When I envisioned Belize, I pictured the beach, dive shops, palm trees, and rum cocktails with Madonna’s “Isla Bonita” playing in the background. I did not picture a cool river tumbling through a pine forest, but that’s what we found on a sunny day on February. The Mountain Pine Ridge Forest Reserve is located just south of San Ignacio, Belize, near the border with Guatemala. There is just enough of an elevation change that the lush jungle foliage transitions to pine trees and it looks more like Northern Wisconsin than tropical Belize. We watched the temperature drop on our car thermometer and marveled at the newly constructed road.
The road through Mountain Pine Ridge was dirt until 2024. As of our visit in February 2026, it is paved all the way to the Caracol archeological ruins. You can visit the ruins and several spots within the reserve as a day trip from San Ignacio if you want. We heard good things about Big Rock Falls and the Rio Frio Cave. We had a lazy, relaxing day and only visited the pools. There is a checkpoint on the road when you enter the designated forest reserve. A security guard asked us our plans and looked at Roz’s U.S. driver’s license. Google Maps was a little confused by the exact location of the turnoff for the pools. You’re best off just watching for the green sign.
After the turnoff, it’s just a couple minutes drive down a gravel road. You can park anywhere along the road when you see the signs for the walking path to the pools. The path is about a five minute walk. It goes over a small wooden bridge and there are 20 steps down to the river. There is a little branch off the path to a restroom and just before the pools there are a couple small wooden changing rooms to get your swimsuit on or off. We used neither of these, but it seems like a safe bet that you would need to bring your own toilet paper.
Once you get to the pools, just find a flat rock for your stuff and start exploring. It’s fun picking a pool and then figuring out how you can climb over to it. Some pools have good spots to have a waterfall massage your shoulders, legs, or feet. This was great after climbing the temple at Xunantunich earlier in the week! The water was refreshingly cool in February and would be great on a really hot day. Apparently it’s pretty popular with locals on Saturdays. We had it nearly to ourselves when we got there around 11:00 am. Crowds grew as the day went on, but there is plenty of space. You can climb both up river and down. There are a lot more pools than you can initially see, so keep climbing around and exploring.
You can see a picnic shelter overlooking the pools and can reach it via the access road where you parked. The road changes from gravel to dirt and would probably be a little treacherous after recent rains; it had quite a few ruts and potholes when we were there. It’s only a couple hundred yards to the shelter and it gives a great view of the falls. There are bathrooms in the shelter, but they are in pretty rough shape and you need your own toilet paper.
It would be a good idea to visit the shelter first. You could see the extent of the falls and scope out good spots. We probably would have gone further down river if we had known more pools were there.
The Rio On Pools don’t seem to be promoted much within Belize. They’re a great way to spend a day and added bonus, are completely free. If you’ve visited or would like to, please comment below. We’d love to hear your thoughts!