Lago de Atitlan...a vacation from our vacation

After our week of school in Xela, Torrie and I headed to Lago de Atitlan for the week of Semana Santa. Easter is very different here (and in most Catholic countries). Here the whole week before Easter is a major holiday...but strangely enough they do not celebrate Easter Monday. To celebrate, most guatemalan towns hold ¨processiones¨- religious processions in which massive statues of Jesus at various stages of the Easter story are mounted on heavy wooden boxes and carried by at least 40 men in a circuit that leaves from and returns to the cathedral or church. Children act as the twelve deciples walking along with the procession and other people are dressed to represent other biblical characters. There are generally at least 2 major processiones - Good Friday and Easter Sunday - but in some places, like Antigua, processiones are held every day of the week.

Because we didn´t see any actual processiones, I can´t upload any photos of one. Instead, here is a picture of my room at my homestay in Xela.

Seeing that the whole week is a major holiday throughout Guatemala, we headed to the lake for a bit of quiet admist all the craziness. But even in the small towns around the lake processiones were held and we were lucky enough to see a bit of the event in San Juan de Atitlan. A carpet of brightly coloured sawdust is created for every procession to walk on. In San Juan, Torrie and I had a spent a really great afternoon watching the construction of the carpet. The carpet is built in sections and different groups of people were assigned to constructing each section. Some were families or neighbours, but other groups were made up entirely of teenage boys. That was really the most amazing thing... One section was being created by a group of abuelitas ( old grandma-type ladies). Their pattern involved very traditional, catholic designs. Right next to them however, was the group of 20 or 25 teenage boys creating graffiti- inspired designs.

I loved San Juan for other reasons as well... The weaving there is completely different from elsewhere in the country. The women have formed a number of weaving co-ops and they use only natural dyes and materials for their weaving. One image that comes to mind when I think of Guatemala is the bright colours and intricate patterns of the women´s (and in some communities the men´s) clothing, but in San Juan the weavings being sold are all light, natural plant colours and the style of weaving is different as well.

San Juan was also the cleanest town that we have been to in Guatemala and overall was so great that we went back twice.

We stayed at a hostel/hotel (la Iguana Perdida) in another small town on the lake, Santa Cruz de Atitlan.

 Volcan San Pedro, cloaked by clouds

The Iguana´s laziest resident, Bosco the German Shepard

 Swimming!!!

 A jungly pathway at the Iguana 

The town of Santa Cruz is about 15 minutes uphill from the lake front. It is a pretty little town with very windey, very steep streets. Torrie was sick with a cold the day after we arrived so I took advantage of my free time to take a weaving class up in the village. The women of Santa Cruz must be among the strongest  in the world -  walking those streets everyday (usually with a big basket on their head) and back-strap weaving for a living!

 (this picture is from San Pedro, but it is a nice photo and it ïllustrates the heavy basket!)

Santa Cruz is like many of the towns on Lago de Atitlan though, and it is really a little sad that the majority of lakefront property is foreign-owned (hotels, guest houses, private homes). Because of this, there was very little opportunity to practice our spanish at our hostel, as English was definitely the lingua franca. But we viewed the week as a little vacation from our trip and had a great time there! We made some great friends, enjoyed the sauna (!), ate delicious, home-style food (something I really hadn´t realized I missed so much) and took part in the weekly Saturday night cross-dressing party. Tor really enjoyed changing his identity throughout the week - first sporting only a moustache for a day and a half and then dressing as an Elton John inspired woman for all of Saturday night!

 (try and miss this face Mom!)

 (sadly the portion of the night where Tor was in a very short mini-skirt had come and gone by the time we took this photo with our friends Sarah and Simon)

One thing that we have come to realize is that our niche friend market is definitely young thirty-somethings, usually who have lived in the UK for at least 5 years (and who enjoy the card game Yaanif more than life itself). 

We are now back at home in Xela for a second week of spanish lessons. We will be sure to write again soon, but it is getting dark quickly and threatening to rain so I will leave you here. 

With love, 

Lisa and Torrance

A final photo of us for my (Torrie´s) Mom, who claims to have forgotten what we look like.

A picture catch-up, and another belated update

Hello again everyone,
thanks for tuning in for another post. Lisa is busy doing grad school stuff this internet session, so sadly you´ll have to bear with me for the entirety of this blog. Apologies in advance.

