Blogs from Capital Region, Guatemala, Central America Caribbean - page 6

Christmas Blog Letter - 2015 December 21, 2015 Dear Friends and Family, This has been a difficult letter for me to write as I review the past year’s events; for those who may not know, John passed away on May 4 of metastatic prostate cancer, peacefully at home according to his wishes. We were blessed to have had fifty years of wonderful adventures together raising two amazing children who have given us three amazing grandchildren: Erika and Jose’s son Daniel is ten and live in Austin, TX and Matt and Megan live in Antigua, Guatemala with Lorelai Pearl (Lola, age 3 3/4) and Cash (age two). Last year’s letter ended by saying we were leaving for Chile and Antarctica shortly and indeed, we did just that. We spent six days on our own in the Lake ... read more

Just two nights, one day in Antigua before heading to San Pedro La Laguna for a few days round Lago Atitlan. The shuttle to Antigua wasn't the longest bus ride (took about 8 hours), but definitely the least comfortable so far! We have spent the day getting laundry done (yay- clothes don't smell cavey anymore!) and wandering around the city. It's a very pretty colonial city, with lots of church ruins and churches that have been rebuilt, pastel coloured shops and houses and cobbled roads. The city used to be the capital, before it was nearly destroyed by an earthquake in 1773. It's surrounded by 3 volcanoes, including one active one, but the clouds meant that we couldn't really see anything!! Very excited to be at Lago Atitlan tomorrow for my birthday :)... read more

The flight into Guatemala City was pretty spectacular because the plane had to skirt around two lofty towers of cumulonimbus clouds with the sun setting behind them. The greater intensity of Guatemala City was immediately obvious at the airport. More pushy taxi touts, and more serious frowns on the crowd. Bill's friend David met us at the exit and took us across town to his family's lovely home in a gated community within GC. They generously provided a lovely meal of beef, wild mushrooms and asparagus souffle, and more alcohol than one could respectfully accept. We drank a lot, and really enjoyed the Guatemalan rum "Zacapa" as well as a Spanish sherry in the solero style called "Cardinal Mendoza". Later when I visited Dan Murphys on the web, I was only able to find Romate Cardinel, ... read more

The 25th of July is not an average day in Antigua apparently. Today the entire town celebrated Saint James, all day, non - stop, everywhere. Music flooded the streets and thousands paraded through with different costumes and dances. Sitting in Central Park watching the locals enjoying the celebrations but also the peddlers trying to make some money and extremely young children shining shoes and selling cigarettes shows how polarised our societies are. We escaped the fiesta for a couple of hours on the coffee tour high up in the mountains. Did you know coffee starts off as a red fruit? Well we know everything about coffee now! And we have realised that coffee back home is not real coffee! While up there one of the volcanoes puffed out some smoke which you can sort of see ... read more

Sigh. The Spanish language opened itself up to me about 20 years ago (cue the yikes of realization) and I have never been the same. Sitting back in my 8th grade classroom, Sra. Weaver scribbled the words "presente" and "ausente" on the board... and time stopped. It is a bit bizarre to think of such an innocuous moment as one that has so changed my way, but maybe I had an inkling even then. Maybe I knew that I would become obsessed. Maybe I already had. So obsessed, you see, that a close lady friend and I embark tomorrow to Guatemala, making this my ninth Latin American country visited so far. And when I was writing a response email to dear Jesús, the first lad from whom we will be renting a room... I struggled. Can ... read more