Snorkel me timbers

So after a brief hiatus from the blogging world, we decided to make one last post before we headed back to civilization. At roughly quadruple the cost of an hour of internet compared to Guatemala, this may be shorter as I'm trying to play beat the clock.

So we made our way to Flores a couple of days ago...I don't know the rum haze makes days in the sun sorta fly by and become slightly muddled. It was a pretty uneventful trip here, except for nearly missing our passports getting stamped. You basically get dropped off by a bus and then have to walk your bags across a bridge to the other side of the border. It was more than a little confusing as nobody tells you what to do, but they expect you to have the right stamps. Bastards! Anyways, talk about culture shock, try to going straight to english and about two steps up the ladder out of poverty than what you've been in the last two weeks. We quickly adjusted though, except for the part about everybody not being nearly as friendly in Belize as Guatemala, mostly the travelers not the locals, and getting used to everything being at least double the cost. But we made our way out to Caye Caulker, our little beach town that could, and have spent the last few days chilling out maxing. Tommy still was fighting the hershey revenge trail for the first couple of days here, but it appears that things have finally settled down. All it took was a Belikin (the local Belizian beer), after a few days of Gatorade and cracker subsistence to get the boy right.

The highlight of the trip has got to be the Raggamuffin tour snorkling tour we did. Three amazing dive spots, tons of fish and crazy corral, a booze cruise on the sailboat trip back, jamming reggae and eating fresh conch cerviche. It was tailor made awesome. I got to pet a nurse shark and a couple of pretty big sting rays. I also came face to face with this giant green moray eel. I imagined it bitting my face off, but luckily it went back into its hole. We have no pictures, and I can't even begin to describe the awesomeness, cornucopia of colors, or sheer terror, but it was well worth the trip, if you ever make it down this way. Other than that, we've just been taking our fair share of sun in, eating barracuda, lobster, and crab like kings, and drinking 1 barrel which is such and amazingly awesome tasting rum for the cost of about 7.50 a bottle. It's nearly cheaper than drinking water.

Tomorrow we have to go home, and the shock will probably be just as bad as heading into Guatemala city at night, but for now, lets drink some more one barrel, enjoy the sunshine and "go slow man",

Later,
Alan

P.s. Tommy's pictures are as follows.

Hi all,

I'm flying home tomorrow but got time to get on the internet beforehand and upload rest of the pics from guatamala.

Sorry, but not everything is rotated properly, I forgot.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2015956&l=02ee2&id=122802302
and
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2015957&l=5d844&id=122802302

Temple photos

Hey folks,

Here is the link for the latest photos. I should get Tommy to post his tomorrow if possible.

http://nd.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2118545&l=285db&id=5609966

Meeting the Myans

So we didn't actually meet the Mayans, as much as sat on top of Temple 4 as the sunrose and the howler monkeys did their teritorial grunting, and the mists began to burn off the jungle as the other main temples campe into view. The guide called it a meditative place..."meditative" only begins to put in the words the feeling. Talk about huge temples, it was overall pretty impressive, even after enduring waking up at 3 in the morning and enduring the pounding rain and mosquitos that attempted to thrawrt our path. We also got to see most of the park before any other guests were there, which made going with the tour well worth the money and effort. The tour was lacking itself in substance, but I think I've been spoiled, getting first hand archeology tours from the archeoligists that actually dug them in Jordan. Hearing, pretty wild conjecture at points about things, left one wanting for at least a few facts and figures. Other than that...Flores is everything we hoped it could be. A friendly, cheap little town built on an island in the middle of a lake! It's actually pretty beautiful, but you want to see mas linda y bonita....head to Semuc Champay, where we spent the prior three days lounging about at El Retiro in Lanquin

El Retiro is a cross between paradise and heaven, all at a cost slightly less than a premium car wash. We were only going to spend a day there to check out the pools, but ended up much longer as we got sucked into a fantasy world that you might never want to leave. First off, we've stayed at some pretty sweet spots, and some much sweeter spots, and El Retiro is like the double chocolate coated syrup laffy taffy, of backpacker hangouts. We had a huge first class bus all to ourselves one the way with only one other dude, Jonny, our friendly Brit from our ride to San Pedro and our one night at Trippy's. Jonny is a hilarious kid, using a variety of english phrases, like "right fit" and "wicked" amongst a miard of others. His penchant for "drum base" which is not trance mind you, added a lot to the parties later in the evenings. So after a bus all to ourselves we found ourselves checked into a gorgeous bungalow overlooking a river, and walking into happy hour. All for about 5 dollars a night. Our early drinking, and my fast twitch drinking muscles, led to a pretty early night, and the next morning we were off to the best day in my estimation of the trip so far.

