Advertisement
Published: June 27th 2007
Edit Blog Post
Hello all!! Sorry we have been so bad at updating this blog. Its actually really difficult to find time to write what we have been doing everyday but this afternoon is a chill one so I will make the update.
What were we doing when I last wrote...oh yeah, we had hiked Pacaya and finished our second day of language classes, man that seems like forever ago, haha!
The third day in Antigua we slept in (finally) and walked around the town exploring the shops and finding out what else was around each little corner. We ended up finding this really cool church that was undergoing a facelift that was about 75-100 years past due. For about .40 cents we got to walk through the ruins and down in to the catacombs and see the altars that are still up. Locals still come to the church and keep candles burning 24 hours a day. It was a beautiful day and we took lots of really cool pictures. Speaking of pictures I have yet to use a computer with a USB port so I have no way of getting my photos on here, arg!!!! Guatemala is full of very, very old computers that just have basic functions and spanish keyboards so I still have not figured out how to do an apostrophe (am I spelling that right?)...anyone know the alt code for that?????? haha...seriously.
Anyhow, we took our thrid lesson that afternoon and our final lesson Saturday morning. It was hard to say goodbye to Paolina and Julio as they had become like our little family in Antigua. We spent that afternoon just wandering around some more and ended up getting caught in a huge downpour but it was fun anyways.
On Sundays, the town of Chichicastanengo becomes a huge market with loads of people coming to buy everything from food and clothing to huge pieces of metal and livestock. We took a shuttle from Antigua with 6 other people and got there around 8am. The market was unbelievably overwhelming and packed full of tourists and local natives. Children as young as 2 or 3 years old try to sell you little items and native women push blankets and other hand woven itmes in your face trying to get you to buy. Since Cam and I were going on to Lake Atitlan that afternoon we had to carry our packs the whole time and that was not enjoyable at all. I was hitting so many people with my bag (on accident) and getting through the crowds proved difficult when most Guatemalans stand barely over 5 feet tall. We bought some items for some people (be excited readers...it might be you, lol) and after 3 hours there had had enough of the shoving and bargaining.
We had to catch three different chicken buses to get to Panajachel which is the town on the Lake we wanted to stay at, but the long trip was worth it. Lake Atitlan is so beautiful and surrounded by huge peaks (I think a couple are volcanos) and the town of Pana is a small little hippie town inhabited by many foreigners. We stayed in a really awesome hostel called Marios Rooms and we had a very nice room with t.v. (the first!) and a huge porch with hammocks right outside our door. We met a friendly guy from Germany named Gerhard who said he would like to join us on a boat tour around the Lake the next day. We thought this would be a good idea since the cost goes down the more people you have on the tour.
Monday morning we got up early enough to catch a tour that started at 8am. Gerhard turned out to be very strange and annoying and by the first stop in San Marcos we were ready to be rid of him but alas, had to spend the rest of the day with him. We went to San Marcos, San Pedro and Santiago, all along the Eastern side of the lake. San Marcos was very sleepy and nothing really to see or do so we did not spend much time there, as with San Pedro. People usually go to those towns to relax and meditate and not have to do anything so I guess those were not the best places to choose for our tour.
In Santiago we knew we wanted to go see Maximon (pronounced Masheemon), which is a figure of like a mexican cowboy who has for some reason become a deity in Guatemala and people bring him gifts and money and pray to him to bring good things, bad things, whatever their hearts desire. When we hopped off the boat in Santiago an older little man approached us and asked if we wanted to see Maximon and we said yes. We followed Salvador up in to town and down a couple of dusty streets until we reached a little dark building. It smelled like very stronge incense going in to the first room and when we reached Maximon room the smokey air and smell was sooooo intense. The little figure stood no more than 2 feet tall and was smoking a cigarette with the help of his "aids" who watch over the figure and keep him happy. It was one of the strangest things I have ever seen but also one of the coolest. Salvador said prayers for the "gringas (white girls) and the Alamanian (german man)" and showered us with smokey incense. I did feel blessed and at that moment was in awe over the sheer blind faith that some people have in something like a two foot tall wooden carving. After many thanks and of course an offering of money to Maximon we left the little place and explored the awesome church that sits atop the mountain.
By the time we got back to Pana it already felt like it had been a long day when really it was only about 1:30. We decided we had seen enough of the Lake and Pana and that it was time to go to the jungle. We booked our shuttle from Pana to Guatemala City and the huge bus (think tourists on the way to Reno style) from Guatemala City up to Flores. Our shuttle left at 6am and we would not be in Flores until after 7pm so we had a huge day of sitting ahead of us. That was yesterday and now I am tired of typing so you will all have to wait a couple more days to hear about the Mayan ruins of Tikal and the city of Flores. The only thing I will tell you is that it is hot as hell and the humidity has to be over 100%!!!
Anyways, just know we are doing good and travelling smart and hopefully tomorrow I{ll be able to find a place with a USB port so I can share some of the awesome pictures we have taken.
Love to you all!!!
Em & Cam
Advertisement
Tot: 0.063s; Tpl: 0.01s; cc: 9; qc: 47; dbt: 0.0363s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb