PRIME MINISTER BARROW OF BELIZE SETS THE RECORD STRAIGHT ON SOCIALIST DICTATORSHIPS OF ALBA FEDERATION.

*** President Michelle Bachelete
*** ex-President Zelaya
**** President Kirschner
*** President Lula de Silva


*** Hugo Chavez, Emperor of the ALBA war machine and Federation, also President/dictator of Venezuela
**** Communist President Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua
**** President Evo Morales of Bolivia
*** Prime Minister Dean Barrow of the small country of Belize.


PRIME MINISTER OF BELIZE, DEAN BARROW GIVES HIS TAKE ON PRESIDENT CHAVEZ of Venezuela, PRESIDENT EVO MORALES of Boliva, PRESIDENT DANIEL ORTEGA of Nicaragua, PRESIDENT RAFAEL CORREA of Ecuador, PRESIDENT CHRISTINA KIRSCHNER of Argentina, PRESIDENT BACHELETE of CHILE, PRESIDENT ZELAYA of Honduras, PRESIDENT LULA de SILVA of Brazil.

In a famous quote of an old proverb, Barrow said this about the ALBA Federation of Communists, as Dictators for Life Socialists of their countries and their WAR on the rest of the American countries.

With a smile in a television interview when asked about ALBA and their WAR they have declared on the democracies of the Americas, he said:

If you are not a Socialist by the time you are 18 years old, you obviously have no heart for helping the poor. By the time you are 40 years old, if you are still a socialist, then you have no brains!

BELIZE TOURIST RESORTS FOR SALE DUE TO WORLD DEPRESSION

WORLD DEPRESSION TAKES TOLL ON TOURIST FACILITIES IN THE EXOTIC BEAUTIFUL CARIBBEAN REGION. THIS IS THE LIST OF PLACES FOR SALE IN BELIZE.
- On Wed, 9/2/09, Lan Sluder wrote:
From: Lan Sluder
Subject: Bz-Culture: Revised List of Hotels for Sale in Belize
To: "Belize Culture" , "Belize Culture"
Date: Wednesday, September 2, 2009, 9:35 AM

Here is a revised list of hotels, lodges, inns and B&Bs currently for sale in Belize.
--Lan Sluder


Hotels, Lodges and Inns for Sale in Belize

As of September 2009



By our count, more than 60 hotels, lodges, inns and B&Bs are currently for sale in Belize. Aside from these properties that are actively on the market via media advertising or listings with real estate companies, a number of other hotels are for sale but currently are not being promoted. The largest concentration of hotel properties for sale is in Cayo District, followed by Caye Caulker and Placencia. Despite its ranking as the number one tourism destination in Belize, with the largest number of hotels in the country, Ambergris Caye has relatively few hotels for sale.

Below are hotels and related businesses currently offered or advertised for sale in Belize. Several restaurants are also included, although this is not a complete list. All asking prices are in U.S. dollars. Prices are those set by the owner and in some cases may bear little relationship to actual market value. Most properties, if they sell at all, do not sell at full asking price.

We attempt to provide current and accurate information, but such information is subject to change, and owners do change their minds. To correct any listing or to add a listing, contact Belize First (www.BelizeFirst.com) or email lansluder@gmail.com.

CAYO DISTRICT

Pook’s Hill Lodge, Belmopan, 11 cabañas on 100 acres, asking US$2,300,000

Gumbo Limbo Village Resort, Mountain Pine Ridge Road, San Ignacio, 4 cottages, restaurant, pool on 40 acres, US$660,000

Falconview Backpackers Adventure Hostel, Santa Elena, asking US$328,000

Roaring River Golf Course, 9-hole golf course on 20 acres with restaurant and five tourist rental cottages, asking US$1,800,000

Aguada Hotel, Santa Elena, 22 rooms, owner’s apartment, restaurant and bar, pool, asking US$850,000

Royal Mayan Resort and Spa, Benque Viejo, 25 rooms on 8 acres with pool and spa, asking US$1,750,000

Belmopan Hotel and Convention Center, Belmopan, on 2 acres, asking US$1,200,000

Macaw Bank, Cristo Rey, 5 cabañas/cottages with owner’s house on 50 acres on Macal River, asking US$550,000

Five Sisters Lodge, Mountain Pine Ridge, 18 units with restaurant on about 15 acres, asking US$2,200,000

Windy Hill Resort, San Ignacio, 16 cottages and 9 rooms on 97 acres, pool, tour operation, asking US$1,800,000

Belize Jungle Dome, Belmopan, 7 rooms, pool, on 2.88 acres on Belize River, asking US$850,000 (owner’s villa not included but is available at an additional US$275,000)

Belmopan Bed and Breakfast, Belmopan, 3 units plus owner’s residence, pool, asking US$330,000

Casa Maya Eco-Lodge, San Ignacio, 7 cabañas on 30 acres, restaurant and bar, swimming pool, asking US$1,400,000

