The city of Granada I left Managua after only one day and went of in search of local buses for Granada. They guy at the hostel gave me such bad directions that I had to keep walking around the neighbourhood looking for the bus stop with my very heavy backpack on my back. I eventually found it - in the area that he told me I didnt need to go to and caught the first bus that was there (old Toyota vans). The bus was empty so I was able to find a spot in the front to dump by [View Full Entry]

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Goodbye Guatemala.. After spending 6 weeks in Guatemala, I got my first glimpse of Guatemala City as I spent my final night there waiting to catch my flight to Nicaragua. I said goodbye to Jen that morning and caught the local ‘Monja Blanca’ bus to Guatemala City. When I got there, I was helped by the guard at the bus stop to find me a cab because he didn’t want me to get one myself (He mananged to get me a very good discount). I waved my new friend goodbye and got into my cab for the short ride to my [View Full Entry]

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Destination 3: Lanquin & Semuc Champey It was supposed to be easy. We were to catch the 6am bus leaving Rio D to take us to Coban via El Retcho on the bus that was heading towards Guatemala City. Fine! No problems! We got on board, found our seat and dozed in preparation for the 4+ hour journey to El Retcho. We stopped at numerous points, not uncommon on the Guatemalan bus journey to pick up and drop of random passengers. Its not as if they have set stops or city signs for that matter. Its also important to note that [View Full Entry]

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Destination 2: Rio Dulce & Livinston The next morning saw us taking the first bus out of Flores for the Rio Dulce or the'Fonterras'. I was excited about the getting there mainly because for me - it signified the Caribbean, my first chance to get a glimpse of it..... What of Rio Dulce? Well its a one horse town, minus the horse. It is essentially one street - that takes one blink of the eye to complete. There are some accommodation options on the 'city´side but it´s worth your while to find a lancha to take you to an establishment somewhere [View Full Entry]

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On the bus, Off the bus, On the bus, Off the bus....Ooops you missed it! I had said goodbye to Antigua & school. Now armed with my three exercise books filled with all my worldly knowledge of Spanish (minus my dictionary which I had lost in Honduras - no! I haven't spoken about Honduras yet!), I set off with Jennifer to hit the tourist trail of Guatemala. We were off to visit the three main sights (Or the sights that I hadn't seen yet, really!). * Tikal * Rio Dulce & Livingston * Lanquin & Sempuc Champey Destination 1: Flores [View Full Entry]

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It's so sad to say goodbye to new friends!! My last week went by in a blur of activities and multiple farewells. I still had to complete my last 8hr week and get in as many of the sights & activities that I had not yet done during my 5 week stay. (Where did all that time go? And why did I always leave everything till last mintue....AGAIN!!!). Fiesta Time On the tuesday of my final week - We had a fiesta to celebrate the last day before the start of Lent, so I spent some of the morning making [View Full Entry]

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I can hardly believe that 4 weeks have since passed since I arrived in Guatemala. I have one more week left of school before I continue the rest of my Central American journey, first around Guatemala and then continuing south towards Nicaragua & Costa Rica. In my attempt to cover as much of the grammer as possible during the time that I had. I slowly started to increase my hours, first from 4 to 5 hours, then from 5 to 8 hours per day. Why I chose this amount of torture, I will never know - but it certainly has been [View Full Entry]

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It’s back to school for me. My first two weeks in Antigua This blog is taking me ages to compose! Call it Writers block or Call it "OMG! - My head is going to explode with too much information" block - but nonetheless I have been staring at this for the last few days. So to bite the bullet here goes... Yes! I know that I started the Antigua part of my blog talking about another town (ie Monterrico), so now here is a little story to keep you all amused about what I have been doing with myself for [View Full Entry]

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School was over for another week and I needed to go somewhere to relax. There are a multitude of destinations that are nearby Antigua that one can visit during the course of a weekend between classes. It was just a question of where to go! It was Friday lunchtime before I eventually selected a destination - It was going to be ‘Lago de Atitlan’. One of the cheapest ways (and in my opinion, most comfortable) is to take a local ‘Pullman Bus’ directly to the lake. It is far cheaper than using a private shuttle service, where they tend to pack [View Full Entry]

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Antigua is cold this time of year! I wish I had figured that out before I arrived carrying nothing with me except light t-shirts & clothes. I had no idea what to expect when I arrived in Guatemala City Airport except the hope that someone from my language school would be there to pick me up when I got out. As soon as I cleared customs - There he was. Sergio, my driver. It was going to be a 45 minute drive from Guatemala City to Antigua. I didn’t know what time it was. I was too tired to ask and [View Full Entry]

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