Well, the trip has finally winded down to a close here in San Jose. What a journey it´s been. I feel like I´ve seen more in the past ten weeks than I have my entire life. From the friendliness of the locals, the organic beauty of the landscapes, the mystique of the ancient traditions; the trip has been both completely satisfying and hugely surprising. Half of me never wants to leave. He wants to forget the plane ticket home, and move south through Panama, hop to Latin America and tour the continent. Stay in one city for a month, really get [View Full Entry]

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After a relaxing time in Belize, if not damn expensive, I headed down to Cobán in the Alta Verapez highlands, a lush green plateau in Central Guatemala atop a limestone shelf marked with fast rivers and huge networks of caves. I spent the first day mucking about Cobán, and treated myself to an expensive ($4 US) dinner at a Chinese joint; a welcome break from chicken, rice and beans. I went on a cool tour of a coffee finca owned by German immigrants. Cobán is renown for it´s perfect altitude and soil that yield supposedly the best beans in Central America, [View Full Entry]

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Well, after buzzing around Guatemala and Mexico, and spending every other day on a bus, Caye Caulker in Belize was exactly what I needed. The caye is a 45 minute boat ride from sketchtown Belize City. Forget cars, forget paved roads, forget ambition; the pace of life on Caye Caulker is almost at a standstill. The entire island is a beach spotted with lazed out tourists and dreadlocked rhastafarians. The only way to get around is walk, bike, or catch a lift on one of the many golf carts buzzing around. The first day there I went on a snorkelling tour [View Full Entry]

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After a hasty escape from the cold, but very admirable streets of San Cristobal, we found ourselves in Quetzaltenango, the second biggest city in Guatemala (only 200,000...Guatemala City has 3 million!) We got off the bus, only to be sheparded into a hotel by the two 60-year-old Slovenians that rode in with us. We spent the first day in Chichicastenango (Guatemala loves their 'castenangos') which is one of the world's most famous markets. For some reason we decided to go at 5:30am, hey why not have another ridiculously early morning. It was really an experience. Chichi was a labyrinth of st [View Full Entry]

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Yet another early morning awaited us as we arose in the middle of the night to catch a shuttle that brought us up through the Peten region in Guatemala to a river that seperates the Chiapas in Mexico from Guatemala. It was a nice, but chilly boat ride, then another bus ride to Pelenque from the opposite bank. Had a bit of a sketchy time when we found our passports couldn't get stamped at the border because they were 'out of forms', and we were stopped at an immigration checkpoint on our way to the passport office in Pelenque. Luckily, the [View Full Entry]

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After a hazy three days in San Pedro, Calum and I headed off for the Rio Dulce, supposedly the Amazon of Central America. It was beautiful, the boat ride down the river was two hours of high cliffs on either bank and lush jungle tumbling into the river. We stopped at a hot springs and a birding island, before cruising to the ultra-laid back Garifuna town of Livingston. It is the only real Carribbean town in Guatemala, and really feels more like Jamaica. We stayed right on the river, in a cool joint that was built over the water, basically a [View Full Entry]

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After a hasty escape from the expensive but quaint town of Antigua, the 4 of us (a Scot, a Californian, an Aussie and I) made it to San Pedro, on the shores of beautiful Lake Atitlan, described by British writer Thomas Huxley as the most beautiful lake in the world, which was immedietly understandable. We boated across, after being hassled by a drunk on the beach for a while. San Pedro is a little laid back hillside town, and has the odd feeling about it that most of the inhabitants are hippies and backpackers that meant to pass right through it [View Full Entry]

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After three solid days with my knees in my mouth crammed in a bus, I've finally made it to Antigua, Guatemala...and it's about as gorgeous as all the guidebooks and postcards make it out to be. I met up with a Scottish guy, Callum, and a guy from California, Eric, and we're travelling together for the meanwhile. We stayed a night in San Salvador (ten dollars a person for a dirty little room in the slums!). It's by far the most crowded city I've seen so far. The sketchiest being Managua, the confusing sprawl of the Nicaraguan capital offering no remorse [View Full Entry]

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After 3 great weeks in Costa Rica, I finally moved onto to country #2: Nicaragua. The change was evident right at the border. We all filed off the bus to have our passports checked, and we were swarmed by about 20 little kids, all really skinny and hungry, asking for money for food. All those summers doing camps primed me to have a soft spot for kids, and this was really hard to take, I found it pretty difficult, and I still find this scene haunting me everyday since, again and again. The border took 2 hours, we got on the [View Full Entry]

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My past week was spent on the beautiful sunny Atlantic coast, which accommodated my first few days of no rain and blistering heat. My first stop was Cahuita, and on the way we stopped in Limon, a big port town, to take a break from the bus. We were getting off, when all of a sudden there was smoke everywhere, from behind which a group of riot police emerged herding us indoors. Turns out they were firing off tear gas at a bunch of protesters that were rioting against a pro-upper class government reform. After the chaos settled, and we were [View Full Entry]

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