August 27, 2005 The ride into Guatamala is beautiful. Horses run free everywhere. People don´t fence them, they just go out and look for them when they are needed. Dogs are also plentiful. Somehow they have learned to look both ways before crossing the street. This is very good being that everyone drives like it´s the Indy 500. Our driver is doing 100 MPH on a dirt road. I´m not sure how, but we arrive safely to Tikal. He suggests we wait a few hours before entering the park. We are at the high tourist time and are more likely to [View Full Entry]

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The rain spattered off the windscreen of the minibus whisking us from Flores, where we were staying, to Tikal, the great lost city of the Mayans (how come all these great civilisations managed to keep losing these huge cities anyway?). I (Gerry) was by myself, as Denise doesn't best like ruins and she and I would visit them together the next day anyway. To be fair we have seen more ruins over the last 10 months than most archaeologists see in a lifetime. I, however, never fail to get excited by a pile of old stones in some quiet bit of [View Full Entry]

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Yes, I know, always been full of it...but now full of espanol...hey, this is an ordinary keyboard...@ is where it should be but no n with the bizzo!...so greetings from Antigua, the city in Guatemalam not the other one...where were we?..Lake Atitlan the huge caldera of the old volcano..320 m deep, stayed at Panajachel on the shores...lots of touristas, shop/stalls all the color of the Mayan textiles, carvings, bags, bits and bobs,,you know... Early in the morning watching a older gringo guy sipping his morning coffee, lips pursing in expectation even before his cup left the saucer...eyes sort [View Full Entry]

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Quetza que?? Chicken bus rules man!! You ride cheap, run a lower risk of getting your bus ride hijacked and you get to sit with 2 other big hipped Mayan women on a seat built for 2..if youre lucky you get their kid in your lap, or a chicken...but hey, why sit alone when we can be one big happy international family all together!! Yea so after a liiiindo beautiful scenic trip over and under and around mountains, valleys and volcanoes we finally got to the place. They call it Quetzaltenango or Xela for short..figure that one out..makes getting the right [View Full Entry]

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Websites and guidebooks told us not to go near San Pedro on Lake Atitlan as it is a hotbed of armed robberies and rapes. So how did we manage to end up there digging in to a rare fried breakfast complete with crispy bacon? Well, as some of the small roads around the lake are too dangerous to travel on, we reckoned we would be safer on a boat! We booked an all-day boat trip around the lake. The first place the boat stopped, for breakfast, was San Pedro! Anyway it seemed quiet enough and we had a beautiful view of [View Full Entry]

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As Guatemala City, the capital of Guatemala, is supposed to be one of the most dangerous cities in the world, we didn't hang around for long, but we did have to stay one night there as we flew in after dark. Our guesthouse was fortified like an Iraqi police station, which made us think all the hype might just be true! In the morning we hastily sped off for the beautiful old town of Antigua. Antigua is a UNESCO World Heritage site and hears how they describe it "Antigua, the capital of the Captaincy-General of Guatemala, was founded in the early [View Full Entry]

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Antigua is a small town surrounded by volcanoes (one of them Guate's only active one!) and mountains scattered witn Maya villages. Life goes on slowly in Antigua, Maya women come down from the hills early in the morning to say a quick prayer in the yellow church by the plaza before heading for a long day at the market, and we creep out of our room (that's the one with the huge mouldy patch on the roof) and head to one of Antiguas many laid back cafes to start the day with a traditional breakfast: eggs, fried platains, black beans and [View Full Entry]

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Trying to get some photos from the last few days... Got out of Quetzaltenango after more wrong turns...if there's a one-way street, I'll always find it...and head down the wrong way!...endless bumper to bumper, trucks, cars, bikes, down narrow, dusty, bumpy, crowded little thoroughfare, sudden turns for a few blocks, back on the straight, cutting along the inside to pass, trucks trying to run me into the gutter, cars pushing at the back wheel, pedestrians dodging out of the way, dirty, dusty, shop fronts or whatever covered in dust, no signs at all, just hope we're on the right road!..get a [View Full Entry]

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Rugged up for the first time in a while...v strange after sweating it for so long. So, where were we? back to the 22/7 looking for Barra de Cruz, the famous point break...only 100 something ks from that last beach...can't remember, stayed there for 3 days tho'...Tony at his new bar El Burro Barracho was good host, dinky little hotel...surf scene..right on the beach..oh yeah Puerto Escondido, yI think I,ve written it up, tres pretty and in the early stages of development, sure to be unrecognisable in another few years, sorta close for americanos and canadians to fly in......so, on the [View Full Entry]

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Spanish Language Schools Guide Today I'll write about La Madrastra from business point of view. What they keep saying is "Don't miss the final episodes... Don't miss the final week of La Madrastra..." for past 3 weeks I think. After investing more than one month of time watching it, I do want to watch the conclusion of the program. And the another thing that they do is to start the new show before finishing the old one. For example, the running time of La Madrastra is from 8pm t [View Full Entry]

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