Find out what its like to live off the grid at a fishing resort in Belize.

We have been house sitting a small beach front resort in Belize for almost a week now. Steppingstones Resort is located just outside Monkey River Town in the Southern Belize District of Toledo. We said our good byes to the new friends we made at the B&B in Belize City and headed out of town. There are only four major roads in Belize.

Silke with the B & B Inn Keepers in Belize City

We followed the Southern Highway past a large prison where the inmates gave us the one finger salute, through several little towns and past small mountains and rain forests. It was a very bumpy ride in our used vehicle from Belize City to where we had to park and hop in a boat.

The trip took about four hours with several stops at gas stations and a couple of small shops along the way. We found that the fuel gauge in our Kia Sportage didn’t work and we still needed to stock up on fresh vegetables.

The last several miles of the trip to the Monkey River Village were the worst. The road was gravel and had just minimum maintenance done to it. We have been told that it has been very rainy up until now and this road is just a little bit worse than usual. Oh joy, I’m already looking forward to driving back and forth on the Monkey River Road to get into the next bigger town to do our shopping.

Monkey River Road in Toledo Belize

A friend of the property owners, Chris and Sue, arrived by boat a few minutes after we pulled in to Monkey River Village. All of our luggage, the supplies we purchased for the next week and four adults were loaded up. I’m amazed we all fit into the tiny boat.

It took only a few minutes by boat to arrive at the dock in front of the Steppingstones Resort. The beach front resort, our latest house sitting assignment, looked just like the pictures we saw online.

Two large buildings nestled between palm trees, on a beautiful beach. The white facades and shuttered windows gleamed in the sunshine and the blue trim looked very inviting. Two medium sized brown dogs welcomed us as we walked off the dock.

Walking inside the main house, unfortunately told a different story, and I almost turned back around. Everything in the tiny kitchen was covered in a film of grease.

House Sitting Tip: Before taking a long term house sitting assignment do some soul searching and find out where your comfort levels are in terms of cleanliness. Your own standards might be impossible to be met, especially in a Southern country like Belize.

I didn’t know where to set our groceries when we walked into the house since I didn’t want our stuff to touch anything. We ended up setting everything on the large table on the other end of the room and excused ourselves ‘to get some rest’. I started cleaning right away.

Steppingstones Resort is solar powered, which means if there is no sunshine, there is no hot water or electricity (there is a back up generator, but it wasn’t turned on when we arrived). Since it had been raining for the last several days, there wasn’t any hot water of course so we heated water one tea kettle at a time.

Sue and Chris stayed overnight in one of the Cabanas and we met the nearest neighbor, Dennis, who invited us to a lovely dinner featuring locally grown foods like shrimp, plantains, breadfruit and other vegetables I can’t remember or know how to pronounce. The meal was very good and we had a wonderful evening. Early the next morning Sue and Chris, as well as the live in handyman Paschal, headed out by boat.

Nick and I were left to fend for ourselves for the next three days at this off the grid place.

As we stood on the dock, watching them turn the bend around the mangroves, we looked at each other and started laughing. “What have we gotten ourselves into now?” and “Can we survive this for the next several months?” are just a few of the questions we asked ourselves.

We decided if we can come up with a daily and weekly schedule to maintain our sanity and learn to adjust to all the different foods we might just be able to pull this off.

One of the dogs ‘Jeeves’

The jungle starts right behind the grassy area

One of our first meals

Beautiful Flowers are abundant

A great place to relax

Right now I’m looking forward to an upcoming trip to the town of Independence on Friday and a visit from Dale next week some time. Dale is a guy we met through his blog. He has been living on his boat in the area and he actually met the former house sitters before they left to go back to their lives in the US.

We have limited internet access at this time, so that’s all for now. In my next article I will talk more about the Steppingstones living quarters, the livestock as well as the bug situation. Be sure to check out our ‘Fun in Belize‘ category for related articles.

Leave us a comment below if you have any questions about living off the grid in Belize.