http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Central America Caribbean , Guatemala , Petén Region , Tikal en-us Fri, 24 May 2013 00:31:05 +0000 Fri, 24 May 2013 00:31:05 +0000 I headed off to Tikal with the two American air hostesses I had met in the Rio Dulce. We splashed out a whole 30 a night for dinner bed and breakfast and a sunrise tour of Tikal. We had a shuttle drop us off outside the park entrance so we could wait the 2 hours until 3pm when we could but a ticket valid for the next day. We then has about a 12km drive through the jungle into Tikal and our hotel http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-775850.html Wow where to begin We spent a couple of days chilling and wandering the cobbled streets of Antigua. We had an absolutely hilarious last night... We went back to Rainbow Rooms for what we thought was going to be a reggae night... It was pretty dead to begin with just us a rude American group and two extremely eccentric Guatemalan men. We got into a conversation with them in a mixture of English http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-775674.html On Thursday Feb 25 Paulino picked us up in the little town of Flores a small town that is the capital of the State of Peten in Guatemala. It is an island in Lake Peten Itz the last holdout of the Maya against the Spanish conquista remaining an independent native city until 1697. The first to fall was Q39umarkaj 174 years earlier. The Peten was just too remote and hot to bother with app http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-773187.html In the morning we were to catch our next transport to Tikal at a hotel located a couple of miles from our hotel. The hotel owner was kind enough to agree to take us to our rendezvous site. But first breakfast About ten minutes before we were to be at our bus stop we gathered our gear and headed out to the owners truck. As things seem to go here we were not terribly surprised when it would http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-757475.html Two weeks in Central America.Starting in Cancun spending a few days in Tulum where I had wonderful days onf diving in the Cenotes.Then I spent a bit more than a week on Caye Caulker. Excellent diving wonderuf relaxed island life. No cars just golf carts... No mobile phone reception for me...From there I had a twodays trip to Guatemala to Tikal. I stayed in Flores on Lago Peten Itzca a wo http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-756269.html We woke up early this morning to go to Tikal some of the largest Mayan ruins in the world. Tikal did not disappoint it was amazing. I felt dwarfed next to the grandness of the temples. Standing there you could just imagine life back when the Mayan empire thrived. We saw ritual sites as well as old rock carvings. There were also monkeys swinging around and we are pretty sure we heard jaguars H http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-732547.html The Peten Inza lake looks like the caribbean sea from the air. I was a little confused when I saw the clear and turquoise water. La isla of Flores is a wonderful place to stay when exploring the ruins of Tikal. There isn39t much to do but take in the lake have some atoles drinks like horchata and tamarindo and tostadas and maybe go for a TukTuk ride but the ambiance gives you a nice tast http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-728279.html It was an early morning for us today. Our sunrise tour started at 415 AM. At about 4 AM the howler monkeys started roring. We put on our head lamps and walked to the main lodge where we met our guide Chino. The lodge was suppose to make us breakfast to go but something got lost in translation and they weren39t made. We walked into the jungle in the dark to temple IV. This temple had a set of w http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-715939.html Today we went to Tikal using a shuttle we booked when we arrived in Flores. There was some confusion as the company we booked with didn39t show up and we went with a different company that traded in our voucher. We arrived and checked into the Jungle lodge. We have been really lucky because we haven39t had any of our hotels booked in advance but it is the low season and there are hardly any http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-715716.html The process of buying presents for gadget enthusiasts can appear extremely daunting. They have seemingly just about every gadget below the sun and they know about all the most recent tools. The purpose of this guide is to assist you avoid the pitfalls and get the ultimate geek gadget for your loved types. Gadget obsessed geeks are notoriously tough to buy gifts for. They possibly have it or they h http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-709717.html As we continued on an outer circle around the ruins we came across some areas called complexes which were identified with letters instead of numbers. The complexes did not features such large temples and some none at all. The one thing that they all did feature was a set of impressive hieroglyphic rock carvings the best of which are now in museums which contained the text of the ancient Maya.A http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-706455.html After one more day in Lanquin at the highly suggested El Retiro Lodge we hopped a shuttle from Lanquin to Flores our base for our tour of Tikal.I39ve started to learn that posted arrival times are rarely ever met as we left at 8 am and arrived near 6 pm the trip was supposed to last 7 hours.We got off the shuttle with a hostel called La Union in mind. As we were waiting to get our bags o http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-695390.html Tikal was the capital of a conquest state that became one of the most powerful kingdoms of the ancient Maya.Though monumental architecture at the site dates back as far as the 4th century BC Tikal reached its apogee during the Classic Period ca. 200 to 900 AD. During this time the citydominated much of the Maya region politically economically and militarily while interacting with areas thro http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-693788.html Guatemala has always me think of two things worry dolls Those miniature colourful woven cotton handmade figurines kept in matchboxes and purchasable from the shop Evolution to take away your worries and my friend Tree whose parents spent much of her formative years working tirelessly on human rights for Amnesty International in this part of the world. Thats it. I know little else http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-692080.html David taps me on the shoulder as I awake crumpled on the bus and whispers Hey Drew Just thought Id let you know that the bus is going to be stuck here for next 8 hours. The car ferry is not working they need to fix it.Okay thanks for that David I sarcastically thought. We had just changed the itinerary the day before to realise we should have changed it to this way instead taking http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-691995.html HolaTikal Mayan ruins were nothing short of spectacular. The ruins are amazing as is the setting Set deep in the jungle and sprawled over 25 square miles you walk through a series of trails to each site whilst monkeys and birds sit above you in the canopy.The excavation work that has been put into recovering such an interesting settlement has been in itself amazing. Imagine having to remove ce http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-686951.html The weather has been a pain on this trip so far because of it I didnt get a sunset shot from Tikal and I also lost the sunrise pic.ltspangtltspangt I woke up at 0430 to hear the sound of rain pitterpattering on my tent so turned off the alarm and turned round and went to sleep.ltspangt I eventually got up at 0615 and headed off to wander round the ruins.ltspangt The tops of http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-680887.html Sitiing on the first bus we took in gauatemala for six hours accompanied by a rather pungent smell of urine and a spitting child meant it was a relief to finally arrive in Flores. Flores is a little island surrounded by a lake and is very pleasant to walk around. It is also the proud owner of a Christmas tree complete with star wars music awful and continuous and a cockerel at the top.Lots o http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-677818.html Another border cross and heading north and back into Guatemala cant seem to get away from this placeThe reason for my reenty and stopover is to visit Tikal supposedly one of the most spectacular of all the Mayan ruins sites. The Mayan people settled here around 700bc and by 250bc most of it was completed. It sprawls over 30sq kilometres making it way bugger than any of the other sites. As you http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-667545.html We got up at 630a to see what tour we were doing. The caves were closed because the rivers were too high so we got ready to go to Tikal. We grabbed a piece of toast and got picked up around 7a and went to pick up two other couples. There were six of us total. The border to Guatemala isn39t that far away so it didn39t take long to get there. We had to get our passports stamped and wal http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Guatemala/Peten-Region/Tikal/blog-657081.html