Mopan River Resort, Benque Viejo, asking US$2,850,000

Eva’s, San Ignacio, restaurant, leased, asking US$150,000

Amore Mio Italian restaurant, San Ignacio, leased, asking US$35,000

CAYE CAULKER

Seaside Cabanas, 16 rooms on seafront, asking US$2,299,000

Belize Odyssey Hotel, 22 rooms, asking US$4,000,000

Tropical Paradise Resort, 25 rooms, restaurant and bar, asking US$2,500,000

Popeyes Beach Resort, 20 rooms, restaurant and bar, seafront, asking US$1,800,000

Iguana Reef Inn, 13 rooms plus owner’s suite, pool, asking US$3,000,000

Tropics Hotel, 17 rooms, asking US$1,400,000

Jaguar Morning Star Guest House, 3 units plus owner’s apartment, asking US$499,000

Barefoot Caribe, 14 rooms plus seafront restaurant/bar, asking US$1,900,000

Sunset View Hotel, 25 budget rooms plus bar, lagoon side, asking US$560,000

Tom’s Hotel, seafront, asking US$3,200,000

Casa Rosado B&B, 3 rooms, asking US$250,000

Don Corleone Caribbean Trattoria, leased, asking US$125,000

AMBERGRIS CAYE

Ecologic Divers, dive shop with 3-bedroom tourist rental (included), asking US$699,000

Seven Seas Resort, 1-bedroom units on seafront, pool, RCI timeshare affiliation, asking US$1,950,000

Banana Beach, 66-unit hotel with restaurant on seafront, asking US$8,500,000

Lagniappe Provisioning, asking US$50,000

Casa Picasso Restaurant, asking US$150,000

Ruby’s Guest House (not Ruby’s on Barrier Reef Drive), 11 rooms and 2 casitas, asking US$399,000

Winnie Estelle charter boat, asking US$185,500

Conch Shell, 10 rooms, seafront, asking US$950,000

Jungle Jack’s restaurant and bar, leased, asking US$35,000

Mr. Joe’s Grocery and Grill, includes owner’s living quarters, asking US$500,000

Palapa Bar, leased, with owner’s house, asking US$700,000

REMOTE CAYES & ATOLLS

Slick Rock Adventure Lodge, Long Caye, Glovers Atoll, seafront, asking US$995,000 for leased dive resort only or US$2,195,000 for 5.2 acre island with resort facilities

Blackbird Caye Resort, Turneffe Atoll, 18 cabañas on 44 acres, seafront, asking US$4,000,000

Manta Reef Resort, Glovers Reef Atoll, 15 cabañas plus house and restaurant on 12 acres, seafront, asking US$5,500,000

Unopened fishing/dive resort on Long Caye, Lighthouse Atoll, 27 units, asking US$1,950,000

Gaviota’s Resort, Tobacco Caye, 7 rooms, seafront, asking US$495,000

HOPKINS

Kanantik, all-inclusive seafront resort with 25 cabañas on 300 acres, asking US$8,400,000

River House Lodge, Sittee, 6 units on 2 acres, asking US$890,000

Sir Thomas’ at Toucan Sittee, Sittee, 6 cottages plus owner’s house, restaurant on 1 acre, asking US$950,000

Caribbean Bed & Breakfast, Hopkins, 6 rooms, asking US$445,000

Parrot Cove Lodge, 6 rooms, 2 houses, pool, restaurant and bar, asking US$1,750,000

DANGRIGA

Mama Noots Jungle Resort, Mayflower, 48 acres, asking price US$1,600,000

PLACENCIA

Pickled Parrot, 2 cabañas, restaurant, owner’s apartment, asking US$395,000

Miller’s Landing, 7 rooms on 1.94 acres, pool, seafront, asking US$1,200,000

Manatee Inn, asking US$375,000

Ranguana Lodge, 5 cabañas, seafront, asking US$1,250,000

Seaspray Hotel, 21 rooms, seafront, asking US$1,500,000

La Chapelle Suites, 6 units plus 3-bedroom unit, asking US$1,700,000

South Waters Resort, 4 cabañas, restaurant and bar on 2 acres, asking US$3,000,000

Green Parrot Beach Houses & Resort, 8 units, seafront, asking US$1,495,000

COROZAL TOWN

TJ’s Guesthouse, 10 rooms with manager’s apartment, restaurant and pool, asking US$275,000

Las Palmas, 29 rooms, space for restaurant, asking US$2,900,000

Hok’ol K’in Guesthouse, asking US$598,000

Oasis Bed & Breakfast, 21 rooms, asking US$475,000

TOLEDO

Sea Front Inn, Punta Gorda, 14 rooms and 6 apartments, restaurant, asking US$1,100,000

