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Punta Gorda – southern Belize
SOUTHERN BELIZE, CENTRAL AMERICA – this is my story about meeting Dr. Alfred Lau, one of the world’s most respected botanists and also known as the “King of Cacti”. I also spent time with a Kekchi (or Qʼeqchi) Mayan family in a village with their pet paca – locally known as a gibnut.
It is May 2, 2006, and I am in Punta Gorda in southern Belize. I arrived here the previous day after a gruelling 5-hour bus ride from Guatemala City to Puerto Barrios, in the far north of Guatemala at Amatique Bay along the Caribbean Sea.
As I arrived in Puerto Barrios late in the afternoon, I decided to stay for the night before taking the “fast boat” across Amatique Bay to Punta Gorda in southern Belize. Puerto Barrios is not a particularly nice port town and I was glad to move on the next morning.
The “fast boat” across the bay turned out to be “the extremely fast boat” and I was relieved to safely arrive in Punta Gorda. I found PG, as the locals call it, to be quite a nice town. The residents here are mostly of Caribbean ancestry and often mixed with the indigenous tribes such as the Kekchi Mayan people.
My first day in town was uneventful. I explored the town, had several conversations with the friendly locals, and book a two-day, one-night stay in a small Kekchi Mayan village located 23 km (14 mi) to the northwest of town.
The “King of Cacti” – Dr. Alfred Lau
The next day I was once again strolling down the unpaved streets of Punta Gorda when I came across an elderly man doing some maintenance around his very modest wooden house. We started a conversation about the attractions in town, and soon digressed to the surrounding jungle and its conservation. Within minutes we were in deep discussion about the beautiful jungles of Central America and its rare fauna and flora.
The man invited me into his living and offered me a cup of tea. “Alfred Lau”, he introduced himself. “Glad to meet you sir”, I responded. If I was a botanist or a lover of cacti, which I am not, I would immediately have recognized him as the famous Dr. Alfred Lau.
Dr. Lau (aged 78 at the time), is a highly respected botanist and popularly known as the “King of Cacti”.
After a nice cup of tea, our conversion progressed to the cacti of the Americas, in particular Mexico where I spent time in recent weeks. I remember that on a day-trip from Oaxaca City, southern Mexico, to the mezcal distilleries (mezcal is similar to tequila – the national spirit of Mexico), I came across several cacti, so I foolishly deemed qualified to get into a heavy debate with the “King of Cacti”.
Born in Solingen, Germany in 1928, young Alfred left his homeland as missionary and plant collector to study theology in England and later completed a doctorate in the United States.
He spent most of his life as a missionary in Mexico, where he tried to improve the fortunes of young native American Indians through education as well as religion. A keen botanist, he financed his evangelical activities by collecting and selling the seeds of cacti and other succulents. On his collecting trips, which were often made on foot and in the company of his pupils, he discovered many new plant species.
Besides succulent plants, he was interested in many other types of plants, especially orchids, carnivorous plants, and passion flowers.
(Image by Hans Braxmeier, Pixabay)
The ban by the Mexican government on the export of plant seeds abruptly cut Dr. Lau’s principal source of funding. His situation was made worse by unsubstantiated rumours about his collecting activities, which were never officially investigated but resulted none the less in his expulsion from the country and followed him to Belize when he settled there.
Dr. Lau shared with me his academic publications and contributions to books on the topic of cacti, succulents and other plants. He also mentioned to me that he discovered many species on cacti, of which some were named after him (laui – the Latin adaptation of his family name). One such species is the pink and blue Echeveria laui.
I asked him how many species have been named after him, and he replied that he can’t recall exactly how many. I later found out that many species were named after him (see list below). I remember asking him how he managed to get his discoveries named after him, and he explained to me the process of botanical nomenclature, which is the formal, scientific naming of plants.
He was once described by someone who knows him as: “Dr. Lau thought nothing of climbing cliff faces or stranding himself on frozen, windswept mountains to look for a population of cacti, even when he was rather advanced in age.”
Shortly after Dr. Lau received authorized to return to Mexico, and less than a year after I had the privilege to meet him (May 2, 2006), he passed away on 27 February 2007 from heart disease.
One of Dr. Lau’s most remarkable discoveries, and namesakes, is the Eriosyce laui. This enigmatic soft-bodied cactus species (see photo below) is known to only grow in a small barren area (less than 10 square km / 3.86 sq mi) in the coastal desert of Tocopilla in northern Chile, where hardly any other plants are capable of surviving. Rain is almost non-existent here so this plant mainly lives off the coastal fog).
The Echeveria laui is a slow-growing perennial succulent plant native to the state of Oaxaca, Mexico.
The Kekchi Mayan village of Laguna
After my interesting talk with Dr. Lau, I hopped on a bus and headed in a northwesterly direction from Punta Gorda. At the turn-off to Laguna Village, the bus dropped me from where I walked 4.5 km (2.8 mi) to reach the small Kekchi Mayan village with a population of about 250 people.
I received a warm welcome from the local family. The village has a small local hut specifically for foreign visitors. I think there were two or three rooms, but not sure. I stayed alone here for two nights while every meal was served at a different village home, which was quite an experience.
One of the men in the village took me on a 3-hour hike around the jungle and to a nearby lake. Along the way, we came across a big snake crossing the overgrown path. What an interesting time I spent with the Kekchi Mayan people!
☛ Read more: Blog posts about Central America
Some of Dr. Alfred Lau’s Discoveries
Blog post and photos by Peter who has been travelling almost full-time since 2005 and has been to over 122 countries. He visited several countries, such as Japan, more than 20 times. Peter is Editor-in-Chief and Publisher of GlobeRovers Magazine, an independent travel magazine focused on intrepid destinations.