We headed eagerly awaited Semuc Champay like children on Christmas morning. And as we climbed in the back of a Toyata pick up truck with about 16 other backpackers, and held on to whatever was available, our enthusiasm could not be curbed. 45 bone rattling minutes later, we found ourselves at the entrance to the Grutas (caves). The funniest part of the day was the guide telling us in english. "the most important thing to remember in the caves is...." followed by rapid fire spanish and quiche that nobody understood a word of. To get the adrenaline up, cause the caves are kinda cold, you start with a robe swing into the river. It was pretty fun, with the most entertaining parts being watching people flirt with disaster almost get caught up in the rope. A short walk up the hillside and to the entrance of the cave, the guide hands out candles, yes candles, for a wet, windy, watery cave tour. A few of us had head lamps, but the majority were stuck holding these meager candles in their hands like swords waiting to battle the darkness. 5 minutes in half of them blew out, and it was a constant battle to keep the things lit, as teams of protective light holders frantically tried to relight those of their newest friends and coleagues. I was secretly thinking how cool I was to half my head lamp, when all of a sudden ten minutes in the bulb burned out and I found my new best friend being a long haired Isreali dude with a candle that must have been made of Kerosene the way it refused to go out. It was a surreal experience, seeing a bunch of lit candles swimming in the darkness of a cave, peoples dimly lit faces, laughing and giggling either with fear or enjoment depending upon how close their only source of orientation was to being extinguished. A climb up a waterfall, and then a return trip out, we made it back safe and sound, although Tommy took some big hits in the cave stepping from about a foot of water to something over his head! A little almuerzo and we made our way to the entrance to the park. On the way passing over an 8 m bridge over the river that of course begged to be jumped off of. After my camera blew the first picture, Tommy was able to at least get something passable on the second jump. I on the other hand got his pretty well on his first jump, so as not to subject him a second time to the suck your gut up fear as you perch yourself 24 plus feet over the edge of a swift brown river. At last we made our may to Semuc Champay. Only thing that express the beauty are the pictures. It was absolutely jaw dropping. Reminded me a ton of pictures from Havasu falls, except in a jungle. Nothing really eventful, except a girl falling and twisting her ankle and knee horribly on the way down from the overlook. 90 percent of the stuff we did on this day, you could never have done in America because of liability issues, and the injury turned out to be a bit of reason for the safety concern, as she fell on these ridiculously steep stairs. Luckily the Isreali guys were here heroes and carried her out, while a med student that happened to be in the group, pretty much said it was minor.

The next day was spent just lounging and enjoying life, after being dead beat from the previous days activities. In the afternoon we went tubing which was absolutely fun, until this really cute Isreali girl ended up getting snagged on a strainer about 5 minutes from the pullout. I was in the back, and didn't realize how serious it was until the Aussie girl in front of me turns with this look of horror as she speeds past and yells "help her!". So I frantically guide my tube towards the strainer also, and grab the tree she is caught on. Instantly, I'm thrown out of my tube, but I end up getting this dress thing she was wearing over her swimsuit, untangled, and she spurted free. I then end up spending the better part of 100 m thrashing after my tube and escaped sandals. It sounds much more exciting than it really was, as the dress she was wearing hopefully would have torn before she drowned, but she seemed very appreciative, and when we got to the pull out ran up and gave me the biggest a hug, which might have turned into a great moment or something if not for the fact that two seconds later the same Aussie girl who missed helping her in the first place, yelled, "hey your tube is escaping". She ran into me later in the night at the Halloween party, but as usual, I have no game, and my inability to understand her accent led to nothing. (every isreali i hear, I swear to God they say "Iceland" when they say "Isreal")

The story should end there folks, but sadly it doesn't. Sadly you say, well that night we experienced our first casualty of the trip in terms of health. I awoke at like one in the morning to somebody puking off the side of our bungalow, and thinking it was the drunk brits, went back to sleep. An hour later Tommy came back in, grabbed a blanket, and spent the rest of the night sitting in the hammock and crapping his brains out. The victim of what we think was some bad food, let's just say the 8 hour trip to Flores was the stuff of nightmares for him, as he was forced to share his bowels with some of the seediest toilets in backwater gas stations and bus stops that you could imagine. Luckily he appears to be feeling better today, and he can get copacetic before we head to Belize City tomorrow.

