in London.

I'm guessing some of you are probably thinking, I shouldn't complain about the cost of my recent hotel, after all, it is THE Atlantis Resort and it is a Caribbean island with sharks, comediennes, palm trees, celebrities...blah...blah....bullshit!

BELIZE - We are worth the costs you are asked to pay & have much to offer, just in a beautiful simplistic & natural ART form o.k., none of the fancy high priced commissioned stuff from artists which the resort will charge the pants out of the customer for.

To us Belizeans, Belize is .....well.....not being original here......PRICELESS.

A-P-P-R-E-C-I-A-T-E the value you get for your money here in this Banana Republic, you are getting a GREAT DEAL take it from me!

Come to think of it, I think it's time I raise my prices,.... hell........how else am I gonna pay for this vacation?