Home. Huh.

So, after nearly a straight 48 hours of boats, buses, and airplanes, I arrived home in one piece--if not a little tired--last Tuesday. I almost can't believe it. Being home is (so far) a little like the twilight zone and I am almost a bit scared at how normal it seems to be here. I mean, there are little things, but overall it's just home. I do still keep trying to throw my toilet paper in the trash can rather than the toilet (no where in Central America are you supposed to flush the paper) and keep trying to wear the same clothes everyday, even though I now have a closet full to choose from; I can now check my e-mail on my own computer and don't have to pay for internet time or schedule in internet time to my life, it's just always there. The first night I slept in my bed I felt like a princess, it was so soft and large and plush and luxurious!! I hadn't even realized how accustomed I had become to mediocre mattresses. But in a way, if you don't know you're missing it, it doesn't really matter! It is great to see my family though and good to be back in such a familiar and safe place, at least for the time being. Probably the best thing ever about being back though is 1)Drinking fountains and 2)Drinkable tap water, something I've always grown up with and taken for granted, but something much of the world does not have.

We have had my dad's family here the last few days on through the weekend, so I feel that I have not had much down time, between socializing, looking for my cell phone (my mom donated to the local second hand store, it's still somewhere in their donation area), and getting back to work already at the bakery I was working at this winter. It's strange to be looking forward to the next months and thinking about jobs or apartments rather than bus schedules and travel stops, but forward does seem to be the best way to go! (I can see though how easy it would be to get depressed with "normal" life and start wishing yourself back to the wonderful, hassle free travel world where everyone is looking for new experiences, good times, new friends, and adventures. . . and if things don't always work out, you can always move on...) My plans from here? Who the hell knows!! I think I'll be around home for a little while, working a tad and regrouping, then, the sky is the limit! Thanks for letting me share my adventure!!

The last breath

So, two days until I find myself on a plane home, incredible! I have managed to drag out my last weeks here on Utila,and have loved it. Diving is something that I have enjoyed a little more every time I´ve gone. I decided not to do the advanced course, and have just been fun diving, but have been down 15 times, that seems a good start to me! I moved dive shops for my second week, which has been fun. I am enjoying the people I am staying with at the new spot more, but prefer diving with the other. Some of us took a special boat tour with my shop on Thursday to the north side of the island and it was fabulous. Probably my 3 best dives, plus we had lunch, drinks, hung out in the water, a full day of it1 I´m going to miss the ocean quite a bit when I get home I think. I´ve basically been living on it for the last month...and Idaho doesn´t have many oceans as you all know. Ok, I know that is not much but that´s all I can do for now!
See you all in the states. Call me next week when I get home!

60 feet under

Wow, I was 60 feet underwater yesterday. More than once. That's pretty crazy. I am now officially an open-water certified diver...quickest diploma I've ever owned! Diving is pretty cool, I'll have to say, although I'm not quite hooked like some people...yet, I think you have to do it a few times after you get used to not worrying about all your equipment and equalizing your ears and everything. But, I'm still on Utila, course completed, trying to decide what to do next. I may stick around here, buy a few fun dives a couple of days, or even (maybe) do the advanced dive course, which basically is a bunch of dives, no theory like the first course. The money is a bit of an issue though. Whatever, day by day. The trouble is, I really like this island that I'm on! It's a great place to hang out, but if you're not working or diving and are by yourself...it's a pretty quite place during the day. Not that I'm exactly complaining or anything :). Plus, I think it is a great spot for me to spend in denial of the fact that I'll be home in (relatively) so little time! All for now, since the internet is a little pricing out here on islands in the Carribean. My ears are still clogged and I can't hear things so well, send me some ear popping vibes!

Rum punch in hand, freshly caught fish dinner in the stomach, hangining out in the water just off a deserted island that we called home for one night...I´d say there are worse places to be. That was night one of the 3 day 2 night sailing/snorkeling trip I took last week from Cay Caulker (in Belize) to Placencia (also in Belize, further down the coast). It was amazing. The only thing that would have made it better was for there have to been just a little less wind...I don´t know how our tents managed to not blow away that first night. We spent the day on the boat all three days, hanging out, sailing and made at least one stop every day at a snorkeling sight and at least one more stop for general swimming/lunch eating. We had two guides who cooked everything for us, actually caught and cooked a lot of it (spearfishing...). There were 13 people on the trip, some couples, some solo travelers, myself and my friend Robbert who I met way back in Semuc Champey (and then ran into him again while with Dad). It was an incredible trip, the water is so beautiful and blue, there weren´t a bunch of other boats around, the sun shining, and just the wind the water and us. Awesome.

