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Published: March 8th 2010
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After our brief stop back in San Cristobal we hopped on a bus to the town of Comitan, further south near the Guatemalan border. Not many tourists stop here as most get the cushty shuttle bus straight from San Cristobal to Guatemala. But as we fancy ourselves as ´real´travellers (haha), wedecided to do the border crossing independently...
Comitan
Comitan is a nice little town with a pretty central plaza and colourful cathedral lit up nicely at night. It did get a bit chilly at night though. Here we went to a kind-of tapas bar, where with each drink you could choose a free dish of, for example, bananas in brandy and cream, cheesy chips, chocolate pancakes, popcorn with chilli sauce and lots of other random things. Here they took our picture, so if anyone ever goes here, have a look among the hundreds of pictures on the wall!
The main reason we came here was to visit the Lagos de Montebello and El Chiflon. Awaking on our first full day here we endeavoured to see both.
El Chíflon
We got to El Chiflon by taking a mini-bus out into the country, then a little tuk-tuk up
El Chiflon
A very big and powerful waterfall! the track that leads to the area. El Chiflon is a huge waterfall, padded out with campsites, a restaurant/cafe, BBQs, lots of spots in the river to swim in, a walking trail to the waterfall and a zip-line across the gorge. We walked the trail and admired the huge waterfall, then we zip-lined across the canyon and back, which was great fun, even though we didn't really understand the instructions we were given. We had a lovely swim in the clear turquoise water, and then walked back to the main road hoping to flag down another minibus. One passed just as we got to the road, but shortly after another arrived, and at first glance i thought it couldn't possibly fit anymore people. We were urged in regardless, and i sat with half of a bum cheek on a seat, wedged up against the door. The people on this bus were very friendly and we chatted with them in our limited Spanish on the journey back into town. There were only a handful of other people at El Chiflon which made it very enjoyable! It was definetly well worth the trip.
Lagos de Montebello
Back in Comitan we
El Chiflon
Facing downstream hunted down another minibus, this time to go to Lagos de Montebello - a set of picturesque lakes on the border with Guatemala. We found one and headed there, back into the countryside but in another direction.
At the lakes two young lads accosted us and offered a tour. We explained that we just wanted to walk but after lots of persistence we gave in (they were official tour-guides which encouraged us a little). This turned out to be massively to our benefit as the one lake that we had arrived at wasn't one of the main attractions, and the lakes were very spread out. So this young guy drove us around in his truck, while we would get out to walk around the various lakes. Some were very picturesque, all surrounded by verdant greenery with no human or town noises to be heard at all, very peaceful. Others were nice, but as we were seeing a lot of lakes, they were a little underwhelming (especially since it was drizzly and a bit nippy). The most impressive lakes that we saw included one very pretty lake with an island in the middle (once used for a Corona advert apparently),
El Chiflon
look closely for Ben to get a sense of scale that some tourists were rowing to on a boat that consisted of five planks trussed together, and another lake that was nationally split in half, one side belonging to Guatemala, the other to Mexico. It was the kind of place where you could stand with one leg in either country, which is always fun.
On our way back into town, a chap got onto the minibus with a bag full of live chickens (their heads poking out of the top), the first time this has happened on public transport with us present.
On to Guatemala
The next day we set out for Guatemala. This involved taking another minibus to the border town, about 1 hour and 30 minutes away, wondering what to do at customs (a surly man stamped our passports but offered no explanation), getting into a taxi driven very erratically across the 4km of inbetweeny land, then arriving at a Guatemalan town called La Mesilla.
Our first impressions of this town (and second, third, fourth and fifth) were that this was the most mental place we had ever been to. The Mexican border town was quiet, clean and orderly. La Mesilla packed in huge
amounts of people, rubbish everywhere, sounds, sights and smells overwhelming the senses, and persistent money changers and transport arrangers. We could have easily wandered through without visiting either immigration office, but we did (even though we struggled to find the Guatemalan office which was not the most official looking of places).
We then changed some pesos to Quetzals with a man in the street, as two young lads looked on, sucking ice-creams. One then took us to the bus station in his moped taxi/tuk tuk with trailer thing, Sarah on the wide seat next to him, me in the trailer with the bags. Some young boys enjoyed running along side holding onto the trailer. I had a big green shield bug on me the whole time. We then got to the bus station, which was just a dusty square with a few buses and lots of men shouting and standing around. The buses here are old school buses from the USA, just like in the films, but redesigned and painted in fantastic arrangements of colour and flames, each with its own name. We boarded one for our 4 hour journey to Quetzaltenango. Our bags were thrown up onto the
Ben deliberating a swim
the water was surprisingly cold! roof, and the next four hours were quite an experience.
We have since learned that when these buses are obtained they take the seats out and put them all back in with some extra. Now considering these were originally for children, you can see that you don´t have a lot of space. There is also no maximum capacity. Three will squeeze onto a seat, people will be in the aisle, and people will get on every now and then selling fruit, drinks, pizza, fried chicken, reading from the bible, or muttering something we couldn't understand walking slowly up and down, as the bus traveled at unbelievable speeds through the mountains.
The best thing about these buses was the luggage/ticket boy. As the bus was moving along (very fast, and on very windy roads with very steep drops either side), and someone was getting off soon, he would climb out of the door by the driver, up a ladder onto the roof. When the bus stopped, the passenger would get off and he would throw the luggage down. Then he would whistle or bang on the roof and the driver would be off again. He would then walk along
Sarah
having a swim the roof, climb back down the ladder and in through the door. We have since seen this job referred to as the Indiana Jones of Guatemala. It was quite incredible. He would also be responsible for remembering who had got on and where, and taking their money. He would also be responsible for constantly shouting ´way way´or ´Shell-a´ at passersby, drumming up trade (way way is short for Huehuetenango, the first big stop, Shell-a for Quetzaltenango, where we were headed.) Outside of Huehuetenango the bus stopped briefly, and the equivalent chap for another bus stuck his head through the window, his face an inch or two from Sarah´s, and shouted at the top of his voice ´Shella Shella Shella!!´. It made us jump but it was very funny. The journey continued like this until we finally got to Quetzaltenango (or rather, the bus station within a huge market 3kms outside of the town) just as it was getting dark. Time to find somewhere to stay!
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