BELIZE CITY AND BELIZE DISTRICT

Belize River Lodge, 8 rooms on 47 acres, with fishing gear, boats and a live-aboard motor yacht, asking US$2,000,000

El Chiclero Inn, asking US$1,000,000

Maruba Lodge & Spa, Old Northern Highway, 18 units, two villas, 2 pools, spa, 700 acres, asking US$8,000,000

Bakadeer Inn, Belize City, asking US$375,000

Bacab Eco Park, Belize City, asking US$2,600,000

Tiger Point, Southern Lagoon, eco-lodge on 359 acres, asking $1,700,000

Cheers, near Belize Zoo, 3 cabañas and restaurant and owner’s house, asking US$1,083,000

Altun-Ha Ecotourism Resort and Maskall Golf Course, (formerly Pretty See) Old Northern Highway, lodge building with apartment, 14 cabañas, 9-hole golf course on 1,320 acres, asking US$5,500,000

BELIZE NEXT FALL EXPECTED TO BE BIG FINANCIAL CRISIS.

** Ray Auxillou photo in 2009


FINANCIAL CRISIS ESCALATING IN BELIZE AND BELIZE IS EXPECTED TO FOLLOW JAMAICA IN A YEAR FROM NOW AND TURN TO THE IMF FOR HELP?

Interviewer: Mr. Auxillou, we understand you are being forced by the Government to close your small Tourist Business? Would you care to comment?

Mr. Auxillou: That’s true! We got fined a $100 for violation supposedly for not filling out the monthly reporting forms properly by the Belize Tourist Board..

Interviewer: Were you guilty?

Mr. Auxillou: Probably? But I don’t know the specific rational being used? It wasn't explained.

Interviewer: So why close down over a $100 FINE?

Mr. Auxillou: The first FINE is indicative of a trend, a certain bureaucratic mind set, that will get worse and personally expensive over TIME. Business has to be measured in a RISK to REWARD ratio. We would expect now fines are being allocated, that in the normal flow of such things, as the Government becomes more and more cash strapped and overburdened in debt, that FINES will get bigger and more often. We think we are being warned of this trend with the first $100 FINE, is cheap notice to quit, before we get whapped with $10,000 FINES, or more. I know people who have had that happen! Plus recently in the newspapers there have been advertisements warning of half a million dollar FINES for possession of a $5 Guatemalan cell phone card by people who have family who live in both countries in the border town. We’ve been here before, back in the early 1980’s when we got forced out of the tourist business by the then Income Tax department with wildly inflated TAX ASSESSMENTS and this is a repeat. The practice of FINING will escalate and become ruinous is our extrapolation. Better to cut it off right now at the beginning. The CABINET of the day eventually corrected the Income Tax predatory persecutions with a change in the laws about the income tax abuses in past decades. It was much too late to help us back then. I expect the result will be similar here eventually, but we can’t wait around to see. We don’t know the dynamics within the Belize Tourist Board, or the Government of Belize for that matter, so we cannot know the circumstances behind it. I can guess that there are a number of situations arising to this, but do not really know? Nor do I care. The trend just means that once a government institutional department targets a small business in a predatory and persecutive manner, the situation will get more intense eventually and ultimately more expensive. Down the road we can only expect bigger FINES and more of them. Better to cut it off right now and go out of business. Our tourist business is, or was, a small family HOME BUSINESS, which means we provide a service, broaden the offerings for competitive world market share nationally in advertising, but we are no GIANT billionaire like Michael Ashcroft who just got his telecommunications shares NATIONALIZED. Our business is marginal in returns and most of the rewards are not profits, but intangible benefits, like being able to pay the monthly electrical and water bill. Nobody in the family gets a salary for instance, the most we expect is to build the country in a patriotic sense and do our part to advertise the tourist sights and benefits in competition with the rest of the world. We feel personally we are helping guide new generations of youngsters in developing Belize. Giving them examples to learn from. What we are afraid of is bigger FINES in the future and more of them. The business doesn't warrant a personal bankruptcy, over some clerical abuse of power.

Interviewer: Do you feel this is a political attack?

Mr. Auxillou: Not at all! My feeling this is from somebody STUPID in the Belize Tourist Board apparatus. I couldn't read the signature but it was headed Registrar of Hotels, whoever that might be?

Interviewer: Why not just pay the FINE and correct the reporting errors and go on as usual.