Before the sailing trip, Robbert and I traveled from Flores into Belize where we stayed a few nights at a town called San Ignacio, taking a cave river tubing trip one day, that was fun, but not as great as it could have been. Apparently, during the rainy season, it is almost like white water tubing through these natural caves, which is what we wanted, but the water level is low right now, so it was pretty mellow. Plus, it was a Thursday so we were sharing the park with hundreds and hundreds of cruise ship passengers on a day trip from Belize city where the cruise ships dock. There were 15 buses of people, 45 people each bus and then 2 or 3 buses of just intertubes. Crazy. The culture/economy of cruise ships just fascinates me. The night we stayed in Belize city we walked around town in the afternoon and pretty much everything at the water was closed and locked up-in particular this whole dock full of probably 50 store fronts right where the passengers un-dock, mainly because there was no ship. So, theorhetically, they do business only 2 days a week for most of the year (I think more during cruise ship high season). And, the crazy thing is that they probably make enough, if not more money, than a 24/7 shop owner somewhere else. Really, it´s just such a...fabricated environment to a degree. Seeing that whole line of shops all closed reminded me of where our family undocked in Cozumel Mexico on our family reunion cruise and how we had to walk through this seemingly teaming, busy little mall/local shop area and I wondered if on off days it looked as closed up and abandoned as the dock in Belize City...

Overall, my crash course in Belize (really very few days) was quite enjoyable. The country is definitley different than the surrounding places in Latin America, I think mainly because it was a British Colony rather than a Spanish Colony. It struck me as a very diverse country where English, Spanish, and Garifuna are regularly spoken, not to mention all the Chinese we saw. Also, I would classify the country as a place more geared for vacationing tourists rather than backpackers-partly simply because the exchange rate is less favorable (2 belize to 1 US $) but there are little to no hostels and not a lot to do other than beaches, water sports and hanging out. I was impressed at how seriously I think the country is about protecting their barrier reefs etc, since that is where a large part of there economy comes from. I guess I don´t know the reality of how well their protection laws work, but at least the intention is there. We (randomly) ended up in Caye Caulker during the annual Lobsterfest, which was fun, although not too special. We did manage to eat some pretty fabulous grilled lobster...nearly accidentally as we thought we were ordering the much cheaper lobster kabobs...but, after first getting over the shock of the restaurant bill, we decided that we were probably going to ever be in Belize at Lobsterfest once in our lives, so spending a little more than we´d prefer on some lobster was OK...It was amazing how empty the town felt after it ended though! However, if I were to go back to Belize for a beach vacation, I would go to Placencia (where our sailing trip ended) not Caye Caulker (the more normal haunt). So if any of you out there were thinking about a beach vacation to Belize, check that out first :).

So, the reality is that in 2 1/2 weeks I will be once again back home in Idaho--a concept I am beginning to daily struggle with getting my mind around. I can´t believe how fast time has gone and can only be so prepared for what it will be like to go back (although, one of the guys on the sailing trip pointed out to me that home is sort of like a soap opera-there are a million and one things going on when you don´t watch it regularly, but you can turn the TV on and pick the story line up right way, as if you hadn´t been absent all those other episodes...I thought that was an interesting way of looking at home, and true to a degree.)

Today I find myself once again in La Ceiba, Honduras, preparing to take a ferry out to the Bay Islands. I managed to catch a boat from Placencia to Puerto Cortes in Honduras yesterday (meaning that I finally have that Honduras stamp!) but am still reeling a bit from the boat ride. The ocean just had a grand time with the motor boat we were on, basically the trip was equivalent to a 2 1/2 hour intense amusement park ride. I have no idea how I managed to not get sick, especially when the children sitting next to me started throwing up on the ground next to my feet and all the windows to the cabin were closed so the water wouldn´t get in (loosing ventaliation). I guess I´ll have to give some credit to the three days on a sail boat...but it is not a trip I would choose to do again I don´t think. But hey, it makes a fun story! And really, the most important part is that I am now here in Honduras (with that stamp...) and, with the exception of my return trip to Guatemala to fly home, am practically done with long travel days. I stayed last night in La Ceiba with a couple of Irish girls who also came from Placencia and was planning to stay another night here and catch the morning ferry tomorrow, but I´ve managed to get more done this morning than I planned online and my laundry was done quickly, plus I was having a bit of difficulty finding an affordable room for one person...so, I´ll just take the afternoon ferry out to Utila. So there. I´m looking forward to doing my open water dive, as time has gone on I have grown more excited about the idea of diving, plus I am looking forward to just staying in one place for more than 2 or 3 nights.

