Nebaj to Todos Santos

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Todos Santos was the last and most interesting town I visited as part of a six-day trek from Nebaj to Todos Santos, with Quetzaltrekkers, which is located in the back of Casa Argentina in Xela (Quetzaltenango). This blog is mainly a cursory account of my trip and a review of the trek.

6-Day Excursion to the Highlands

I definitely wanted to get into the Guatemalan highlands, not only for the scenery but because this area was so deeply impacted by the civil war. I met some travelers who went to Nebaj on their own, and they seemed pretty disappointed. There isn't much there to see; however, the four or five-hour trip to Todos Santos each way is worth it, as it´s a proud, unique and vibrant town.

Quetzaltrekkers calls this a six-day trek, though it´s really only four, with two days of bus travel. This made me hesitant to do the trip, but they seem to have it down to a science, and the first and last days have just five hours of travel apiece, which isn´t terrible. They travel by chickenbuses and colectivos to keep costs low, so don´t expect to be comfortable.

Scenery

The scenery is pretty spectacular. The altiplano, while harsh and unforgiving, is like hiking in a fantasy novel. This was especially the case on the second day of walking. We woke up at 3:30 AM to avoid the noonday sun and stop for breakfast during our ascent to the altiplano, but I'd rather just walk in the heat. Regardless, the altiplano is more varied and rugged than what I've seen in South America. Enormous boulders swim in the usual grasses and blend with colorful vegetation. The views are expansive - we could see all the major peaks around us, including the lightly erupting Santa Maria. It was cold at times. Altitude changes everything.

The Guides Rose to the Occasion

Our group had seven clients and three guides. I´ve mentioned in another blog that the guides work extremely hard to please everyone, and their weekly schedules are pretty daunting. All of the volunteers are foreigners in their late teens or early twenties, and they really never get a day off. Basically, foreign clients pay reasonable prices for the trek, the guides volunteer their services, and most of the money goes to help local children. Plus, local villagers get some of the money for their role.

This hike always has a local guide who helps, and Santi told stories about the area - particularly about the civil war - all along the way. He also encouraged family patriarchs and matriarchs to talk to us about their experiences and what life is like there. One tired man with yellow, bloodshot eyes told us a story of him being taken from his house at gunpoint by government soldiers when he was a teenager and lined up with other townsmen. Everyone was terrified as they thought they were about to be executed. He obviously lived to tell the tale.

I was pumping water through one of their ancient water filters one day and noticed some of it was overflowing. I didn't say anything and just drank the water, which was a giant mistake.

I woke up in the morning sick. Irma, one of the guides, walked slowly with me and didn't pressure me to make the decision to give up. "I'll be ok, I know my body," I told her. That turned out to be wildly inaccurate and on the next climb my energy rapidly declined to the point I just couldn't walk anymore. I'd never been to the point where, even if there was a gun to my head, I could not take another step.

They quickly found and arranged for a minibus to take me from the road to the next town. Andrew, a guide who was in school to be an EMT, went with me and took care of me for 3 days, giving me medicine when my fever got high and encouraging me to drink water and rest. The accommodations were pretty uncomfortable because we weren´t close to civilization, but their help got me through the worst of the stomach bug. They were professional and gave me more attention than I needed. For this reason alone I can't recommend them enough.

I'll spare you the details, but I spent most of that night staggering back and forth dozens of times through the heavy rain and mud between a dirty, wet mattress on the floor of a mud hut and pit toilets under a corrugated metal roof from which I had a disquieting view of dozens of glowing pig and dog eyes. There was a point where I started laughing because it was so bad - certainly the worst night of my life, and I've had some tough ones. Hopefully it stays that way for a long time.

Accommodations and Food

For this hike, we stayed with families and ate at local comedores (restaurants, but really just houses with big dining room tables and moms that cook for a charge) along the way. Don´t expect these accommodations to have any luxuries. Most don´t have showers, but the guides arranged some time for us in local temascales, which are basically Mayan saunas built underground below corrugated metal lean-tos. They seem unnecessarily dangerous, but the heat was intense - definitely hotter than a sauna.

The food was pretty basic (tamales and beans) and when they had beds, the mattresses were very old and pretty disgusting. After a long day walking, I didn´t care much, and the rest of the group handled it well, but I could see it getting to some people. In some ways, it was better to sleep on the floor on my air mattress. Some of the toilets are pit toilets and we basically lived side by side with the families, and their many animals, including chickens and pigs. During the rainy season, everything is covered in mud and muck. An owner of a comedor asked if we liked the one town and we politely said yes, but she said sarcastically, "Really? Do you like the mud?"

The area is quite poor, so there isn´t really any option other than living as the people do, which in a way, is part of the experience. I know it sounds like I'm panning the trek, but despite everything that went wrong for me, it still was well worth it. There's no other realistic way to explore this region (2023 edit - from what I can tell on their website, this continues to be the case) and it's as authentic as it gets. The people are grateful for the business and interest - their way of life and struggles would be unrecognized without treks like this. And it's never going to become too touristy because you couldn't do it on your own because there are no real accommodations.

Gear

I highly recommend taking your own backpack, sleeping bag, and sleeping pad. Otherwise, you´ll be stuck with their equipment, which is pretty poor. In a way, that's a positive, since it likely means they maximize their spending on the orphans they work with and not the comfort of the backpackers who are on holiday. But expect to carry a lot - their gear isn't light and they don't use dehydrated food. We carried things like potatoes and avocados, which is nuts. On another hike I did with them in Nicaragua, they carried cooked pasta because they weren't confident they could get their stove to work in the rain. Because of my experience above, I've donated a few gravity water filters to them, but it might be a good idea to have your own, or at least some iodine pills.

There are more photos below.

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Photos

Pueblo in the Altiplano.
I guess there is no sense trying to move all those rocks -- there are no farms here, just livestock.

Dog and Me
The second night we slept on the floor of a one-room school.

Vista
From the Altiplano, there are views of Volcan Tajulmuco, Santa Maria, and several other peaks.

Pantalones
All of the men in Todos Santos wear these candy-striped pants.

Filtering water
The filter kept overflowing with water, which is almost certainly what made me sick.