Mr. Auxillou: It doesn’t work that way in practice. When you are targeted by somebody in the government apparatus for predatory persecution, you are going to be made to suffer. This is a small country and thousands of government jobs are filled by POLITICAL PARTY HACKS, or NEPOTISTIC practices. There is no civil service EXAM done anonymously to fill government positions, for instance. Government jobs are in large part assigned on a basis of family relationships, or political party affiliation. The country is run to enrich people who run for political office and their relatives and friends. A typical practice in most small countries. This doesn’t lend itself to good government practices. We’ve had a running beef with the Belize Tourist Board about their HOTEL monthly reporting forms for three years, I believe? We ran a HOSTEL, which rents only beds, to backpacker travelers, in dormitories. The BTB forms are geared to big business HOTELS that rent rooms. Hostels and Hotels are different animals, a lot of the requirements on the BTB form, do not lend itself to clarity in our bed rental situation. I can’t figure them out, or how to apply them. Some past BTB courteous personnel have explained makeshift patches to use for our situation on these forms, but when we go several weeks without any customers, I tend to forget the explanation and besides they change BTB staff frequently and what is agreed with one person, no longer agrees with the next one. We carefully reviewed the listed complaints for the FINE. It is an impossible situation. If they want to use the regulations to go after you and FINE you, they can, no matter what I did. We just muddled along doing the best we can with an inappropriate set of reporting requirements, to account for tax collections.

Interviewer: So why the FINE now, if you have been muddling along with inappropriate forms for three years?

Mr. Auxillou: You are asking me to speculate! I have no idea? If I speculated I could come up with some guess work.

Interviewer: What would be your speculations?

Mr. Auxillou: a) Well recently we might have embarrassed the head of BTB, with a request for information on their advertising campaign on our debating listserve, by asking for a news release on their plans for a FALL advertising campaign for major newspaper advertising in Guatemala City, Salvador and San Pedro Sula for enhancing for our regional tourism flow, during our annual FALL, DEAD TOURIST season. Local regional tourism is an untapped market in Belize, though BIG BUSINESS over the border. The internal tourism of Guatemala is growing by leaps and bounds, with their 12 million people and new paved highways all over the place. We kind of would like to tap that here in Belize. Somebody on the debating listserve asked me if I really expected BTB to respond? I said no, but I thought we might prompt them, obliquely and politely into thinking about it? This might be a personal vendetta to teach me a lesson? There are over 500 private airplanes in Guatemala City for instance and a lot of those fly every weekend to the Rio Dulce airport, a growing tourist area, just South of Belize, a few miles. We had been thinking of adding another HOSTEL in that location, in a long range plan for a Hostel Chain. Bus service and the road system throughout Central America these days is superb. When we get the Jalacte, Toledo highway route connection from Belize through the South, regional tourism is going to BOOM. People on our debating listserve in Belize, didn’t think our BTB people, even think in terms of regional tourism. They are more orientated to Belgium, Holland, London and New York.
b) Another guess might be their BTB tax revenues have fallen so much, they cannot cover their overhead operating costs and so are just out to SQUEEZE tourist businesses for more revenue through the application of FINES? I’ve been a middle level bureaucrat myself, so I understand with our laws, any intelligent civil servant can jiggle the rules, to JUSTIFY FINES and COVER YOUR ASS if trouble arose from doing so. I expect that will be the result here. Lots of rationalization and justifications and all sounding plausible. That’s why we closed down. It is a turf battle we cannot win, no matter what we do.
c) A much wilder guess is that trouble is looming for a year from now, in government finances when the SUPER BOND escalates. Government size on current tax revenues will obviously become unsustainable. Though we expect tourism to recover somewhat next winter season. A lot of political stuff will hit the air waves this time next year. I’m vocal and trying to contribute to building the nation. This might not sit well in some political circles who are sitting in the hot seat. Though this is a stretch of the imagination. Generally speaking I approve of this current government. I feel no animosity from them politically at all. Like others I’m just waiting to see how it all turns out? Quite frankly, I don’t have a clue for the BTB FINE? The BTB can legally justify it of course. As a previous administrator myself, I know that. What I don’t understand is the WHY? You don’t develop the nation, taking these sort of approaches to small business.

Interviewer: What are your plans now?

