Xela and the agua caliente

---

It was a welcome change to leave Antigua, even though I was really sad to leave the family I was staying with. Getting up after a night of Cuba Libres and a sweaty jazz club for my 7.00 bus to Quelzaltenango (thankfully shortened to Xela by the locals) was a bit more difficult . . .

I left with Michael, this German guy from my school who was also going to be spending the weekend there before heading to Miami and civilisation. We got some local long distance bus and spent the next seven hours (should take four) sitting at road blocks while Mayan families got on and off selling everything from drinks to tortillas and carne and ice cream from ice boxes. It was the most trying journey yet.

Eventually we arrived in Xela. The city is at 8,000 feet and so pretty damn cold. But its also really beautiful and the main square is really impressive with its huge colonial buildings. As the second largest city in Guatemala its pretty cosmopolitian but calmer and richer than the capital. We ate out in a fantastic Italian restaurant where the chef (an Italian) told us his life story about how hed lived all over Europe and cooked for the King of Spain etc etc before coming here. It was never quite clear how he came to be cooking in Xela but we chose to believe him.

The next day, Sunday, we caught a chicken bus and then a pick up to go to some hot springs (Fuente Georgina) about half an hour from Xela. Pick ups here back up the crowded buses. Basically theyre really battered things from years ago with a metal frame on the back so the idea is you pay your 30 cents, and hope into the back with the five or six other families and hold on for dear life as you bump along into town. Its actually a great bonding experience because every person is as uncomfortable as the next. It does beat the five to a seat rule on the chicken bus though.

We got a little ripped off on the ride up, which is the way here really. You save on something and lose on the next. In this case our pick up driver was quoting locals a fifth of the price we were charged right in front of us. Either way the driver was a nice guy and the two us got to squeeze in the front with him because the back was jammers already. He took us up the hill where the mist got really really thick and the air colder and dropped us off.

There were three big pools at the base of a cliff with water trickling down. It was pretty rough and ready and mostly locals. We had to climb down some rocks to get into the water. We expected it to be hot, it was boiling. Once you got used to your skin scalding though it was pretty cool being in the middle of a rain forest type surrounding (and even the odd massive insect paddling along beside you). My bikini was steaming when I got out (we only lasted about an hour). We headed back into Xela with another pick up and called an early night because the next day I had to catch the six am chicken bus to the mountain school.

---

Comments

[Xtof]

2.40 AM and you want me to convert 8 000 feet in meters ? You're not making my night easier :-) Allez j'ai fait un effort, et effectivement, à cette altitude, ça commence à faire un peu froid... Enfin moi j'aurais bien aimé :-) En tout cas, content de voir que tu as mis un nouveau post sur ton blog. Et tu sais que ici, à Paris, je suis pas le seul à attendre la suite de tes aventures ! Xtof

[christine hofman]

At last we have a blog
Great to see you are back to a civilise world. waiting to have news from Mexico next week.