So here's to good times and temples, blowing it with cute foreigners, cool blue pools, and Tommy getting healthy and feeling better!

Later skaters,
Alan

See ya Antigua

So not so much ressurected, but at least returned...we´ve made our way safely back from Santa Cruz. Hangovers not withstanding, it was a pretty cool time. We basically spent the last few days practicing the fine art of just chillin in one of the most laid back and lax places in the world. If the random dogs wandering around the hostel wasn´t enough to let you know the lay of the land, the local hippie artist slash writer hanging on the front porch in a t-shirt barely there and kept together by colorful string, brought it all together. Welcome to Santa Cruz, where those with nothing to do, go to escape, finding even less to do. Well, not less to do so much, just nothing more productive than the well being found after a day spent lounging around in the hammocks and swimming in the lake

The Iguana Perdida was cheap and had a nice family atmosphere, although it was a little hard to break in with the staff. Dinners are served family style though, so its great to hang out and drink a Cuba Libre while meeting all sorts of travelers from around the world. The most fascinating had to be this couple from Isreal who spent most of the first afternoon practicing some sort of wierd improv jewish wailing or singing whatever you want to call it, with acoustic guitar. The guy is a writer for the major news mag out of Tel Aviv and his girlfriend and he just sorta bounce around the world! They ended up putting on quite the show the next evening at the bbq party, as a bunch of local gringos brought out the bongos, and this spontaneous drum circle just sorta broke out. Tommy and I tried our best to do a little noodle dancing, but at that point in the evening it was pretty much just a goat rodeo. The Iguana for some reason themes the Sat night party to be cross dressing, and although we didn´t really get a chance to show off some upper thigh, Tommy somehow managed to end the night with a facefull of gold glitter. (Don´t worry Julia, not from making out with anybody, but rather from a goffy kid from Alaska who was wearing fishnets and daisy dukes...I hope that makes it better) He´s still sporting random glitter everywhere. Everything was just peachy though until about 2 in the morning when I decided to roll over, and the random wooden slats that held up my mattress decided to give way with a cacophony that must have woken half the village. A few random WTF´s and some flashlight reconstruction, we finally put the thing back together and made it through, though the sleep was more than shallow, as I kept wonderig at any given moment if the thing would crap out again.

This morning was filled with a super speedy trip back to Antigua with a shuttle driver that reminded me of the bus driver in Harry Potter. Pedestrians, animals, road laws, all were treated with reckless abandon as we played a two and half hour game of try not to squash your neighbors face into the window. A little more market shopping, and tomorrow we are off to Lanquin, starting the eastern journey towards Belize.

Hope everybody is doing well!

We updated some photos, you can check them out here.Just keep working through them to see the new ones.

Alan´s
http://nd.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2116311&l=3bcf0&id=5609966

Tommy´s
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2015707&l=9c9f9&id=122802302
and
http://usu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2015711&l=cb970&id=122802302

Tommy here

Hello all,

I hope everyone is good.

I have been able to put up pictures from the first 4-5 days from my trip, mostly just antigua and around that part. A bit of montericco on their but not the really good ones. I will send out some more links as I get more photo's on.

You should be able to get to them from here.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2015578&l=ce419&id=122802302

I have never tried it before so I hope that works.

Tom

Day Trippin

Greetings from San Pedro, possibly the cheapest spot in Guatemala you could find. Seriously, it boggles the mind. We are finally starting to find a groove in this crazy mixed up world. On Wednesday we somehow managed to buy stamps and send postcards succesfully. Tommy´s first try pretty much consisted of going to the post office and pointing to his post card with some money. I think I might have added a general butchering..but they got the point. The coolest feeling though was actually going to the local supermarket and buying some fresh peanut butter, cheese, bannanas, crackers, tortillas, and a bottle of the cheapest local rum we could find. All in all I think we payed 11 dollars. The bannanas were worth it...the rum, well its still a good time once you get past the taste.

