Blogs from Antigua, Capital Region, Guatemala, Central America Caribbean - page 12

We awoke Sunday morning at 6 a.m. to very loudly ringing church bells, which could be heard throughout the city. We are talking, manual ringing here. As an aside, it is funny how you get used to what is available to you for a shower, and forget what you had. It is also curious how you begin to expect to hear Spanish outside your window and start to know what is being said! The owner of our hotel was to be setting up the next leg of our trip to Lake Atitlan. She was supposed to email us the information the previous evening. By morning, we had no email from her. We went next door to eat breakfast and to see her about the information (her office is upstairs as she owns the restaurant also). Clay ... read more

After a couple of day, the exhaust just becomes part of the world around us. It’s kind of like cooking something really pungent in the house. You don’t really realize how much it really smells until you walk out to get the mail and then when you come back inside… WHAM! It hits you like a ton of bricks! At first, Ann wanted to throw up, but now? Nah. What exhaust? We sat and wondered if lungs can really fill up with bad things or that is just something we have been told. First stop of the day, BREAKFAST! We will spare you the repetitive details, as breakfast was a replay of the day before. (Luckily Wilson was able to join us. See photos) Once we were fueled up, we strolled over to Saint Jerome School ... read more

We started our day by talking to the valet parking guy and asked him to get us a taxi to Miami International, as there was not a shuttle from our particular hotel. As it happens, and in the traditional Latin American style, he knew somebody that would not overcharge us. This special arrangement was only available to us because he is a good guy and just wanted to help. (Yea... OK.) So, private transport to Miami airport was quite exciting and seatbelt was required. Our guy really knew what he was doing, but it was much crazier than the worst of Jacksonville’s morning rush hour traffic. Miami airport was busy, very busy. But, not so much for the international flights. Our hiking backpacks were the only luggage we had and due to the multiple straps and ... read more

This weekend was the first weekend I went out on an overnight adventure. I had the best time! I went to a place called Semuc Champey. I was in heaven! This place is a tourist spot so there is a lot of different stuff to do. I’m pretty sure we got to do all of them! So on Friday we left at two in the afternoon and arrived at the hostel around eleven thirty (I think). This hostel had the box springs for beds and a nice molded pillow to go with it. So after looking over the room to make sure there was no centipede crawling out of my pillow I fell asleep. We had to wake up by seven the next morning so we could eat breakfast and then adventure to Semuc. Well that ... read more

Dangey Fever, a very rare illness you contract from mosquitos. There is only a certain type of mosquito that can carry this illness and no one in Maximo Nival history has every received this disease until this weekend. I happen to be that one in a million to receive Dangey Fever. There are two types of Dangey Fever. Type A and type B, The symptoms are similar except with type B you can bleed out your eyes, mouth, ears etc.. I happen to have Type A thanks god! So my symptoms consisted of a 104 fever, achy body, stomach pain, and my eyes felt like they were going to fall out. On the third day of this horrible agony I agreed with calling a doctor. The doctor came and hour later, took my tempter, and was ... read more