Day 9 - Lanquin Caves

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Lacey and I awoke at 4:30am and were ready to leave at 4:45 but realized we were locked IN the hotel. A guy finally came and let us out around 5:30. We walked to find a bus station listed in both our guide books. We found the station but it no longer existed. lol. We did find a shuttle bus and paid a little more but 2 hours later we were in Lanquin.

The hotel here is called El Retiro. It's awesome. Everything is wooden huts. The restaurant has swings around the bar. It also has family-style dinner. The toilets are eco-friendly/non-flush. You pee in the front and poop in the back, then put a spoon of lime powder down it to keep it from smelling. There is internet after all too! You sit on cushions on the floor while at the computer.

Lacey and I lazed around the hotel, jumped in the river, caught some rays, and ate some lunch. In the afternoon we signed up for a tour to the lanquin caves.

The ride to the caves was in the back of a pickup truck. It took about 10 minutes to get there. Once at the caves, our guide took us through. My pictures of these did not turn out very well but I can say that these were cool caves. MUCH bigger than the caves we went in with those guys in Honduras.

There were a lot of man made stone steps that made climbing easier. There were also lights strung for lighting. There was a section though that we needed candles/flashlights for. We also needed to climb through narrow passages and up small slits, balancing ourselves on rocks. It was cool though.

The best part was at the end. We waited until dusk and then sat at the entrance of the cave and watched all the bats leave the cave. I thought it would just be a bunch that would leave and then it would be done 5 minutes later, but we sat there for 15-20 minutes and they just kept going.

The whole time I kept thinking how much Uncle Dave and Auntie Barbara would LOVE this. lol. There were literally thousands of bats. Steady flow. They flew so close to us that you could feel the breeze as they flew past your head. Leaving was the hardest part. It was scary wondering if they were gonna hit you as you walked out. In fact, one hit my head as I walked out. I was making little screams the whole time as I was leaving. The guide thought I was funny. He kept calling me "Sarita" (little Sarah) the whole time.

Got back to the hotel and despite our dirtiness (literally had dirt all over our legs) we had no time to shower before dinner, as we were already late. It was a HUGE BBQ. SO much food and great stuff too. After dinner I hung around for a bit but my sinuses have been acting up so I felt kinda shitty and head to bed.

I was asleep for awhile until the guy in the loft upstairs was having extremely loud sex and was shaking the entire hut. One of the other girls in my room (who's from Montreal) finally went out to porch and yelled for them to stop. After that we heard nothing. Lovely.

Today I head to Semuc Champey. There are apparently tougher caves but then an awesome afternoon in the waters. Lacey was out a little too late and drank a little too much so she won't be joining me. It's a full day trip. I'll be back for dinner then off to bed and up early tomorrow to head to Tikal.

My trip is coming to an end. Sad but I'm ready to head home... home in Honduras. Weird feeling missing my "home" in Honduras.

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Comments

[Uncle Dave]

BATS....AHHHHHH...!!!
Glad to hear you are having a great vacation... as for the BATS, I am not sure why anyone would want to put them in a situation like that where thousands of birds could come and peck your eyes out....LOL. Enjoy the rest of your trip, looking forward to seeing you in a few weeks.

[clara]

Sarah...sounds like interesting toilets....and I thought the self-cleaning ones in Germany were different...when this strange object comes up and rotates around the toilet seat spraying water. I guess Germany is pretty high tech compared to the lime powder of Central America!