Well, I find I may be rambling now so will move on to my other computer duties. Love to all!!

Adventures with pops: lava, fincas, ruins, rivers, and of course, a lot of buses...

Well! The last 9 days have been fun filled and packed with daughter/father time (for the most part). It started with an early morning pick-up at the Guatemala city airport after an overnight flight for my dad (and few hours of sleep for me). We spent our first day in a daze mainly, but talking and catching up. Our second day in Antigua, we went on a Pacaya Volcano tour, which is an active volcano near Antigua. Last year there was a large lava flow (6 ft wide) and now, while not so impresive, is still active with a bit of flowing lava. The tour was a bit of a trip really. The walk up wasn´t too bad, until we got to the hardened lava field that we walked over, and whose heat increased the higher up we went, trying to get as close to the flowing lava of course. One girl in our group actually melted the bottoms of her tennis shoes. It was a pretty intense experience, so hot and really quite dangerous, but definitely an experience worth having. We spent the rest of the day resting/sight seeing in Antigua and the next morning found us up early (yet again) looking for a cup of coffee for dad on the deserted streets of Antigua before starting our long travel day to Finca Tatin, our home for the next 4 days.

Needless to say, it was one long day, nearly 12 hours later, 2 buses, 1 taxi, two boats and minutes of wait time in between, we found ourselves at Finca Tatin just in time for dinner. Finca Tatin is located along the Rio Dulce River, closer to Livingston/the coast rather than Rio Dulce, but is in the middle of the jungle on the river. The heat and humidity were a bit of a shock, especially for dad, who granted was still just trying to get adjusted to being in Guatemala, much less the tropical smothering climate! Our time and Finca Tatin was divided between card games, backgammon, jungle walks, a kayak trip to a nearby reserve, swimming, reading, and a trip to a nearby Mayan village where we had lunch in the house of a local family.

From Finca Tatin, we took a boat to Rio Dulce and a bus from there to a place called Finca Paraiso that was listed in the guidebook as this spot with a natural hotspring waterfall cascading into the cold river where you can swim, hang out and...even stay the night! There was indeed this incredible natural phenomenon of hotspring mixed with stream water, but we didn´t get there until later in the day. When we got of the bus, there was just this old, dilapidated sign that said Finca Paraiso, bungalows-restaurante in one direction and Aguas termales in the other direction. Being weighed down with our backpacks and wanting to first unload our stuff before a relaxing afternoon by the water, we started walking the direction of the bungalow/restaurant sign. I was sure we were in the completely wrong place. We were walking by fields and peoples houses, with the lake still looking a ways a way...plus, the guidebook mentioned nothing about the place being over a mile of the main road! We persevered though and eventually ended up at the hotel, although we quickly learned that if we wanted to enjoy the cascadas and hot springs, we needed to walk all the way back from where we came! We did do this though, after checking into a room and taking a quick swim to "cool" off (the water was so warm). Our night at this finca was worth it though, although we ended up walking a lot more than we planned to! Twice with our backpacks on...

The last adventure of the last week or so was Tikal, up in Northern Guatemala. We traveled up on Monday, opting to stay in the park at one of the slightly more expensive hotels (rather than busing from Flores as many do). It was very worthwhile to do. We entered the park both in the evening on Monday and then also on Tuesday. The ruins were so different from Copan-mainly, they were simple huge. Plus, the whole place is in the jungle so you are walking under all this jungle canopy and then come out to a clearing with all these large ruins of an ancient civilization. Not something you get to experience every day. The one downside was that our tour guide was a little lazy/not good and our tour was very short and not as thourough as we´d like, oh well. that is life.

