Belize-HM?

Well, I've never been there for a honeymoon , but I did go to Belize for a business trip a number of years ago. It's not particularly touristy - beautiful, but a little run down. Other than Belize City and diving, there's not much to do or many places to go. I've also heard that it can be a little sketchy if you don't blend in with the local population (i.e., if you are not white - I found this to be true generally for the east coast of Central America). It's supposed to be great for diving. Maybe your travel agent meant that it wouldn't necessarily be an easy vacation.

If you are looking in that area, why not try Costa Rica? It is beautifuly, very safe (they don't even have an army!), and not too expensive.

Sure, no problem. If it helps, here's my pitch for favorite Costa Rica sights:

Manuel Antonio (west coast) - beach + nature preserve. Just gorgeous. So much fun - literally on the walk to the beach you get to see lots of wildlife. Also, check out a very cute, family owned b&b called las colinas.

Arenal - probably my favorite trip. It's a still-active volcano in the interior. When I went I did a long hike to a waterfall, back to hotel, showered, then took a taxi to Tabacon, a resort built around local hot springs. Had a fabulous dinner there, then sat back in the hot springs with a drink and watched the lava flowing off the volcano in the distance. Stunning. (sounds scary, but it's not). You can actually stay at Tabacon, which is what I would do if I were to go back (I was a student on this trip).

Tamarindo - a beautiful beach, not much else to do, but not too crowded and lovely. Stay at Hotel El Jardin del Eden (sounds cheesy, but very very nice - I treated myself). Very relaxing.

Another popular place to visit is Monteverde. It's a cloud forest in the interior. Pretty low-key. Hikes can be very easy and you get to see lots of cool birds.

Stay as far away as possible from San Jose - ech! You'll probably have to stay there at least one night - I recommend Hotel Yaohan and visiting Volcano Poas (inactive, but very cool views). I think there are creative ways to get to these places - e.g., someone told me that a guide can take you from Arenal to Manuel Antonio on a horse or something. I don't remember when the rainy season is - you should check that out. Oh, one major negative is that the local food is bland bland bland (the national dish is, literally, rice and beans), but if you are going as a tourist you will have plenty of options.

FM me if you have other questions. I visited a long time ago, so hopefully my hotel recs are still valid!

We went to Costa Rica for our HM, but we had considered Belize first. We didn't go there only because when we were planning, they had recently been hit by a hurricane and still recovering.

But I definitely want to go and think you shouldn't scrap that idea yet. There are some gorgeous places to stay. And from what I've seen Belize City is not the highlight.

I think its Ambergis Caye thats the main resorty beach area.

If you do go to Costa Rica, definitely stay at Xandari just outside San Juan - its a fabulous hotel. One of our favorites.

My friend Evelyn stayed at one of the islands they call Cayes (Pronounced Keys), called Ambergris Caye, it's the most popluar one. It's where they filmed Tempation Island and Madonna got her inspiration to write her song 'La Isla Bonita'. She stayed a two places, first one is Victoria House,

http://www.victoria-house.com She LOVED!!!!!! This place.

then they stayed at Ramon's Village where they just filmed an episode of 'Wild on E' not too long ago.
http://www.ramons.com She didn’t like this one too much

Then she stayed a week at San Ignacio at 2002 Eco-Tourism Award Winning Chaa Creek Cottages

http://www.chaacreek.com
Or you can stay at Five Sisters Lodge:
http://www.fivesisterslodge.com
Or Francis Ford Coppola's Place:
http://www.blancaneauxlodge.com

Then they did a couple of days in Tikal, Guatemala & hiking up the Mayan Ruins then ended her our trip in Belize City. Everything, including all transportation to & from all our hotels, plus their own guide in Tikal and a couple of other tours (plus remember we're staying at all the Honeymoon suites in Belize) cost them a little over $4000 for two weeks. Airfare was about $1000.
It probably would have been less if they didn’t go to Guatemala.

While surfing the net she came across a small company owned by two Americans who vacationed in Belize and fell in love with the country & decided to move their & open up their own tourism agency. Their names are Mike & Donna & they run Belize-Eco Tours. THey are REALLY sweet & helpful, you can e-mail them at:
[email protected]

Or check out:http://www.belize-ecotours.com

Hope this helps

More Belize info i found. May be helpful to some. This is evelyntorress' great advice:

I ran into an email evelyntorress sent me and thought it would help some about Belize:

Blancaneux is really pretty, we went there for a wine tasting, it's in the middle of nowhere though. Duplooy's is right next to Chaa Creek but we didn't get a chance to go there. Honestly.....don't do what we did & move around from place to place to much, ESPECIALLY if you guys ae only going to Belize for a week! Stay on San Pedro, it's much more fun, you guys can always do day trips to the main land. I was watching 'E' the other night, that woman Brooke (I forget her last name) who used to host 'Wild on E' just came out with a calendar & she choose to have the pictures taken on San Pedro, she said that out of all the places she's been to in the world, San Pedro is still her favorite. We loved it too! There's a lot to do on the island so....I would skip staying at either place (Blancaneau or DuPlooys). BUT....here's their site: (just in case...)

http://www.duplooys.com/

Blancaneaux is really pretty but like I said it's in the middle of nowhere so if you guys want or expect any kind of nightlife, you can forget that right now. There's plenty to do during the day (tours)but at night, expect to be doing a lot of sleeping cause there's nothing near by. DuPlooy's is pretty far from San Ignacio too. It was very relaxing but after the second night we were iching to go out & have some fun so we paid $45 for a ride to town! It depends on what you guys want to do, do you wanna just relax or do you wanna go out & have fun at night?

There is nightlife in San Pedro, there are three dance clubs but they are only open from Fridays to Sundays late at night, plenty of bars though! I was talking to Husband & he said he wished we would have spent more days on San Pedro . San Ignacio was nice but we hated Chaa Creek so much that we went stir crazy,, we missed the funn atmosphere of San Pedro. It's a tough one to call. Blancaneaux seems like a really nice place, good wine, good restaurant, but bring a book to read, epecially if you guys don't plan on doing any day tours. It's very peaceful there, at night you'll be able to listen to the babbeling of the river that's next to the casitas. You'll have a long drive to get there and back from Belize City, first you'll have to take the flight from San Pedro to Belize City, then take a car, it's about a 2.5 to 3 hour drive if I remember correctly. Hey, there are water taxies that go to & from San Pedro for about $27 (I Think), that would save you money instead of taking the flight out to San Pedro & back, the only bad thing is that it takes longer. The flight is under 15 minutes, the water-taxi takes about an hour & a half.