From there we had one of the most harrowing bus rides of our lives. What was supposed to be 2.5-3 hours ended up taking the better part of 4.5. ´So there we were crammed in the bus with a bunch of Israelis, a couple Canucks, and a Brit with one of the strongest accents I´ve ever heard (sorry not the start to a bad joke), trying not to throw our cookies on one of the steepest roads I´ve seen in real life. We were on our way through some highlands to the Lake, the travelers mecca, and man was it a journey. About 30 hairpin turns, where I thought for sure he was going to have to three point turn, we made our way into San Pedro at roughly 7 at night. Out of nowhere kids are jumping on top of the bus, pulling our bags down, and the stress level started racing, but it turns out they were just looking for a referral commision from one of the many hotels around the main drag. After extricating our stuff from their clutches we ended up following a couple of hippies that led us to their abode called, who woulda thunk it, ¨Trippey´s¨. Keep in mind that San Pedro is the ¨recreational¨capital of the Guatemala, though we´ve yet to partake. It was actually a really chill place with the best vibe of our trip so far. A room for a little less than 2 dollars a night also couldn´t be beat. We spent the rest of the night sitting back with litres of beer on some pillows and hammocks underneath the central gazebo, listening to everybody´s crazy travels. (Its amazing how much the rest of the world travels in contrast to Americans´) Everybody there had been going for at least 3 months, and one person there was on month 11. Really really nice people, and when a local mayan woman came shambling by around 9 with some of the best homemade chocolate cake (mom, your´s is still better), it made the night.

This morning we slep on it, and ended up deciding to move to a little bit nicer spot. There is a huge full moon party tonight and Trippey´s is home to the after party, and since we really aren´t into the mushroom taking or acid laced pink moon punch, we decided it might be a little bit too much of a goat rodeo for us. We found an amazingly gorgous spot overlooking the lake with private bathroom and comfy beds for a little under 7 bucks, so can´t complain. The rest of the day was spent kayaking around the lake and practicing the art of just chillin. (2 hours of kayaking is about $1.25) Well were back to the room to ´catch some more rum and hang low. Tommorrow we are off to Santa Cruz, another side of the lake that apparently has some cliff jumping! Later!

Maybe idiots, but clever nonetheless

Uploading photos in this whole blogger thing is super slow on the internet connection we have, so here are some photos through facebook.

Just visit
http://nd.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2116311&l=3bcf0&id=5609966

You should be able to check things out there. I´ll get Tommy to post the link to his pictures whenever I track him down.

Alright later folks.

Of Lava and Beaches

So long time since any update. I blame it on Tom´s stank, this is what happens when you only bring 3 t-shirts. I look at the title of this thing as I try to convey the last five days, and I can actually say magical...magical in the sense that we´ve somehow managed to survive through one week here.

After a night in the barbed wire compound known as Hotel Aueropuerta, we decided that we were way over our heads to try chicken bussing it to Antigua, and better judgement hooked us up with a shuttle that was far safer and faster than anything Tom and I could have gotten ourselves into. We ended up quikcly finding our saviour and base of operations, Black Cat hostel. Recommended by a guy I met in Alaska the cheap cost (8-10$ a night plus breakfast), not to mention a plethora of english spoken was hard to beat. We spent most of the first day walking around town, checking out churches and generally trying not to be overwhelmed.

A few gallo´s (think a cheaper corona) and we found the confidence to move onto bigger and better things. We found some cool folks at bar at the hostel and made our way to the local gringo bar to catch the red sox game. From there we decided that salsa was in order, and off to La Sala. As we walked by the packed dance floor bouncing live salsa music though the fear overtook us. We are white and though I can kinda dance by American standards, there was no way in hell I could even get a spot on the floor in Guatemala. So we decided to pass on by, and head back the only two and half blocks to our hostel. We were somewhat nervous about waling around at night as we had been told if you´re going places, make sure to be with a group. So seeing the Policia on the corner only a block away from the hospital, we were like ¨yes, safe!¨. Oh how wrong we were, suddenly the policia start walking towards us and next thing you know we are spread eagle with our hands on the wall getting the sunset rubdown from the local pigs. Fishing hard for a bribe, our complete misunderstanding or non-comprehension of spanish finally benefited us. They eventually got so tired of ¨que?¨and ¨no hablo espanol¨that they finally let us go without one quetzal out of our pockets. Legs shaking uncontrollably we made the last block home safe.