So, now I am in Flores, frantically trying to get myself ready (aka this blog, buy a new toothbrush, get dad to the airport...) for the next leg of the trip. Dad is flying this afternoon from Flores to Guatemala City where he will stay with the same lady who I stayed with when arriving in the country, and she will see him off tomorrow at the airport in Guatemala. What a whirlwind! This afternoon I´m setting off for Belize with a traveling friend, Robbert (who we actually ran into at finca tatin, although I met him in Semuc Champey) where we will make our way accross the country up to Cay Caulker to go on a 3 day sailing/snorkeling trip starting the 3rd of July. What fun!

P.S. due to internet snaffoos-way to common down here-it is now Thursday and I'm in Belize. I haven't yet heard if dad got home yet, but I hope so...

Quetzales and Semuc Champey

So, after leaving Robin at the airport, I began a marathon bus day, spending nearly 11 1/2 straight hours on a bus ( or 6 to be more exact) with hardly time for a bathroom break, finally arriving back in Guatemala at a little hostel called Los Ranchitos up in the mountains in central Guatemala near a national park. The draw of this little stop is that it is one of the only places in the country were it is possible to see a real live Quetzal (national bird, endangered species...). they come to feed in the ttrees around the hostel in the mornings and evenings. I stayed two nights here which was perfect. there were not many other people and I spent most of my time by myself, but it was just what I needed. Saw a few Quetzales, recharged my batteries, read my book, took a little walk through the cloud forest surrounding the hotel and then took off for Lanquin/Semuc Champey. Semuc Champey (A mayan name that means "where the river runs under the earth") is this natural wonder where a 300m limestone bridge (more or less) was formed over hundreds of years, where the river runs underneath the bridge while on top, there are all these natural limestone pools filled with rain water from the mountains. They are blue and green (depending on the time of year) due to the minerals in the water. One of my days was spent on an all day tour here, which was incredible, the tour also included this excursion into one of the many cave system that are found in this area. We were swimming with candles in the dark back into this cave, climbing ladders...it was pretty neat, although quite cold after awhile. The place I stayed at was called El Retiro lodge and is located in the closest little village to Semuc Champey, called Lanquin, and it was pretty much like a backpackers resort. It is located along the river (which we rented intertubes one day and floated down), all the beds are in these bungalow, straw houses with hammocks outfront, and everything (including the food at the reastaurant etc) was just put "on your tab." It was a really great place to relax for a few days and I spent my time with this group of 7 british folk traveling together and another single traveler from Holland, we had a lot of fun. (I taught them my new card game, they were hooked.) One of the nights it was the birthday of one of the girls of the large group, leading to a "fancy dress" party, meaning crazy dress up...who knew the crazy things other backpackers carry around with them...In addition to the day tour at Semuc Champey, I also went to the Lanquin caves, another large cave system that goes on forever. The caves themselves were cool, but only so impressive, what was incredible was sitting at the entrance of the cave at sunset when all the bats began to fly out for the evening. There were millions of them, just swishing by. In the dark you couldn't see them, but when you take a picture, you see bats all around you. Pretty crazy.
From here, I headed back to Antigua on Thursday, spending another long day on the bus, but arriving in Antigua early enough to still get a dorm bed in the hostel I wanted to. Since then, I've been getting things in order for my dad's visit (he's coming on Monday, yay!!!), doing laundry, spending money, and just taking it easy. I was hoping to get to see some of "los chicos de Guate" that always ate lunch and dinner at Lili's house, but they're men and Guatemalans and so far I have not been able to get a hold of them on the phone. Who knows, the weekend is not over yet.
Today I changed my return plane ticket to a week later than planned, I know, a week hardly seems like much, but it's just going to make all the difference! After I leave my dad, I'm hoping over to Belize for some general traveling, but mainly this 2 night 3 day sailing snorkeling trip that is supposed to be incredible (and am hopefully going to run into the solo holland traveler from Semuc Champey there again) and then will make my way back to Utila to do my open water dive and hopefully a few fun dives, leaving myself just enough time to get back to Guate and then home! Crazy that it seems so close now, the return, although I know there are many more adventures waiting for me before that comes!!

