Blogs from Verapaz Region, Guatemala, Central America Caribbean - page 12

Laquin ended up being an amazing place to jsut hang out and meet other travels and generally enjoy doing nothjing. We stayed for 4 nights, after planning to spend just one, we ended up having an amazing time. We viste Semuc Champey, where we went on a tour organised thru the hostel. But it was defintely worth it and couldn´t never have ahd the same experience without our guiides. We arrived at the caves and we astounded by the beautiful surrounds of forested hills, huge river and pretty waterfalls. Before we explored the caves we go to play in the river. In fact the whole day constited of playing. We went on this massive swing over the river and then mid flight would jump off, trying to land as gracefully as possible. I naturally screamed like ... read more

To be honest, as nice as Antigua is, there's so much else to do around Guatemala that you can't spend every weekend here. It's location in the country makes it relativly easy to travel around and as there are so many tour companies situated here, you might as well take advantage of them, though ask around a few places first to check prices. One thursday, myself and Dave from the project decided that we could get onto a tour to the Alta Verapaz region of Guatemala, home of Semuc Champey with turquoise lagoons, and Lanquin with it's natural caves filled with vampire bats! We found a tour group (Chisubin Travel Agency Operator) around the Parque Central of Antigua that would provide us with transport, 2 nights accomodation in Lanquin and activities for $70 - For what ... read more

Semuc Champey!!! We checked in at the front desk of El Recreo at 830am about transport and we got a car at 9am. It was a 4-door truck like yesterday's transport but the bed was framed in so passengers could hold onto the bars. We went to El Retiro and picked up a crowd before heading out to Semuc Champey (stupid El Retiro and their crowds of people staying there instead of us...). With 15 or so people standing in the back of the pickup the frame rather resembled a pen for gringo transport. Our initial plans were to just get transport to Semuc ($5.50 each way), but we were offered a tour that included transport, Semuc Champey admission ($7US), a tour of the Las Marias Caves ($4US), and tubing on the river for only a ... read more

Back to internet so time for an update on whats been happening. Leaving Flores our 5 hour directo bus turned out to be anything but. After 5 hours we pulled into a larger than expected town but were pleased to finally be there. You can imagine our surprise when we suddenly realized we had sailed 1.5hrs past our turn off in order to drop half the collectivo (minibus) off. Just to add to our smiles and head shaking the driver dropped us in a car park outside a shopping mall while we waited for him to pop home for lunch his wife had cooked. Finally after 9 hours we arrived in Lanquin just in time for the evening down pour. Unfortunately our bags rode on the roof and so our room resembled a Chinese laundry as ... read more

Nonstop action! We endure more sweaty bus rides and miles of loose rocks called "roads" until we arrive in the far flung communities of Lanquin and Semuc Champey. Dave and I broke off from the ladies for this adventure (they went to a big Guatamalen market to shop). The big attraction here are the caves. We arrive late in the afternoon and head directly for the cavernous Lanquin Caves. We are told that many thousands of bats blast from the entrance of this cave everynight at around 6:30pm. That gave us 2 hours to explore. We don our headlamps and begin the adventure. It turns out that the front section of the cave has some electrical lighting. At first this is actually kind of disappointing, but it turns out that these lights help us appreciate these ... read more