Tonight, Crooked Tree Village is almost like a ghost town as floodwaters continue to rise. Those who needed to evacuate their homes have done so, and drivers with small vehicles have already parked them on the other side of the causeway.

The floods from Sara are quickly making their way to the Crooked Tree Lagoon, where it will sit for months before it flows into the Belize River and out into the sea. And the villagers will continue life as they already know it - boat rides in and out of the village, waiting for the tide to go down to inspect the damage.

It's become tiresome and frustrating for those who have lived there for decades, but without any other option, they must once again endure seeing their home turned into an island.

Courtney Menzies visited the village today and has this story.

Almost overnight, the floodwaters in Crooked Tree Village have inundated their causeway and cut them off from the rest of the district. For the residents, it's nothing new, since they know the water travels from Cayo, to the Belize River Valley's Spanish Creek, and then to their lagoon. But this time, with two almost back to back tropical storms, the water began rising a lot faster.

George Tillett, Chairman, Crooked Tree Village
"We started getting a high level of water since Nadine, [Tropical Storm] Nadine, which almost filled the lagoon to capacity and we were tightening our skins for this one when we heard Sara because our lagoon was already up to capacity with water. So with this one that came, [Sara], really overfilled the banks and now flooding a lot of residents in the area."

"Crooked Tree is a catchment for the entire Belize River water shed, all the water coming up from Guatemala, Benque Viejo, Cayo, all those waters reach Crooked Tree as a catchment or as a reservoir before it silts its way out to the sea. Crooked Tree lagoon area has played a very important role ecologically speaking because without Crooked Tree lagoon, there would be no Belize City, Belize City would have been flooded under flash flood but the water comes to Crooked Tree and now we gradually ration it out to the Belize River."

And since the villagers are used to their lagoon overflowing, they immediately began taking their vehicles out of the village, and even evacuating their homes. It's basically a routine at this point - and until the waters recede the villagers will have to be ferried in and out.

George Tillett, Chairman, Crooked Tree Village
"That last one you see on the tractor going out, that was supposed to stay here in the village. From 2 days ago I got on the village chat, encouraging people in small vehicles who want their vehicles to be on the mainland to start taking them across but that case that you saw just now is a sick person going down and they're taking the vehicle over with the sick person to reach the hospital so. Most of the people who have small vehicles without the intention of staying on the island, if you notice this island is dead right now, there's not a lot of vehicles moving around, most of the vehicles are on the other side since a lot of people, instead of using the buses to go to work, they use their private vehicles."

"We have our friends at the junction and Bicayne, our neighboring village, where people would leave their vehicles and jump on the bus coming in and then the buses will stop where the water starts and that's when the buses being us across. As I speak, the Belize Audubon Society is providing us with a boat for the midday run and the Coast Guard is going to kick in later on this evening because as you know, we have five buses leaving the village daily and five coming back."

But just because it happens often doesn't mean the villagers aren't severely affected. For Verna Samuels, who runs the Bird's Eye View Lodge, she says it's the eighth time they've had to pack and up and close down because of a flood. It took them three days to take everything to the second and even so they had to leave some stuff behind. But she say she's not sure how much longer she can handle it.

Verna Samuels, Bird's Eye View Lodge
"We had a long low season vacation and first of November is when the season starts and this came the 17th so we were in the middle of everything coming back, the season starting, like for example, the day we had to pack, we had 25 people coming, so now we're dealing with a lot of refunds and people not understanding and people saying keep my money until you open and it's a lot of issues, everybody, especially the people who have to deal with answering the same questions over and over, saying this is beyond our control, we can't do anything, we want to be open as much as you want to be here but this is what it is."

"It's very difficult but… like when we have to go down there and see what it is, this is the eight time, so I have always been strong but somehow, this is too much."

"It really hurts us, and it hurts us financially, physically, every way you can think about it, it's hurting us, from our heart right to the rest of our bodies and I'm also very sad for our staff because they have been on vacation for at least 2, 3 months and they were so happy that we were open and we started with a boom, people were coming but this is what it is."

And it'll be months before the water recedes. But for the Crooked Tree Villagers, it's not a good enough reason for them to just up and abandon their homes.

George Tillett, Chairman, Crooked Tree Village
"Due to the fact that it's a basin and not like the areas up in Cayo or down south that will flood today and they can walk across the river tomorrow, we're going to be here for some weeks. I can recall 2013, when they had a flood, water came early November and we got back to normal sometimes in early February the following year."

Courtney Menzies:
"Have you guys just accepted that this is your way of life and once you live in this village, and this is your home of course, but once you're here, this is just something you have to get used to?"

George Tillett, Chairman, Crooked Tree Village
"To us the villagers, Crooked Tree is a paradise. First of all, it's an inland island, believe it or not, all year round it's an inland island and it is the home of the favorite cashew and there are many resources that people can live a nice comfortable land and, what the heck, there's nowhere else to go. This is our home."

According to the chairman, MIDH explained that to widen the causeway to mitigate the flooding would cost up to 5 million dollars