Cayo is the agricultural heart of Belize, and Belize is the one country in this region that genuinely feeds itself. An FAO study handed to the government in 2022 put domestic production at 60 per cent of consumption, against islands nearby importing over 90 per cent.

Mountain Pine Ridge is 300,000 acres of granite and pine, geologically unlike the limestone that makes up most of the country, and it costs nothing to enter. Roads can close in heavy rain, so take the paved route to Big Rock if the weather has turned.

Stay a second day in the pines rather than rushing south. The reserve is big enough that most visitors see one waterfall and leave, which is why the second day is the quiet one.

Placencia is a Creole fishing village on a sand spit, and its sidewalk is a genuinely car free public path the length of the settlement. Bicycles and golf carts are banned on it and the ban is enforced.

Maya Centre sits at the turn off for the world's first jaguar preserve, declared in 1986 after Alan Rabinowitz found the highest density of jaguars ever recorded in the basin. Entrance fees are collected in the village, so the money lands before you even reach the gate.

Toledo is the Maya south, and in April 2015 the Caribbean Court of Justice issued a consent order in which the government accepted that Maya customary land tenure exists across the entire district and gives rise to constitutional property rights. Delivery of that ruling is still disputed. Spending in the villages is the most direct thing a visitor can do.