guatemalteco

July 5^th.

Ah yes. My belly is full of delicious steamed vegetables and red wine, I just wrote a song, and now Beck’s ‘Guero’ is playing. Yes please k thanks. It’s Thursday evening and I’m in Antigua, Guatemala’s old national capital before some hecckas as earthquakes destroyed it. It’s a colonial tourist town, about an hour out of Guatemala City, and it’s been a good base for the last week or so.

SO! UPDATES! After Tikal I met a French lassie Aviva and we headed to Semuc Champey, a national park area full of crazy huge mountains and limestone rocks and crystalline pools along the river. The bus ride was crazy- I mean they all are, here. But he preferred the left to the right side of the road (not a positive in these parts), sped, braked heavily, all the time, and then wouldn’t stop when people started feeling ill due to his shitty mountain driving. The mini-van was packed out, and he refused to put on the AC. And it’s frickin humid. But anyways we arrived, all good, in a town called Lanquin, about 40 mins from Semuc Champey. The hostel there was great. It sat on top of a valley, overlooking steep corn fields and houses speckled amongst the forest. The showers were open and spanned out across the valleys so that everyone could see your titties. Well worth it but.

The next day we took a tour to explore Semuc Champey. This involved a crazy steep hike first thing in the morning, then another walk to the pools, where our guide made us take limestone slides down precarious cliffs. Clessic. But it was beautiful. We also explored some caves behind a waterfall, which was pretty bonkers. After that we had some lunch and then explored some water caves, where they give you a candle. I guess it’s novel to have wax dripping on your hands and for the light to constantly go out when you’re swimming through water. But yeah, another hair-raising experience where we had to climb up a waterfall in the dark. Pretty much a self-induced water boarding situation, though most of us complied. The height was maybe 4 metres, and you could have slipped all too easily. Thanks to my risk-conscious father, all these thoughts ran through my mind. But we made it ok, and at the end, one guy from the tour told us that his friends were in doing the same tour a few weeks ago and it was raining really heavily outside and the water trapped them in the cave for four hours, constantly rising. And when we got to the mouth of the cave it was pissing down rain and we all felt very lucky to see sunlight.

Then after we jumped off a 12 metre bridge into a river and finally tubed down the river. It was a full-on day, and I felt like a child again, where fear was just a part of everyday life and easily surpassed.

The next day we caught yet another bus here to Antigua, and took it easy for the afternoon. Then we went to San Pedro, a little pueblito on the shores of Lake Atitlan (google that shi, or watch for upcoming facebook photos cause it is totally brilliant). In San Pedro we stayed at a hostel called Zoola, which was full of handsome Israelis, great food, and noice hangout places and a horizon pool looking over the lake. 

Our main day in San Pedro was yesterday, when we woke up at 3.30am to do a crazy hike up to the top of Nariz del Indio, a mountain which looks like an indian’s face, the nose the highest peak. It was tough work and we were with an Israeli princess who gave us strife when she refused to walk any further and sat down on the ground and called for her boyfriend. We tried to help her but to no avail. And we tried to hurry her along (the sun don’t wait for SHI, btw), but to no avail. So we carried on. And we watched the sun rise over the Guatemalan highlands over this brilliant huge lake. And in the distance a volcano was smoking. And then we had coffee and bread and nutella, in the early morning cold, and soaked it up.

Next on our list of activities was ziplining. That was fun, nerve-testing and ultimately rewarding when the ground dropped from beneath you to reveal early morning fog rolling off the lake. 

And THEN we went back and chilled and had lunch, and then, HORSEBACK RIDING!

This was a lot of fun. The guide’s horse looked like beyonce (weird/true) and my one was called Lola, a big brown beast of a lassie. We rode through town feeling like conquistadors through the cobblestoned colonial village. We rode around the base of the San Pedro volcano, and then took a walk down to the beach. ‘Beach’  is a loose term- the lake has been rising for the last 10 years or so, swallowing houses and farmland. I chatted with our guide Pedro on the shore about the area. In 2002 there was a landslide and 1000 people were killed, more homeless, and it was up to local volunteers to find the bodies. It happened at 4am, so many bodies were lying in their beds with their babies and loved ones. Our other guide, Salvador, was pretty scarred from the experience. ‘I can never remove these pictures from my mind’, he said.

Today we woke up super early (again, damnit!) to head to the Chichi (???) markets, a 2-hour bus ride away. Along the way the road was blocked due to student demonstations and we were told it would be closed for 3 hours, and our driver was prepared to patiently wait. Luckly, thank the heavens, the road re-opened pretty quickly and we were on our way. The markets were crazy busy- and the sellers very persistent with whities. One woman followed me around for 20 minutes showing me a wall hanging which began priced at 300 quetzales and then she slowly brought it down to 80 quetzales, doing all the bargaining work herself. If you just walk away then the price reduces dramatically. I just didn’t want it though, so I couldn’t help her. I bought some beautiful things, though now I question how they will fit into my backpack. It will happen, somehow. It always does.

Once we left the markets it was another 2 hours back to Antigua. I tried to sleep but with no luck. So now, it’s 8.20pm, and I’m totally spent. I’m catching a bus at 3.30am tomorrow morning to commence my 15-hour bus ride to Utila, the island where I’m doing my open water dive certificate. I went to the markets this afternoon, and loaded up with bags of strawberries, apples, juice and biscuits, ready for the long day ahead. I long for a day when I don’t have to set my alarm to DO anything, it’s just been a full-on week. But I only have one week left and I’m feeling slightly pinched to get it all done.  I will rest when I’m home. Or when I’m on a tropical island. Either/or.

Love to all. See you soon.

Ps here is my homecoming schedule: Utila > Antigua > Guatemala City > LA (24 hours) > Fiji > Sydney > Melbourne. H.O.L..Y. MO.SES.

xoox