Parque Nacional Tikal Restaurant Tips by Bwana_Brown Top 5 Page for this destination

Jungle Lodge Dining Room: Fancy Buffet Dining

We found that the meal set-up at the Jungle Lodge pretty well required you to dine Buffet style in their main Dining Room. There was no other option, just pick what you wanted from the particular buffet being served and pay the set price. The tables were all professionally set up with the required crockery and cutlery and the waiters were attentive to all our needs (a little hand-shaking motion with a comment of 'Picante' got me the required hot sauce for breakfast!).

One afternoon we took a walk down to the other two hotels to see if we could order something from their restaurants, but no luck in either case. Only later did we discover that there is a small 'restaurant' area at the entrance to the car park area, and close to the Visitor's Centre (which we had bypassed completely when our van dropped us off directly at our hotel).

Favorite Dish: Our evening buffet meal consisted of a bowl of very tasty soup, chicken breast in red sauce, very crisp carrots/beans Julienne, pasta with sauce parmesan, rice and bun (90 Q or US$12 each) as well as a bottle of cold white wine from Mendoza, Argentina (160 Q or US$21). The wine was a bit expensive, but it was actually quite difficult to get anything reasonable at all for wine in the far reaches of Belize, so we both quite enjoyed this particular bottle! We noticed that one of the tour groups being served consisted of the same crew of professional bird-watchers we had seen more than a week before while we were staying at the Crooked Tree Wildlife Sanctuary in Belize. Near the end of the meal, the lights began to go erratically dim before going completely dark - the type of thing that would have had me up and out of my chair in pre-retirement days when my job was keeping the power on! One of the bird-watching group then pulled out a spotlight for some secondary illumination off the ceiling until the waiters came around to each table with candles for a more romantic finish to the meal !

For breakfast, the chef whipped us up nice vegetable omellets (with ham, onion, tomato, red pepper, mushrooms and cheese) to go with our fruit, juice, toast and coffee (60 Q or US$8 each). Overall, I thought the dining room did a great job of it!

Address: Jungle Lodge, Tikal National Park, Guatemala

Comparison: about average

Price: US$11-20

Rating: 4

Theme: Eclectic/International

Jungle Lodge Restaurant Bar: Those Cold Beers Tasted Good!

Our first order of business in Tikal was to head into the array of Mayan ruins to get the lay of the land while we still had daylight - so this meant a 3-hour up and down trek (11:30-2:30) in the tropical heat of the mid-day sun. After a quick wash-up on our return, it was not long before we settled into the cool comfort of the Restaurant Bar located only a few steps from our accommodations block!

Those ice cold Guatemalan 'Gallo' beers certainly went down quickly and not a bad price either at only US$2.60 each! After we had calmed down a bit, and were sipping more slowly, we got talking to an English couple sitting at the table next to us. It turns out that they live in Falmouth, Cornwall only 15 miles from Truro where my wife and I spent Christmas with her family! The guy even knew some of the same people from the area that we did!

Favorite Dish: Our conversation dragged on so long that we ended up ordering a plate of Cheese Nachos from the bar menu to help us along with the beers. This was an OK dish, but only had cheese to go with the nachos, no salsa or anything else. Later in our visit, when we tried to order something else from their menu, they said the Nachos were the only thing served in the Bar because, in reality, they had the Dining Room tables set up for large bunches of tour groups. Our 5 beers and plate of Nachos only came to US$17 - quite reasonable for a hotel bar I thought!

After some of our later excursions into the park, I switched to bottled water to help replenish the fluids that were sweating out of me at a rapid pace!!

Address: Jungle Lodge, Tikal National Park, Guatemala

Comparison: about average

Price: less than US$10

Rating: 3

Theme: Eclectic/International