Two weeks gone

Yikes! I somehow lost half of this post! Just got on today and realized that the first part is missing. Sorry, reader. The first part of the post was talking about how we left Xela and arrived at Lago Atitlan, a beautiful, huge lake in the middle of the Guatemalan highlands. It is surrounded by a bunch of different villages, and we traveled around the villages for a little more than a week, relaxing and celebrating Tait´s birthday. We stayed in three villages, the first was a little wierd and gringofied, but CHEAP and had delicious food and the village itself was really cool (I´ll post the pictures I originally posted later). Then we splurged and went to a beautiful hotel will gorgeous views of the lake and its volcanos, and then spent 3 nights camping at the biggest village on the lake, Panahachel... which is where this blog picks up. I´ll try and track down the original...

Kathleen; Pana was gringofied, somewhat like San Pedro, but it was more institutionalized so it was a little less wierd. We didn´t see a lot of Pana, besides the business we conducted there (buying used fabric, mailing said fabric, exchanging books, etc...). We were mainly taking refuge, because the moment we set up our tent the heavens opened and it poured. After the first night, when we woke with standing water in our tent, we were forced to move to a little concrete pavillion on the hotel grounds. After three nights of this, we called it quits and moved on to the next destination. Of course, on the day we left, the sun was shining and it was the most beautiful day ever (see pic). But before we left we took a day trip to Chichicastenango, which was reputed to have one of the biggest markets on earth. And it did. We were there for Dios de los Muertos, and it was QUITE the party. Here is just one of the paraders (I think he was parading as one of the conquering Spaniards). Oh, and another picture of a sign that tickled my fancy (don´t pee in the sink).

We spent two full days of hard getting to our next destination. The first night en route we spent in a little village called Usbatan. It was lovely, except that our hotel was literally a shithole. E.g. the toilet was a hole covered in shit, and the whole hotel stunk. I was miserable. And I am not overly hygenic, and I have certainly seen my fair share of gross and primative toilets in my day. But this was the worst. However, the town also had a lovely little plaza, not noteworthy except for all of the life that was happening. There was an interesting rainbow theatre, which we agreed must be used for everything from school plays, to concerts, to the nativity scene. There were two basketball hoops, and there were three different games happening SIMULTANEOUSLY at EACH hoop. Everyone just ignored each other and took turns. We also had a delicious meal at the market... a fried taco filled with veggies, and Tait had some sort of spicey tamale filled with some sort of indiscriminate meat. Also, the very popular arroz con chocolate... basically mushy rice cooked in hot chocolate... its a breakfast and dinner drink... delicious! They also have arroz con leche, which is mushy rice in hot, sweet, spiced milk.



The travel itself was also an adventure... we took about 12 chicken buses to get where we were going... I think I explained earlier that chicken buses are US school buses that have been reincarnated as mass transit. Well, the seats are built to seat two but almost always seat three. That means there are 6 people across an aisle built for 4, and on the hairpin turns you are literally holding on and bracing yourself for dear life (they are long turns too... you think that they´re over but... still holding, still bracing, still praying, still grimacing). On one of the legs, Tait had to sit on the roof of the bus. Oh... because there are also little minivans that are built for 12 and regularly hold 25. On one leg we secured a prime spot (the bus left at 4 in the morning, so didn´t have much competition) but picked up a family of 12 on the road. The little girl squeezed on the little ledge in front of the front row of seats, (she was a cutie of about 6 or 7) was sitting in between Tait´s legs, and puked for the entire journey. She was a stoic little thing, too. As were her three younger siblings, who didn´t peep for the entire 3 hour unpaved bouncy uncomfortable journey.

The next day we arrived in Lanquin, at a little hostel set on the river. It was lovely, much warmer than in the highlands, and had a great restaurant. We camped the first night, and again were woken by puddles of water in the tent (it had been raining here for days, and rained for the first 12 hours after we put up the tent). So, the second night we slept in hammocks... where we could feel the breeze, hear the rushing river, the animals, the rain... but stay dry. I had never slept the night in a hammock before, but I think I could develop a taste for it.

This region is built on limestone and is marked by limestone caves and outcroppings. We went to visit Semuc Champey... which is hard to describe. In between huge limestone cliffs a river RACES, and goes under ground, under these beautiful lakes set into limestone craters, and then comes out in dramatic waterfalls on the other side. We went on a fun hike to the spot where you could view everything, but of course, it started to rain as we were hiking, so it was considerably more slippery. We played in the lakes and swam (again, a little cold because of the rain), and watched tour groups hurl themselves off cliffs into the waterfalls.

Tomorrow, we head north to the Mayan ruins of Tikal and the hot (hopefully not too rainy) jungle. We´ll try not to let this much time pass again between posts.