In late October I met up with two friends. Mark has been living in Buenos Aires for the past year and was traveling North making his way back to the US. His girlfriend Sarah got time off of work to come down and meet us. The three of us booked a trip on the Inca Trail some time in July. I was still in Costa Rica and up until then had not made any plans this far in advance, but being in Peru by late October seemed like a good thing to shoot for. Mark and I know each other because we studied abroad together in Buenos Aires a few years ago and I of course met Sarah through Mark. We met up in Cusco a few days before the hike to get acclimated. The ... read more

After spending a few days in San Jose I headed to the Nicoya Peninsula to visit my friend Derek. We studied together in Sevilla and both went to Colorado. He lives in the tiny town of Los Angeles. There are little over 400 people living in the town. Derek has lived there for almost 2 years volunteering in the Peace Corp. I arrived right in the middle of Semana Cultural, which is more or less a semi-organized town Olympics. During this week pretty much everyone stops working and they play games all day. There was everything from relay races, egg toss, checkers and an obstacle course to soccer, basketball and a three-point competition. The entire town is divided up into eight teams each with a name and a team color. They try to divide the teams ... read more

I left Antigua for Honduras where I met up with my mom, sister, Susan, Mary and Hayden. We arrived in Copan Ruinas very near the Guatemalan border. This is a nice town tucked into a valley surrounded by mountains. Copan is also the site of the southern-most large Mayan city. This ruin site, like all the others, had its own unique features to offer that other sites may not have had. Copan in particular is known for its carvings and hieroglyphics. What makes these special is how deeply carved in the rocks they are, the rulers or city designers here had different interests from building the largest temples possible, perhaps they just had smaller egos. After walking around you could really see what the people here found important compared to the rulers in other cities, ... read more

Well it has been quite a while since my last update, and I have covered a lot of ground since then. From San Cristobal I made my way to Palenque to see maybe the most impressive Mayan city. (Unfortunately I sent home my memory card with Palenque photos!) I got up and made my way around the ruins when they opened to avoid most of the crowds. Without a doubt my favorite ruins thus far. I could elaborate more, but words cannot do this place justice. From there I made my way to Cancun for purposes different than the majority that visit there. My intentions were to get certified for Scuba Diving and get out. Not much culture, very pricey and resort hotels take away the real feel of the country. I did get certified ... read more

I started my trip in Mexico city on the 25th of January. I went to all the popular spots in the city. The Zocalo is the huge city square with the presidential palace and National Cathedral. I stayed with a very nice family while I was there. They live in Xochimilco, which is in the southern part of the city near the University of Mexico. In this part of the city there are canals that the Aztecs built and used for obvious agricultural purposes, but today it is mostly used for some fishing and on Sundays families come out and rent long brightly painted boats, more like larger gondolas. Someone drives the boat around the canals with plenty of food and beverages being sold from other boats and mariachi music on others. The mexican gondola ... read more