Hi Everybody! Walt and I had a long journey (27 hr.) to get to Tbilisi. We had to wait 7 hr. in Istanbul for the daily flight (11:30 PM) to Tbilisi. Needless to say, we were pretty tired by the time we arrived. We were immediately impressed with the friendliness of the people and the beauty of the city. The terminal and subway station were brand new and modern in every way. The metro had not opened so we took a taxi to our hotel. The driver actually took us to the wrong hotel. He was ready to get our luggage [View Full Entry]

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Hi Everybody! From Panama City, we flew to Flores, Guatemala, a town on an island surrounded by the waters of Lake Peten Itza. It once had huge Mayan pyramids, but they were destroyed by the Spaniards in the 1600's. Today, the town has many buildings painted in bright colors. The town only has one paved roads. The other one lane roads may have once been paved, but today they are only dirt and sand. The town was extremely dusty. All of the merchandise in shops was completely covered with dust. Our hotel sat on the lake and we enjoyed watching the [View Full Entry]

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Hi Everybody! Today is our last day in Panama. The airport is 15 miles out of town. We decided to move to a resort type hotel in that area since we have a very early flight tomorrow. Our hotel has several pools that are connected and a very tropical atmosphere. We went by the airport to check on our flight. I bought a few craft items there. They are my first purchases in this country. Guatemala and Costa Rica have had more handmade goods than any other country. I am sure that they all have items of this type, but I [View Full Entry]

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Hi Everybody! Friday We enjoyed our time in Jaco, Costa Rica. Our hotel was first class and located right on the beach. It had a nice casino and restaurant. We were able to travel from Jaco to the capital city, San Jose, by a comfortable van. We traveled over mountains with curvy roads and had spectacular views. We saw farming on terraces, coffee farms, a winery, many different fruit trees. Before leaving Jaco, we had a travel agent book a nice hotel for us in San Jose. It is not a city where you want to spend a lot of time. [View Full Entry]

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Hi Everybody! To me, Costa Rica is a step above the other Central American countries. The government years ago realized that their greatest asset was the natural beauty of the country. Today, one fourth of the national land is in national parks and other protected areas. Throughout the country, I have observed bins for recycling plastic, glass, and aluminum. I have not seen as much litter here as in other countries. More people speak English here than in most of the places we have been. We also found English widely spoken in Belize. All Central American countries are willing to take [View Full Entry]

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Hi Everybody! We arrived in Costa Rica yesterday and found it to be a beautiful country. The tourism industry is better developed here. It is a great place to visit. This morning, I took a Canopy Tour. I went several miles outside of Jaco, the beach town where we are staying. A tractor pulled a wagon with about 25 people in it to the top of a nearby mountain. The views of the Los Suenos Resort, marina, Herradura bay and the Nicoya Gulf were spectacular. We had on hard hats and many cables. We descended the mountain via a series of [View Full Entry]

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Hi Everybody! Granada reminds me of Antigua even though it is not as modern. People here are very laid back. In the afternoon, they pull out their wicker chairs and rattan rockers. They sit in front of their apartments or homes on the sidewalk and visit with neighbors. The flowers, foliage, and birds are beautiful! I love sitting in our hotel courtyard and watching the birds fly in for food and water. I am not real fast getting their pictures. A typical breakfast here consists of black beans, rice, salsa, scrambled egg, wheat toast, marmalade, juice, lots of fresh fruit, and [View Full Entry]

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Hi Everybody! I guess you figured out in the last blog that I meant the buildings in San Salvador were old and in bad shape. We left San Salvador and headed for Tegucigalpa. On our way morth to this city, we decided that we really did not want to go there. We asked the bus driver if we could get off before the road split north. He agreed and let us off on a road near a small town. We walked down the hill to this town and saw about 10 people. Nothing was there. We asked a policeman for directions [View Full Entry]

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Hi Everybody! I am going to try to upload some of my Central American photos. We arrived in San Salvador last night. It is the capital city of El Salvador and is densely populated. One and a half million people live in the city with half that number living in shantytowns surrounding the city. There are not enough jobs to support that population. This causes a large amount of petty crime. We got here after dark and didn´t feel safe leaving the hotel. This morning we walked to a pupuserias to try the most popular Salvadoran food - the pupusa. They [View Full Entry]

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Hi Everybody! It has been hard to find things that I wanted to take pictures of in San Salvador. Most peoples are very unattractive and in bad shape. I took most of these in the Central Park area. I apologize for you having to get so many updates from the blog. We are heading out this afternoon for Tegucigalpa, Honduras. I called and tried to make us a hotel reservation but the lady didn´t speak English. I don´t know if I was successful or not. Take care, Everette [View Full Entry]

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