The sister's last fling on Roatan

After our fabulous night swim with the glowing plankton, the afternoon at an internet cafe in La Ceiba and a taxi ride out to the dock, Robin and I found ourselves once again playing cards while waiting for a boat to the bay islands (although this time we found ourselves in the fancy waiting area with AC...). While doing so we met a single girl coming from Utila headed to Roatan for a week long course being trained how to train dolphins--a childhood dream (Zara from Finland). We made immediate friends with her when she mentioned how much she loved to play cards and offered to teach us anew game called Yannif (from Israel) on the boat ride to the island. There was no going back after that...
While waiting to claim our luggage we met two other (rare) backpacker types-two boys from North Carolina-and found that all of us were headed to the same hotel in West End, pretty much the only "budget" place on the island. We ended up arguing/bargaining for an (expensive) taxi ride to West End (two taxis, $10US for each taxi). When we first arrived in West End the driver first took us to a hotel that we didn't ask for (I believe they drivers would have received a commission) and we then spent another few minutes arguing again that we asked to be taken to a different place and that we would not pay them if they did not take us there...ugh. At this point is is almost 7 pm and we finally end up at the right place and choose to share a room with Zara because it was cheaper for us all as the place didn't have dorm rooms. When I went to pay for our share of the room 7 minutes after our arrival, I realized that my coin purse was gone. I quickly caught the taxi driver of the other car that came with our group from the dock (the one I came in had left) and asked if he could phone his co-worker who drove the other taxi because I left my coin purse in the back of the car. The other driver was very unhelpful saying he had no telephone (and what's that at your waist?--"I mean, I don't have his number...") He offered to take me around to look for the car (me paying how much?) and, knowing I only had about 100 or 150 lempira in the purse-maybe 5$-figured I'd swallow the loss. The tragicness is, if I had realized then that my USB port had also been in that wallet rather than 6 days later...that's life I guess. What a mini fiasco, really. Eating dinner that night we were all hit by extreme price shock (things were listed in $US everywhere) but were so hungry we didn't care much (but had Ramon noodles for dinner the next night...). It is a remarkably different experience to arrive somewhere after dark, it leads to a different sort of disorientation and mystery waiting for you in the morning (which is what happened here, because it gets dark at 6:15/6:30 here).
The two islands Roatan and Utila could not have been more different from one another. To start with, the simple size difference between the two makes a difference but the main difference is that Roatan is a fancy resort sort of place. Tourism is huge there, but huge with the higher class luxury resort sort of traveler-not with us backpackers, which is more Utila's style. The beaches however, were far superior to those of Utila. Our first 2 days, we walked about 1 mile along the beach to West Bay(the best beach area on the island) with Nick and Win (the NC boys) and rubbed shoulders with the high rollers for the day, hanging out in the bright blue water, snorkeling, trying no to get sunburned and enjoying our budget lunches of PBJ sandwiches on "economic mold" white bread.
We ate two nights in a row at this wonderful place on the water called The Lighthouse with Zara, Win, and Nick, playing cards every evening with one or all 3 of them. Our 3rd morning Nick, Win, Robin and I took a morning bus to a botanical garden 15 minutes from West End (Zara being at Dolphin training every day) where we walked up to a view point and enjoyed the garden/jungle. After that Robin and I headed to Coxen Hole (the main/largest town on the island and where the cruise ships dock) to go to the bank and change a traveler's check. It wasn't as run down of a town as we were expecting (I mean, with a name like Coxen Hole...) and rather enjoyed our little walk through town. Plus, we ate probably one of the best mango ever after the bank. The rest of our time included some more swimming, a beautiful sunset, more card games...what a rough life. We left Thursday on the afternoon ferry for La Ceiba and caught the last bus back to San Pedro Sula at 5, arriving there at 8:15, eating dinner at the same place we have every other time we've stayed with Luis at Los Molinos, hardly slept that night, got up at 4:15 to take Robin to the airport and say goodbye to my wonderful travel companion of the last 2 weeks...and here begins my next adventure to be given in my next entry.

More to come, I promise!

For all you avid readers out there, have no worries, a normal, more lengthy entry will be made filling you all in on my last week with Robin (it's actually already written, but the reality of trying to type it in where I am now where the internet keeps going in and out is not appealing). I will do so when I arrive back in Antigua later this week. I did say goodbye to her a few days ago and am now back in Guatemala exploring the Coban/Semuc Champey (central Guate) on my own but will be heading back to Antigua Wednesday or Thursday to do my laundry, update e-mails, go to the bank and prepare for my father's arrival on the 18th. How lucky am I that I'm getting to share part of this wonderful experience with every member of my family?! But I am still alive and well!!