After a morning of sleeping in and finding the local market, we found the local tourist area and signed up to take a little tour. Turned out to be the best decision up to that point, of our short trip. We got a sweet tour of a local museum of mayan and local music and instruments, and then walked around the self guided tour of the local coffee plantation. The thing was in spanish, but I think I caught most of it. The coffee thing, was absolutely amazing. My dad would have been in heaven! An interesting night at the local ¨lover´s¨cafe (great atmosphere if you were on a date, not so passionate if you´re staring at Tommy in soft candlelight across the table), but fun nonetheless.

Saturday Morning we fought ourselves awake at 5:30 in the morning to head to Volcan Pacaya. This hike was absolute madness. It was like a zoo trecking up this Volcano. Aside from the 25 or so touristas, there was a ton of locals pedaling sticks for the climb and rides on the horses up the steep muddy rutt of a trail. Calls of ¨Taxi Blanco, Taxi Negro¨ wrang throughout the jungle. After pack muleing it up the mountain for about an hour we found orselves at the top of a gorgeous vista staring out at lava fields not 14 days old. Huge huge mountain, can´t stress it enough. You could see some of the live lava flows, and I thought that´s as close as we were going to get. All of sudden though our guide is leading us right down to the flow. God bless not being in America. No way in hell in the states you would be allowed to just walk up within as close as you could humanly stand to a live lava flow. It was mind blowing. We have some sweet pics of Tommy stabbing the lava with a stick and the ensuing backdraft that follows, but who knows when that will get up. A guy was even roasting marshmellows on the dang thing. Quite the experience for sure. That afternoon we made our way to the market, where I quickly realized I suck at bargaining. After getting relatively gypsied on some gifts for people I finally realized my errors, and got out of there until I learned a little more about the cost of goods.

The next day we made our way to Monte Ricco. We´d had enough of the rain, and had heard good things from my sister´s friend, who suggested it. Montericco is like the local beach for all the folks from Guatemala city to party at on the weekend. So when we got there Sunday morning, we quickly found the place packed to the gills with hungover locals. The first place turned us away (though we would later find, they were completely empty that night), and we made our way to Del Fin. We walked in to find some pretty meager accomidations, but we thought we were hard core and could deal with it. 5 $ a room how could you beat it? After four hours in the place though with mangrove slat walls, incessant chirping parakeets, mosquitoes, and blaring local reggae-ton, we were at our wits end. A walk further up the beach led us to our savior and the nicest place we´ve stayed at so far. Cafe del Sol had private, secure rooms, clean, with a private bathroom for 10$ a day, which was more than worth it. We quickly moved out of Del Fin, (luckily getting out money back) and spent the rest of the day chilling like villians at our own private pool. We were literally the only guests besides a honeymooning coulple up front. That night we had a few beers with 24 year old half Swiss half Guatemalan manager of the hotel, who stands to be the next Donald Trump of Guatemala. The kid has vision and the means to do it too, an inspirational dude.

Monday we got up early for a tour of the local mangrove forest, and the rest was an all day beach extravaganza. The sun came out, and it was all we thought it would be. We found some people at the spot that first turned us away, and ended up wasting the day away throwing the disk, trying not to die while swimming in the ridiculous rip tides, playing soccer with some local kids, and what seemed like a never ending game of volleyball with some other backpackers and and the local fisherman. My team ended up holding court for at least an hour and a half, and my shoulders have the sunburns to prove it. Tommy ordered some amazing local fish at the restraunt, and I ended up with some tasty fresh shrimp alfredo for 7$. One of my favorite days thus far.

Today we spent the rest of the morning lounging in the hammocks reading, and enjoying the sunshine. Then made our way back to Antigua before we head out tomorrow for San Pedro de Lagoona on the lake.

Well, sorry for the length. Maybe we´ll keep things more frequent, in fact hopefully. Thanks for the comments, they are fun to read. We are seriously trying to get up some pictures!

One step off the deep end

Greetings from Guatemala city folks. We made it safe and sound, if not for a little craziness. Same story like anyplace, taxi cab drivers trying to screw around with you a little. 15 quetzales somehow became 50 (we at least know our numbers) for roughly a 2 minute drive, but luckily we were two males who were both bigger than him, and the guy finally gave up after a couple of half hearted demands. Our ¨hotel¨comes straight up with barb wire on the courtyard walls, and master locks on the gates, but its a nice place inside with really friendly people. Fried black beans and eggs, and we´re off to start the next adventure, getting to Antigua! We´ll holler with some pictures when we figure that out. For now, Ciao