Blogs from Western Highlands, Guatemala, Central America Caribbean - page 103

Well, I spent another hellacious night listening to wild dogs and demon possessed roosters carrying on outside of my room. From this point forward, I'll be wearing my headset or some ear plugs. Oh yeah, if my spelling is off it's because there's no spell check here...it's all in español. Sleep deprived and now with a cold coming on, I bartered a boat ride to Santa Cruz La Laguna for 20 quetzals. On the ride over I met a man (James) who was an acupuncturist in Pana, and he just so happened to be good friends with the owner of La Iguana Perdida. Upon arrival, James introduced me to Dave, the owner of the hostel, and wouldn't you know it, I got the last available bed. I shared a room with a guy from Quebec named ... read more

Hola. I haven't had a lot of time to keep people updated because I've been working my ass off in Xela. I'm living in a tiny room with a large family on outskirts of Guatemala's second largest country. Atfirst I was having a lot of trouble sleeping due the rooster (gallo) right outside my window but we ate it two days ago and now I'm fine. I had to rent a bike to get around because its a fairly spreadout city. I'm pretty burnt out with school right now so I might travel for a little and then do more school in Honduras or Nicaragua. I'm getting out the city and heading to the lake for a little rest and maybe a few drinks. The adventure continues... ... read more

As a break from Spanish lessons in San Pedro I decided to take a couple of excursions. First off I climbed to the peak of the hill that towers above San Juan. I started early that morning. Walking along the road between San Pedro and San Juan several guides offered up their services while older men armed with machetes ventured off in search of firewood. The morning light and low lying mist created a beautiful vista over the lake, showing it at it´s best and most peaceful. San Juan lacks much of obvious and immediate interest in comparison to it´s neighbours, and subsquently has few visitors. However the town seemed a little more awake there with people bashing away in workshops, shops open, kids selling things in the streets and many people just hanging around with ... read more

This weekend was a 2 day excursion to Lago de Atitlan (Lake Atitlan), which is about 2 hours from Antigua. about the lake: the massive Los Chocoyos erruption of 85,000 years ago, which blew volcanic ash as far as Florida and Panama, caused a quantity of magma to expel from below the earths crust and the surface terrain to collapse, forming a huge roughly circular hollow that sooned filled with water - the Lago de Atitlan. Smaller volcanoes rose out of the lake´s southern waters thousands of years later and now surround the lake. The dramatic volcano vistas are what make Atitlan what it is today. (The lake is 300m deep, surface area 128 sq km). - compliments of Lonely Planet. We spend 2 days visiting the Lake and some of the surrounding Mayan villages.... read more

The day after visiting Santiago Atitlan I continued my mental rest this time with some physical exercise which required little thought - tackling San Pedro Volcän. At 3020m high this would be probably the highest altitude I have climbed to, although starting at just under 2000m made the task seem a lot easier. A hefty entry fee of Q100 (about US$13, less for locals) was necessary with a rather unusual arrangement of being the same price with or without a guide - this basically being to encourage employment, by subsidising this, to strongly encourage people to take a guide (also for security reasons). However I prefer walking at my own pace, alone so I can take in the surroundings better, discussing things later with others. This bemused the guys in the ticket office and they keep ... read more