First of all, I´ll take advantage of the lightening-fast connection we´ve got here in Xela, and throw up some pictures of things I described in our last post in Flores.

Without further adeu,

Lisa at the glorious Agua Caliente waterfall: the river she´s in is cold, but the waterfall is around 105 farenhieght!

Me with a giant Ceiba, the Maya tree of life, on the trail  into Tikal.

Temple III from Temple IV at the ghostly Tikal sunrise (if you ever make it to Tikal, try and barter a cheap sunset/sunrise tour like we did, it is definitely worth it, not only to beat the heat and the crowds, but also to see way more wildlife - notably, monkeys doing their monkey business).

Aforemention monkey business.

Lis and I on Temple V, second tallest in the Maya world.

Temple I from the heart of the Grand Plaza.

My cousin Jordan. How the ancient Maya knew what he would look like I haven´t a clue.

Ok, so that gets us caught up in pictures from last post. This past week has been a whirlwind: it´s included, among other things, heavenly swimming, our first run in with crime, our first big city, food poisoning, y Español.

Let´s get started.

The day after our last post was fairly uneventful: and 8+ hour day on the bus. The end destination was Semuc Champey, a place we have heard bittersweet reviews on from other travellers. It is supposed to be second to few places in the world in terms of natural beauty, but the tourism infrastructure that has developed so that Westerners like us can see it has apparently not benefited everyone in the area. We were ready for this, but in a country where everyone we´ve met has been happy to see us, the not-so-warm welcome was still a bit of a jolt. Understandably, most of the animosity from locals towards the tourism sector seems to stem from the shuttle drivers. These guys were unreasonably reckless, narrowly missing all manner of local people, canines, poultry, and hog on the nine death-defying kilometres between Lanquin and Semuc Champey. Fortunately, the staff at our hostel were good, and the place (El Portal) seemed decently recieved within the community.

The next day we set out into the park itself, which more than lives up to its reputation. These shots don´t do it justice, but here´s a view of the pools (that sit on top of a 300 metre natural limestone bridge, with the river running underneath) from the mountainside viewpoint.

To answer your question: yes, that water is as good as it looks. Better, infact. It was probably the most refreshing swim I´ve ever had. Our guide (mandatory) and group was an absolute riot. We made our way through the seven pools, which unfortunately connected by cliff-jumps, natural waterslides, and the such. Horsing around was not only accepted but actively encouraged, which I for one was thrilled about.
Said horsing around:

What was perhaps the most fun part of the entire day is not documented by camera, being that it took place deep inside the Semuc Champey Wet Cave.Wet cave is a hilarious understatement: for most of the several hundred metre expedition we swam in water well over our heads while our high-tech lighting devices (candles) dripped scalding hot wax onto our hands.

Lisa impressed me on this adventure-day. Teasing her about being a chicken has become a beloved part of my comedy routine at home, but today she blew me away, participating (and sometimes going first!) in every daredevil stunt out group came up with, including, but not limited to, a hands-free dive from several metres, a harnessless repel down a raging cave waterfall (the very antithesis of safety) a leap of faith into the caves black hole (a pitch black pit, with water some meters into it), and a jump from an 11 metre (yes, 11 metre) bridge on the river (disclaimer: the risk of severe wedgies on the latter stunt is extremely high).

We slept like babies that night, and the next day rode the short bus to Coban, where we spent the day laying low and forgetting to email our moms (sorry Mom). Our next destination was Antigua, which required a bus transfer in the dreaded Guatemala City. This went of without a hitch, with the only delay being a brief detour around a protest march of 10,000 teachers - a spectacle the locals hardly seemed to notice.

Our next surprise came in Antigua, a city we´ve heard so much about from old friends at home, and new ones on the road. We were bitterly dissapointed: we didn´t like Antigua at all. Yes, it´s beautiful - iconic volcanoes tower over terracotta tile rooves and cobblestone streets - but the city is run by tourists, for tourists. If you´d like to explore a place with more Guatemalan culture and less white people, I´d suggest Oak Bay Avenue on a mild Saturday afternoon.

