Baboon Sanctuary?

[World Gallery]

Can anyone offer advice on the Baboon Sanctuary in Belize? It is listed on Cruise Critic's "Must See List" on their port page. It sounds interesting but is something that would need to be combined with something else in the area because it won't take that long.

My question:

1. What are the chances you actually can get up close to a baboon?

2. Is there any interaction? Can you feed them?

3. What is it best to combine this with (something in the area maybe)?

[BigRed93]

Just FYI -They are not really "baboons", but are black howler monkeys. The locals call them baboons. Can't help anymore than that since I've never been to the sanctuary, but the name sometimes confuses people. :)

[The Viking]

We were on this tour purchased through RCCL.

 

The drive to the Sanctuary is about 30 minutes. http://www.belizezoo.org/zoo/zoo.html

 

Even if many animals are fenced in, you often see some as if they were in the wild such as Spider Monkeys swinging temselves from tree to tree.

 

The highlight of the tour, at least for DW, was the visit to the Januar. They offer 5 people for $ 10 each to enter a small cage in the Jaguar exhibit. Being in the cage they get to pet the animal. DW said it was somewhat scary when he jumped up on top of the cage where you could see his huge paws.

 

Follwing this visit we had "lunch" consisting of a little rice and beans plus one chicken leg and a soda. Then we sailed (or rather raced) down the river where we saw plenty of wildlife along the banks and in the trees. This boat brings you back to the tender area.

 

In hindsight I think we would have enjoyed the City and Sanctuary our offered by RCCL more. The animals we saw along the river were the same as in the sanctuary and it would have been interesting to learn more about Belize.

 

If you take this tour I hope you will have a better guide that our condecending guide who did not think highly of the tourists and it showed.