Mr. Auxillou: ( rueful grin! ) I honestly don’t know. The bank in the USA were we had our small savings recently went bankrupt and worried us financially for a month. That seems to have been worked out with the FIDC and the bank assets have been sold to another banking chain and our savings are apparently accessible again. We are looking to find a safer place to put our savings and thinking of Guatemala to diversify geographically for safety, that pays 7 ½ % interest on CD’s. It pays to diversify geographical location due to political and economic upsets. Right now, we are involved in shutting down the tourist operation. We have two European reservation Agents and wide European advertising in Backpacker guidebooks in different languages. Reservations keep trickling in, for as far away as next March and April in 2010. We have obligations, and right now I’m trying to shut everything down as fast as I can. We need to cut off the reservation booking flow, because deposits are being made in Europe, which is money we never see, but are obligated to fulfill. It’s a bollocks of a mess!
For the immediate future, we had one experimental entrepreneurial business we are still in the experimental stages of testing, we had hoped to run the new business, out of this same building facility, here in our section of Santa Elena Town, in parallel with our Hostel tourist business. We had been unable to get internet service here in our section of Santa Elena Town. BTL won’t run a wire out to this section of town, or wouldn’t before the recent Belize government takeover. Maybe things will change? We can’t wait more than a few weeks though, for something to change with internet service dynamics in Santa Elena Town. Things are coming to a head here, on a decision to go, or no go with this new business, which requires internet service. We’ve been unable to make it work using separate locations, like down in San Ignacio, two miles away. Now we are shutting the TOURIST HOSTEL section down, that changes the dynamics. Where we go from here is still up in the air. We are sort of reconsidering setting up the new business over the border, if we could buy a cheap house and take advantage of the better internet quality in speeds and bandwidth, at lower costs available a dozen miles a way from here, in Guatemala. We just returned from pricing real estate in the Guatemalan border town of Melchor de Menchos and prices are reasonable. We’ll explore that option over the next few weeks and discuss things. See if we can afford it? It is a heck of a step to take, just to get an internet connection. That is the closest entrepreneurial endeavor we currently have boiling on the stove. We’ve got some other entrepreneurial ideas, but they are not well developed yet in the research end. First thing, we had planned for September holidays and we are going to Guatemala to take a holiday down on Lake Izabel and in the Rio Dulce area. Plan to stay on our old Winnie Estelle, a boat which is retired currently from the tourist business in San Pedro, Ambergris Caye and tied up in a marina down there by the old Spanish fort, owned by a consortium of friends. We want to check out the tourism investment opportunities for a hostel also at the same time. After that, it is resolving this internet supply problem here, and what we can do about it? If we can do anything constructive about it? We were talking yesterday to the Real Estate people in San Ignacio about putting this building up for sale, to give us investment mobility and more choices. We are holding back on that decision for a while. Other entrepreneurial ideas are vague right now. We have some, but they are not well researched. One of the criteria for decision making is to avoid businesses that must deal with Belize government departments that are over regulated, in our opinion. We don’t want a repeat of this BTB type of trouble. That eliminates a lot of business making opportunities.

Interviewer: Thank you and good luck!

Mr. Auxillou: Thank you, your welcome!

FALCONVIEW BACKPACKERS ADVENTURE HOSTEL GOES OUT OF BUSINESS !

*** Falconview Annex containing two furnished apartments and a dormitory, also a vegetable nursery and warehouse and storage rooms.
*** Hammock room.



THE STORY OF THE RISE AND CLOSURE OF, ‘FALCONVIEW BACKPACKERS ADVENTURE HOSTEL’, IN BELIZE !

We got a notice in the registered mail today, of a FINE for a $100, for an improper submission of hostel guests filling out the Belize Tourist Board registration form. That sort of was the parting of the ways, the straw that broke the camel’s back so to speak. We had invested $350,000 dollars and about 8 years in building a genuine, designed and built from scratch, HOME BUSINESS for traveling ADVENTURE HOSTEL, for young,adult backpackers, in Western Belize . We've been operating about three years.

As we had planned it, the idea was that the HOSTEL would give us some company of young people ( we are retired ) and hopefully make enough to pay the utility bills and the different trade and business licenses required. We were not looking to live off any profits or anything like that. Low budget tourism is not the way to get rich. I’ve been in this business since 1964 and indeed was one of the original tourism pioneers of the country of Belize . All my Belizean children are in tourism, if not as a main endeavor, as a small sideline business. As a family group we have over a million dollars invested, if not more.

The $100 FINE demand this month, from the Belize Tourist Board disturbed my equilibrium and perhaps it is FATE telling me I have outlived my time in this world. Or it is time to change life styles again? Belize is getting to be a too over regulated place, from my viewpoint. Certainly I interpret the BTB FINE of a $100 , as it is time to make a fateful change of course once again, in my life choices. You can run a home business that doesn’t make a profit, but you can’t run a home business that has NEGATIVE CASH FLOW. We view the BTB FINE as an abuse of power and common sense and NEGATIVE CASH FLOW. Instead of upgrading their reporting guest registration forms, to fit the industry requirements, they choose to apply government bureaucratic institutionalized EXTORTION, from our viewpoint. We went through this in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s with the Income Tax Department of the time, that started with one unwarranted tax assessment, or a court case, that escalated over a number of years to repeated tax assessments in one year, when they needed to squeeze money out of people. It was plain EXTORTION and we view this with the BTB as the same thing. The Belize CABINET later modified the Income Tax laws, but by then we had sold out and closed our business of the time and moved on to something else. Our personal family philosophy is that, business has to be enjoyable. You need to enjoy what you are doing. It has to be FUN! Having young adults traveling the world stay with us, is always fun for us. We get to hear their stories and give a bit of old sage advice and so forth. Many e-mail us from all corners of the world telling us their latest exploits. We enjoy getting those e-mails. It is like having an extended family. I get more e-mails from tourists who have been here, than from my own 14 grandchildren.