A Time of Mourning

I regret to inform you that last week saw the disappearance (and almost certain death) of my USB port that contained all my photos from the last 4 months. It was last seen in the back of a taxi on Roatan Island in Honduras...
I believe I'm still partly in shock and denile of this reality (although coming to terms with it a little more every day). The true irony is that I recently decided I should back the USB port up on disks but kept putting it off...really, quite a bummer. I mean, if someone was to mug/rob me, but first give me the option of keeping one item, I think I would have chosen that cable!! However, what is done is done and I will recover from the shock. It is a minor consolation that I do have a few photos already online plus am realizing that there is a good possibility I can get photos of places from friends I've traveled with. However, I still feel that observing the normal lenght of mourning time is allowed, although, due to my minimal wardrobe considerations, will not require myself to wear black for the whole period.

Glowing Plankton

As an absolutely incredible side note the entry I wrote yesterday below, we went swimming last night at the Casa Kiwi only to discover the water full of these tiny little plankton that glowed/sparkled when we moved. They apparently can live in only warm water and really specific conditions and it was incredible. I think I know what it feels like now to be in a fairy tale, it was like we were creating glitter underwater, a moonlight glow coming just from the tiny little microscopic bugs around us! Also, I think I mentioned it below, but we continue to be very (directionally) disorientated here in Trujillo, I mean, the sun is setting in the west, but over the ocean...our instinct tells us the ocean is to the east...the fact is Honduras is actually more parallel to the equator than we were imagining (rather than perpendicular) and then Trujillo is on this little bay/peninsula area that is facing even a slightly different direction, leading to our confusion. It didn´t help last night that the full moon we´ve been seeing for the last week was no where to be seen in the clear, starry sky. I mean, how can the moon just disappear?

Island life

Ahh, another week gone by in vacation land…since that is where I think I am. Really, just week after week of vacation time (especially no longer being in Xela, or taking Spanish classes or anything like that…). It has (or actually, at the time of writing this) been tough to find a computer/internet situation that was acceptable for spending more than the obligatory 12 minutes to check e-mail, look one quick thing up, then log off due to issues of time, money and energy (for dealing with computer stuff), that’s life down here I guess. This entry is actually being written on a computer at the hostel we are at now just outside of Trujillo that is supposed to have internet service but doesn’t and the owners are away right now and the caretaker seems a bit clueless…hopefully I’ll be able to upload this entry to the internet tomorrow in La Ceiba before we head to Roatan, but I’m getting ahead of myself, last week first.

After dropping off my mother at the airport Sunday morning, Robin and I headed to the bus station for a 3 hour bus ride to the town of La Ceiba where all boats to the bay island leave from. The plan was to spend an hour or two in La Ceiba tracking down information about trips to La Moskitia because all the tour companies that organize trips have their offices there and we felt talking to a real person is what needed to happen. However, it being Sunday all said offices were closed…plus, it was the morning after the last night of the week long "carnival" that La Ceiba is famous for, meaning the town was in bit of ramshackle shape having just come up for the first breath of air after a week of revelry. So, after being in town for maybe 15 minutes, we caught a cab out to the boat dock to await the boat to Utila. We arrived at about 11 in the morning to this dock maybe 2 miles out of town that looked completely empty…turns out there are two boats that travel to Utila each day, the first leaves at 10 or 10:30 am, the second at 4 pm…so, we spent the next five hours at the dock playing cards (gin rummy best out of 23 anyone?) and waiting. We felt really lucky that there was at least one little convenience store at the ticket office of the (fancy-shmanzy) boat to Roatan so that we at least had a little food to snack on (doritos and an ice cream bar, not the healthiest lunch, but hey, it’s calories!). We actually enjoyed ourselves quite a bit and it was fun to watch the day go on as the dock went from this deserted covered porch to a happening place full of people and taxis as the time for boat launch/arrival neared.
Utila is an island off the coast of Honduras that has a reputation for the best (and cheapest) place for one to get their scuba-diving certification, meaning it is packed with foreigners (young backpackers mostly) crazy about diving, or if not crazy about, there to learn how to do it. Neither Robin nor I had any great desire to dive because, as Robin said, "just because it’s the cheapest place still doesn’t mean it is free…" we still had a great time there though. The island is something like 7 miles long by 1.5 miles wide or something and the bulk of the population all lives in Utila town along the western coast. There are private houses spread out on either side of the town, but mainly 80% of the island is "uninhabitated." All the bay island are English speaking and the local residents are mainly descendents of populations brought over from Africa years ago, it was different to be in a place for the week where English was the main language, although the island English spoken between locals is more like pigeon English and near impossible to understand (when overheard, normal English is used on the tourists). Spanish is also spoken, since it is the national language of the country, but there also seemed to be an island form of Spanish and sometimes it was confusing trying to know what language was needed!
Without diving, we still managed to fill up our time first in trying not to melt because it was incredibly hot (and we were staying in a dorm room on the second floor of a building with western facing windows that even when the air-conditioner (on illegally) and the two fans were on all day, the room still clocked in at 81 degrees…). One day we took a bike ride out towards the highest point on the island called pumpkin hill, riding our bikes down the "runway" of the airport on the island. We visited the Iguana station where we learned that there is an iguana native only to Utila which is on the endangered species list (and one of the main purposes of this place is protecting that population). We walked up to the second highest point on the island (a water tower on top of a small hill) to get an amazing view of the backside of the island and to watch the sunset on my birthday. (Yes, I’m 23 now, when did that happen?!) Another day we took a day trip out to a little uninhabited island called Water Cay with two girls from our hostel where we snorkelled and swam and enjoyed the expanse of ocean around us. There was also this incredible restaurant/bar called the Jade Seahorse/Treetantic Bar that was built around this amazing "garden" of sculptures and decorations created with everything from marbles to glass bottles to sea shells. It was absolutely incredible and, as I’m finding while trying to write this, quite difficult to accurately describe with written words…