The next day we set off for Xela (Quetzaltenango), our current location. En route, during a bus change in Chimaltenango, we had our first run in with crime, the inevitable Guatemalan robbery. In a really slick scam involving a way too friendly guy with good English and a cute kid (the distraction), a pickpocket got into Lisa´s handbag. We didn´t notice until we got on the bus that our wallet was gone. Fortunately all we lost was the equivalent of 12 bucks, and we gained invaluable awareness about just how good the thieves can be.

We are now settled down in Xela (a gorgeous city who´s three most prominent industries are education, beads and chocolate), living with seperate homestay families - so fully immeresed in Spanish - and taking Spanish lessons at the Miguel de Cervantes School (which we highly recommed). Lisa was a bit late getting going on the homestay and classes, as she´s just gotten through a wicked battle with food posioning: all your preconceptions about symptoms of Central American mystery sicknesses apply. Fortunately she is on the mend, and I really needed and extra day of studying!

We´ve got to run (home for dinner, weird, I know), but we´ll try for another post while we´re still here in Xela.

Thanks for reading,

Love, (and on Lisa´s behalf), Torrie

Guatemala!!!

We arrived in Guatemala, our second country, a week ago today, and what a week it´s been. We arrived in Livingston, a Caribbean Garifuna enclave, by boat from Belize. Livingston is loud and touristy, and more expensive then we imagined. Also, there are no safe swimming beaches in town – a serious problem for us. Still, the liquados were readily available as were great places to eat, so really we can´t complain!

We spent a night in Livingston, then got on the boat for Rio Dulce, a trip that has been recommended by many friends at home, and several others we´ve met on the road. The reviews were dead on – the trip is spectacular. High-walled jungle canyons packed with all kinds of birds and studded with caves and natural hot springs (one of which we got to swim in) for the first hour or so, then a huge open lagoon for the second.

We spent a night in Rio Dulce before heading to El Estor and then the next day to Finca el Paraiso, a working farm between the two towns that so happens to have an incredible hot springs waterfall. Mike – thank you for the tip! Sitting in a cool river with a piping hot waterfall falling down onto your shoulders is absolute bliss. When you do get bored of that, you can swim under the waterfall and into the cavern behind it – which has become a natural cave sauna. Glorious.

What was not so glorious was our night of camping that night at the Finca. The finca is awesome – please go there and stay with Julio and his wife and their piggies and cattle! Swim in the lake (the best swim in Guatemala so far)  and eat at their restaurant! Just don´t sleep in a tent. With the fly on. With another person. In the middle of the Gautemalan dry season. During a heat wave. At one point we did somehow drift into some form of sweaty, delirious sleep, only to be woken up by a horse, her baby, and the fattest pig ever to live. It seems we weren´t the only ones dying of heat; these three barnyard clowns felt that 4 am was an appropriate time for a moonlit splash in the lake. About 2 meters from our tent.

From the Finca we passed through Rio Dulce again on our way to Flores. The bus trip was fairly uneventful. We traded travel tips with Hugh, a middle aged guy from Duncan who is travelling through central America with a duffle bag and a lacrosse stick. Yes, he gets some looks.

Lisa loves Flores! This place is beautiful. Wonderful colourful buildings, cobblestone streets, a hill in the middle with a big church on top, tons of food options. Did we mention this is on a tiny island in a beautiful lake (Lago de Peten Itza.) For you History buffs, Flores was at one time covered in Maya temples and pyramids, but the Spanish destroyed the entire maya city upon their arrival.

Speaking of Maya cities, we left Flores the next day for Tikal, el ruinas de ruinas, mother of all Maya sites. Tikal surprised us with how little tourist infrastructure it has. Don´t get us wrong, you can buy your tickets, pay way too much for some awful food, and pick up a souvenier or two, but it doesn´t come close to the sort of money-spending spectacle you get at places like Science World or Niagara Falls. It is low-key, even difficult to find a guide for a sunset and sunrise tour, and best of all, at 4am we were the only people in the site. Camping was affordable, as was our guide Jose, who gave us a wonderful tour (almost 7 hours in total!).

We met a nice family from Idaho and together with Jose we walked around Tikal from 430 pm 7pm on Thursday night and then again from 430am to 1030am on Friday morning. We watched the sun set and then rise again from Temple 4. Watching the jungle wake up beneath you is incredible. Everything is so quiet and then suddenly everything becomes alive – squawking, howling, swinging tree to tree… Most of the swinging was done by the dozens of spider monkeys that live at  Tikal. Goofing around, eating whatever they want, making inappropriate faces and sounds – I think Tor has found his kindred spirits. The skyscraping temples and humbling size of Tikal can´t really be described, we´ll just recommend it to anyone who can get down this way.

