San Antonio

After leaving San Pedro [1] and returning to the main road, make a right turn and you’ll soon be in San Antonio, just down the road.

The village of San Antonio is famous for its exquisite traditional Q’eqchi’ embroidery. However, the younger generation is being whisked right along into 21st-century Belizean society, so who knows how much longer it will survive.

There should be a local tourism representative in San Antonio who can give helpful advice about the area and direct you to an experienced guide to take you to Blue Creek Cave [2] (bring a swimsuit). This is great bird-watching country.

From here the road is passable as far as Aguacate (another Q’eqchi’ village). But if you intend to visit the ruins at Pusilhá [3], near the Guatemala border, you must travel to San Benito Poite via the Santa Teresa Road. Another ruin, Uxbenka [4], is west of San Antonio near the village of Santa Cruz and is easy to get to via the trucks that haul supplies a couple of times a week. Not known by anyone but locals until 1984, Uxbenka is where seven carved stelae were found, including one dating from the Early Classic Period.