As Belize has grown, the new government institutions have flourished in size, quantity and regulation also. I have trouble living like that. Which is one reason nowadays the wife and I go traveling through Guatemala ; things are more laid back, like the days of my youth in Belize , and people not so drawn up in complicated regulations. We stay at HOSTELS and HOSPEDAJES in Guatemala and only sign our names and country of origin.

One of the bones of contention I have with the Belize Tourist Board, is their guest registration forms are designed for HOTELS and not for HOSTELS that use dormitories and bunk beds. We cannot interpret their form for filling out, in the section we are responsible for. The form is designed to be filled out on the top half by the visiting guest and the bottom is filled out by the Hotel operator ( not a hostel operator) . The top half filled out by the guest requires too much private information from my viewpoint. The major bone of contention is the line requiring a passport number, date of issue, place of issue. I’ve traveled the world. Normally travelers do not have a passport handy and passport numbers and date of issue and place of issue is normally done by Immigration officers at point of entry and departure to a country. Not while traveling inside a country. Few of our low budget tourists have a passport handy. They have either left it some place in the country while they explore locally, or simply have it secreted and buried in their baggage so it doesn’t get stolen. Either way, few tourists fill out that part of the form. Neither do my wife and I, when traveling anywhere either, except in police states. Last time I looked, Belize was a democracy and not a dictatorship and police state. A person did not have to walk around carrying their passport. Maybe Belize has changed without me knowing it? Whatever the reason, we are getting FINED for improper filling out of the Belize Tourist Board form, as far as I can tell? The intent of the Belize Tourist Board registration form is to make sure they get their ACCOMMODATION TAX. Plus some statistical collection, which I doubt they use. Most of the time, we do not charge tourists the Accommodation Tax, but simply pay it out of our pocket at the end of the month. These are young tourists on tight budgets and we empathise with them. That said, we don’t cheat on our taxes, nor have any inclination, or need to do so. It’s not our style.

That said; the FINE of $100 dollars by the Belize Tourist Board, for improper form filling out, or something, or other, caught us by surprise. We find it offensive! In our world of the olden days, government bureaucracies are servants of the people and in our view they are paid salaries to serve and to assist and render service, if they are unhappy with some confusion, or with what we are doing, they help to resolve the issue. To be FINED is an insult to us! We do our best with all good intentions!

Never mind that I don’t agree with the form the Belize Tourist Board designed for our business, which I regard as unsuitable and does not fit our operational circumstances. One doesn’t win an argument with a bureaucratic government institution allowed by law, to write their own regulations, interpret their own regulations and fine people for not filling out correctly to somebody’s satisfaction, the form in the manner demanded by some clerk.

Our tourism business is low volume and low budget. It should be high volume and low budget. It does not pay therefore on low volume, to have a full time staff member paid to stand at the reception desk, filling out forms. This is a family operation and only one small side activity during the month of many other activities, we are carrying on at the same time, that have nothing to do with tourism. We are usually too busy settling in guests and selling them on the tourist tours and adventures available by local tour operators. Our philosophy is to have seven small business ventures, each contributing something according to season. We don’t have that yet, but working on it. From the whole then, we expect a comfortable living, without straining too hard.

We had a good family discussion over that $100 FINE from the Belize Tourist Board. We unanimously decided to pay the fine and not fight it in court. The RISK to REWARD ratio projection is that penalties would increase exponentially and more often. Too risky too continue! But the kicker is; we decided to CLOSE down the FALCONVIEW BACKPACKER ADVENTURE HOSTEL business. Once started by any government department, the EXTORTION will continue and accelerate, this has been our experience in Belize . We no longer wish anything to do with the Belize Tourist Board. They are not NICE people! That means our advertising of Western Belize in books, articles and newsletter BLOGS, e-mails and listserves, tourist guide books also will be removed worldwide. We’ll take off all the tourist websites for Western Belize . We must have a couple of hundred of them? The BLOG alone has over 500 articles and photographs. Boy that is going to take a couple of days to delete, item by item? It did some good advertising though as the statistics show around 2 million hits in two years, for information on Western Belize . The $100 BTB FINE took the FUN OUT OF THE BUSINESS. For us, it is some mindless idiotic legalized extortion. We just don’t do business with criminals, whether they are legal, or not. Just a philosophy of life. Life is too short for the aggravation in our view. Move on to something else, we’ve had an interesting three years at it.