After Tikal we spent a couple days relaxing and laying low in El Remate, a sweet little  lakeside town at the far end of Lago de Peten Itza. We wrote some postcards and did some other chores, but mostly hung out on the beach and caught up on some rest.

Today we are back in Flores, and tomorrow we plan to head south to Semuc Champey, a mysterious and beautiful spot that we need to see for ourselves. We hope everything is wonderful with all of you, and thanks again for following our adventures.

Love Lisa and Torrie

HELLO AGAIN!

We will be quite surprised but most pleased if any of you are still following our blog, given that recently, it has been as neglected as some of the dogs down here. We are alive, we are having fun, and we are sorry that we´ve been sub-par bloggers.

We´ll pick up where we left off, which was the blog we wrote from San Ignacio, Belize. We´ll do one post on our last week in Belize, and a second on our first week in Guatemala (feel free to go to the bathroom, get some more popcorn, etc., in between). Some of what we´ll talk about will even relate to the photos we posted last time. What a treat.

After a few nights in San Ignacio we headed further west to a little backpacker camp called the Trek Stop. We camped a couple (spider free) nights and used the Stop as a base to see the ruins at Xunantunich.

Xunantunich, our first big ruin, was incredible. We got on the first ferry across the river, and had the entire maya city to ourselves for about an hour. We ran around like Maya lords and took lots of pictures. We also watched a family of howler monkeys doing their monkey business for well over an hour. They are impossibly cute but also impossible to photograph. Unfortunately for Dave and others who enjoy a good howler monkey impression, they were very quiet the whole time. At one point we got a little too close and one of the big males attempted to pee on us (for the squeamish, skip the next sentence). You may not believe it, but this primate´s pee lasted for at least 3 solid minutes. I´m not sure I have ever seen Torrie laugh so hard.

All in all, we spent close to 5 hours in Xunantunich, and really enjoyed the ruins. We also spent quite a lot of time talking to David, a local artisan in the village below the ruins, who is involved in a really neat project to promote indigenous culture through traditional ceramic art. It was a really cool initiative and we hope to find more like it in our travels. He also gave us some great cucumbers from his garden – really the first fresh veggies we´d had in about a month!!

The rest of the time at the Trek Stop we spent swimming, cooking, and reading. Trek Stop even has its own Frisbee golf course (jealous Robby?), so we were sure to play a round of that as well.

Next, we went south to the Cockscomb Basin Wildlife Sanctuary – known in Belize as “the Jaguar Preserve.” Right off the bat, no, we did not see any Jaguars. We did however get a guide for a night jungle hike, which was an incredible experience. We saw lightning bugs the size of chicken wings, a gibnut (like a weird little gopher), a kingajuu (like a small monkey-cat hybrid) and an ocelot. The whole time the howler monkey calls were absolutely deafening. The next day we hiked all day, and really enjoyed the dense jungle scenery.

After two nights in Cockscomb we headed further south, to steamy Punta Gorda. We got into town and looked into the boat for Guatemala, which didn´t leave until the next day. For anone who stumbles upon this blog and has the lonely planet guide, the boat doesn´t just run on Tuesdays and Fridays. Thankfully for us (we lost track of days and arrived late Friday afternoon instead of Thursday as planned), it runs every day. There´s not a whole lot to do in Punta Gorda, so we wandered around, and enjoyed Belize´s national dish (chicken, rice, and beans from street vendors, for the equivalent of about $2.50) a few last times. The highlight was a visit to a small scale chocolate factory. Lisa was in heaven.

The next day we were on the boat to Livingston, Guatemala, to begin our second country. We really enjoyed Belize, and would recommend it to anyone. The knock on Belize is that it´s quite expensive, which can be true. If you´re into luxury you can find what you´re looking for in Belize. But if you´re willing and able to spend some nights in a tent (we camped over 2/3rds of our nights in Belize) and hunt around for the cheapest (and best) dinner in town, Belize can be done on anyone´s budget. For cultural diversity, world class snorkeling, gorgeous jungle highways, and lots of fun in between, head to Belize.

Lisa and Tor