"Miren, caballos lindos!"

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Hi everyone,

A few weeks ago my friend Jenn and I embarked on a 2 week Central America adventure. We visited Guatemala, Belize, and Mexico, and we had an INCREDIBLE time. Mom suggested using travelblog like I did in Argentina to share our adventures with all of you, so here it goes!!

After nearly 24 hours of travel time we arrived in Guatemala City. It's not all that far away, but the cheapest flight included us taking the train to LA, a bus to LAX, and a 5 hour layover in North Carolina. But hey, we saved 100 bucks! After arriving we immediately left the city for Antigua, a small colonial town to the southwest. Antigua is small but beautiful, with cobblestone roads, brightly painted buildings, and dozens of churches. We ended up staying at the most amazing hostel, The Black Cat, where we met lots of other backpackers and had an interesting night with face paint. The next day we woke up at 5am to hike Volcan Pacaya, an active volcano. The hike was actually pretty challenging compared to other "hikes" I've done in the past, the views were spectacular, and we were able to get about 10 feet from the lava. The craziest part was how hot the air got as we neared the flowing magma, everyone was sweating like crazy. Some Israeli girls brought marshmallows and our guide helped us roast them over the lava flow!!

The other highlight of Antigua was my first taste of fried plantains - so delicious! Jenn and I discovered a great way to save money AND lose weight in Central America - eating street food. It's ridiculously cheap but delicious and authentic, and so greasy that we usually felt too sick to eat more than twice a day. 😊

After Antigua we made our way to Lake Atitlan, a huge lake in Western Guatemala. We stayed in a little town called San Pedro right on the shore. The lake was breathtaking, as you can see from the pictures. We went horseback riding through the mountains and got to check out a coffee plantation - you can imagine how excited I was. The coffee farmers in that region practice sustainable farming, growing all sorts of plants right next to each other. They also cultivate shade grown coffee which is much better for the environment. I also got to learn about different types of coffee trees and the process of drying and roasting the beans.

We got very lucky with the weather, since September is rainy season, and most days we only saw sun. But there was also a TON of thunder at lightning without rain. I have never seen so much lightning in my life. Sitting out on the hospedaje balcony during the warm evenings and watching the lightning is one of my favorite memories from Guatemala.

Our next destination was Flores, on the other side of the country, and to get there we had to go back through Guatemala City. Instead of an expensive shuttle, we decided to take a chiki bus. Sadly there were no live chickens on ours, but it was an experience nonetheless. A chiki bus is an old school bus painted bright colors and with a rack up top to throw your stuff in. There are no schedules or bus terminals for public transportation in Guatemala, we had to ask around to find out which corner to catch it on. I'm honestly surprised our backpacks made it, they weren't strapped down at all, but since the locals stashed their stuff up there too we knew it would be ok. It was a fun bus ride; bumpy, loud, and packed with people, and the scenery was gorgeous.

Our one and only purpose in Flores was to visit the Mayan ruins at Tikal. These ruins are unique because they are surrounded by jungle unlike most other Mayan sites. We spent a whole day hiking around the huge park; there were so many ruins and several still being excavated, and tons of wildlife. We saw howler monkeys, coatis, butterflies, GIANT spiders, snakes, frogs, bats, the list goes on. The various temples we saw were quite impressive, and had great views from the top. On they way back from the ruins, our van ran out of gas. We waited on the side of the road for nearly an hour and a half, another van came to pick us up. Luckily there were several other young backpackers with us, so it was easy to laugh about the whole thing as we sat in the middle of the road waiting. It could definitely have been a lot worse. But Guatemala was definitely the most challenging country I have been to, and at times very frustrating. Everything worked out well in the end, though I think mostly because of luck, but I guess that is part of the fun in travel!

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Photos

Volcan Pacaya
yeah we hiked this.

LAVA!!
it was really hot.

"miren, caballos lindos!!"
...what a little local girl squealed as we went by on our horses - "Look, pretty horses!!"

Howler Monkey
we saw sooo many!

a face
i think this is supposed to be King Moon Double Comb but i forget

the view from the sacrificial altar
just kidding, the Mayans didn't do full human sacrifices, just a few drops of blood. Apocalypto is false, i'm going to write a letter to Mel.

face painting fun?
getting rowdy with some aussies

Comments

[Kevin Hunt]

request
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