A cream and orange colored James Bus drops us along the Western Highway, somewhere between Belize City and Belmopan, at the entrance to the Belize Zoo. As the bus roars away, the thick jungle air of early morning quickly engulfs us, already whirring and squawking.
Enormous mesh enclosures loosely separate macaws and toucans from black howler monkeys and ocelots. Tapirs, raccoons and peccaries dart across human walking paths. Metal cages only separate visitors from the deadliest tenants: stoic crocodiles sunning on muddy rocks, black and spotted jaguars, and smaller bobcat-like jaguarondi loosely draped on the limbs of trees. Everywhere, a sense of simplicity, interspecies reverence and habitat conservation permeate the tropical savannah. I daydream of sensitive youngsters in the United States who rescue injured squirrels and fallen hatchlings. After several hours of gaped mouth wonder, we walk back to the road, squat in the shade of a banana tree for some time, and hop aboard the next passing bus to Belmopan.