The TOURIST HOSTEL business we can easily live without. The big investment in a special designed building is something else. We did plan to make the facility multi-purpose, adaptable to different type home businesses. We had intended to be able to operate more than one business out of here in the same space. We’ve tried several other small business ventures, which have failed. The current one we are enthused about, which is a USA based business, done through the internet, is succeeding experimentally, but we cannot get the internet service here in Santa Elena Town needed to make it work properly. We have at least three other business venture ideas we want to try, but they mostly require being done in Guatemala, where the investment environment is more business friendly than here in Belize. We have been agonizing on how to proceed. The wife meantime tonight has been planning to convert the previous Hostel dining room area into a weaving and loom area. She currently has her loom and weaving projects in our house kitchen area, which makes it cramped. She's going to move the FUTON to the hammock and TV living room. Plus her sewing machine apparatus. Her brother Gustavo is going to move permanently with all his things into one of the furnished apartments. He’s been sleeping there anyway on a temporary basis when we had no guests, for privacy. If we can find a way to get internet out here somehow in the next couple weeks, I’ll make the dining area for tourists into a trading room. Perhaps we shall dismantle the bunk beds and store them in the warehouse, just in case we find affordable real estate on the North Side of Lake Izabel next month September and can build another hostel over there, or one of so many other business ideas we have to try? There is a lot more low budget tourism, both local, regional and international, in Guatemala and the planes from Europe to Guatemala City are full with tourists, mostly year round, unlike Belize . We’re excited about exploring the hot springs in the hills of Lake Izabel and the 25 mile long Rio Dulce gorge that is starting to boom with internal Guatemala City tourism visitors. As an excuse for an adventure, contemplating another hostel tourist business is a good enough excuse to go on a business vacation. Robert Smith, with my old vessel, the 'Winnie Estelle' also quit the tourist business in San Pedro, Ambergris Caye late last year, after several decades and is parked in a Rio Dulce marina. We can stay aboard the 68 ft Winnie Estelle and explore and adventure from there. We want a business trip to Mexico also. Got a great idea for a food packaging business inside Western Belize, but need cottage industry technological help to make it work here in Belize . Got a product source and market already. Just the processing machinery and packing know how, is the problem. If my neighbor can run a cheese factory in a DFC house across the street here in Hillview successfully, then I suppose we should be able to do our own specialty food product also? It kind of sounds like a lot of work, I’d rather not physically get involved with though. Or failing Lake Izabel as a hostel venture real estate location, or the Rio Dulce gorge, we will re-visit the mountains around Coban and re-examine the CARDOMOM spice specialty niche business? If we can find a cheap house to buy? Tea bags maybe, or herbal drinks for the Arabian market. There are so many business opportunities, it staggers the mind. It’s a great world, if you don’t let clerks in the Belize Tourist Board get you down ( grin ) ?

C’est la vie! FATE has strange ways of re-directing your energies and choices in life. The thing is to recognize the signals when they happen. What do you think? Nobody will miss our tourist business out Western Belize here. Though we like to think we helped with advertising and organizing the tourist trade through here, over the last three years. People go out of business in Belize all the time. Nobody will miss our business. Except backpacker adventurers, traveling with old guide books. Drat! We just got another booking from HostelWorld in Ireland in this email session. Going to have to notify those European agents today, to take us off their websites. Should have the signs uprooted on the highway by late Friday. We are officially out of business.

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( We'll send this letter off with a Postal Money Order for the $100 BTB FINE next week. Probably Tuesday or so and end this squabble with BTB once and for all. ) We've tried to comply but their system, doesn't comply with our system. In the conflict, we must quit! They hold all the power. Our only choice is to quit the business. Any suggestion improvements to the letter before we send it off, would be welcomed. We are officially out of business now.

( suggested letter copy )


To: REGISTRAR of Hotels and Tourist Accommodations

From: Falconview Backpackers Adventure Hostel ( Western Belize )

Re: OFFENCE VIOLATION TICKET received by registered mail on August 25, 2009. FINE for $100.00

To Whom it May Concern: ( Registrar of Hotels and Tourist Accommodations )
Your offence violation ticket for $100.00 disturbed us greatly. After review of the violations listed, and re-checking the regulations, we came to realize there is no way that we could ever be 100% in tune with the regulations in the ACT. There would always be something we would be in violation of. It is the nature of broad based complex legislation and the type of simplified Backpacker business we have, and the inadequate standardized forms issued by the Belize Tourist Board to fill out, that do not fit our business flow criteria. We find ourselves unable to comply with the regulations 100%.

THEREFORE:

Enclosed please find the $100 VIOLATION FINE by postal money order. Since we do not wish to carry the $100 monthly VIOLATION FINE as a monthly expense of doing business and the aggravation involved, with arguing with clerks about it. We have decided to CLOSE THE BUSINESS and will be notifying all our customers and advertising agents, booking agents of same, and European and USA travel book publishers. Websites will be closed down and road signs removed probably by the end of this week. If you know of anybody wants to buy six or seven dormitory, double,wood bunk beds, let us know. We wish to sell them!

The building is also for sale!

Sincerely and with best wishes


( formerly ) Falconview Backpackers Adventure Hostel ( Western Belize branch )
Proprietor: Ray Auxillou

NICOLE DENNISON, and DANIELLE SMITH from San Fransico Bay area visit Falconview Backpackers Adventure Hostel.

*** Nicole Dennison and Danielle Smith from the San Francisco Bay area.

These two girls got a bargain rate from San Francisco USA to Belize round trip. Usually you can get airline rates half the price of going to Miami or Houston, even though San Francisco is double or more the distance away. Don't ask me why? I don't understand this thing myself.
Nicole and Danielle stayed in my daughter's TINA'S BACKPACKERS HOSTEL on the beach at Caye Caulker, they stayed in San Pedro and went to Placentia and then out WEST here to see the Mayan ruins of Xunantunich and Cahel Pech, two temple top ruins that are from seperate Mayan Empires, with a thousand year break between them. Slightly different architectural styles. They did their trip, low cost on a Sunday by walking up the hills to the ruins and taking the local bus service along the highways and finally a local taxi back to our FALCONVIEW BACKPACKERS ADVENTURE HOSTEL. They were sweet girls and we liked them and enjoyed their company.

IS THE H1N1 vaccination program a swindle?

H1 N1 FLU VIRUS IS A FRAUDULENT MANIPULATION TO MAKE PROFITS?

The internet comes up with strange stuff. Back in 1926, the internet web pages say a fraudulent SMALL POX epidemic was declared in Kansas City, Missouri, or someplace around there. A massive vaccination campaign was imposed and many got sick and died from small pox. The internet chat says; in a follow up court case, it was proven this whole thing was a FRAUD, that there had never been a small pox epidemic before the vaccination program started. Many got sick and died from the vaccinations. It also says on the internet the same fraud was perpetrated in Pittsburg in the FALL of 1924. To sell to the government compulsory vaccinations.
The American Medical Association is accused of this fraud. They had been formed about 4 years before, by John D. Rockefeller.
That piece of history aside, whether true or false, does raise questions about the current H1 N1 flu epidemic scare in the world and subsequent plans to have a mandatory vaccination program in the USA. Is this just a profit making swindle is the question? Internet chatter says that the H1 N1 was created in a USA laboratory somewhere, I forget where now; but read it, they identified the lab on the internet where it was created. Since this flu epidemic is not considered any more serious than any other natural occurring flu, then why the massive money profit making mandatory vaccination program? Are we the lay public masses just victims of profit making medical hoaxes?
I'm glad our health authorities in Belize don't believe the FLU vaccination is necessary here either. Certainly I don't intend to get one. Having a government make it mandatory as in the USA and in light of historical internet research, it sure reads like SWINDLE?

CRITICS OF THE BELIZE UDP GOVERNMENT QUESTION?

*** Prime Minister Barrow accused of Nepotism, if not actually making a CHAVEZ style dictatorial state.


ALL IS NOT ROSY WITH THE UDP GOVERNMENT OF BELIZE AND THE RULE OF PM BARROW
SOME OF THE QUESTIONS BEING ASKED BY THE CRITICS ARE BELOW!

- is PM BARROW another CHAVEZ dictatorial type? ---- If there is a differenced what would it be?
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All likenesses to any person living or dead are purely coincidental...

SERIOUSLY think about this one folks...

What would you think if you were told that in a Central American country, the first substantial acts of a newly elected government were:

1. To attempt to pass a law to incarcerate innocent citizens (preventative detention). (Smacks of political persecution if you ask me.)

2. To hold indefinitely in lock-down innocent citizens who unknowingly enter a building in which an unregistered gun is located. People, this could be your high school aged child, if you child happens to be in a classroom with another child who unknowing to your child brings a gun to school. You child could end up in jail indefinitely for having done nothing wrong. Think about it. (This is a set up to have a charge handy, any charge, that could safely be used to lock up political opponents indefinitely. The dozens of poor innocent people currently in lock down under this charge are but collateral damage. The real target is JB.)

3. To outlaw bulletproof vests. (Huh? Is that a weapon?)

4. To threaten to "commandeer the rice" from the Blue Creek farmers because they would not sell their privately grown rice for less than cost, and then go on to import rice and sell it at a much lesser subsidized cost so as to run the local farmers out of business (out of spite and bad mind?).

5. To de-politicize the post of Attorney General ... (so that an ex-wife could be appointed to the position?)

5. To have that head of state appoint his brother as Appeals Court judge? (Ex-wife the Attorney General and brother the Appeals Court judge? Doesn't that sound like major conflict of interest to you?)

6. Passes a law to put a choke hold on the unions so they cannot protest.

7. Puts the teachers under government stranglehold so they cannot dissent.

6. Nationalizes a private enterprise. (More to come?)

Bonus question:

What do you call it when a head of state appoints his ex-wife as Attorney General, his brother the judge, sibling from abroad as Min. of Police (Min. of Police needs to be a trusted pawn used to quash dissent. I predict will soon come from the dual-nationality landscape.) ... and then starts to "commandeer" private enterprise? Do we have a name?