After 4 days of relaxing, sun, sweltering heat and fun times Robin and I decided to leave the island on Friday and head up to Trujillo (the old capital of Honduras years and years ago). We almost missed the 6:20 am ferry off the island, which cracked both of us up quite a bit (we didn’t hear the alarm), but made it still. Our experience of Trujillo has been, to say the least, odd—beginning with getting off at the bus station on Friday. We arrived about 1 hour earlier than we were planning on, wandered around town (had a really hard time orientating ourselves, the ocean seemed on the wrong side of us, the map seemed backwards…) but found a nice little hotel near the center of town to stay. The guide book gives the impression that this place is sort of the up and coming tourist spot (written 4 years ago of course) and gives the impression that while definitely a slow moving, sleepy town, there are other travellers around and things to do. We’ve decided that maybe the author misinterpreted this growth and that actually, Trujillo was hot in the 80s and has gone downhill since. There seem to be no other tourists and everything is empty.

This morning we took a bus to a little hostel/hotel about 3 miles out of town called Casa Kiwi that was reputedly a popular hang out (because, as Robin has also so duly noted her week or two with me, half of travelling is the people you meet—other travellers mainly) upon getting here, we found it also empty, with the exception of a couple late 30-somethings guys who spent 15 minutes telling us how there was nothing to do around this area or Trujillo and that we should head back the other direction along the coast. So, that’s what we’ve decided to do. We were able to have our laundry done here (very much so needed) and think we’ll pack up tomorrow and go back to La Ceiba and head out to Roatan because, while it is near Utila, it sounds like a much different place and well, who can complain about pristine beaches and sun (Roatan is more famous for beaches, Utila for diving…). The joys of travelling I guess! I’m not sure if I came out sounding negative about the decision to come to Trujillo because I hope not, we’ve had a good day or two out here and like the town a lot actually, it just doesn’t strike us as somewhere to spend the next few days…hope we’re right! (oh, in case you didn’t figure out, we bagged the Moskitia trip, we even tried calling the offices from Utila but could never get through or the numbers off of the websites where incorrect…we figured the effort wasn’t worth it.) So, this entry is a bit of a book, but then again, that’s sort of the point! I’m having such a great time with Robin here and am starting to get used to not travelling alone (and learning how being alone or with someone affects the way you travel). I’ll be really sad to see her go and lose her company! How lucky though that she could be here as long as she has been able to…well, I think it is time for me to head outside, I’m dripping with sweat here in the little room without a fan where the computer is and hopefully I’ll be able to upload the entry tomorrow from La Ceiba!

Copán Ruinas with the fam!

Well, what an awesome week this has been! A week ago I picked up mom and Robin in San Pedro Sula (where we are now again), I randomly and luckily found this great B&B called Los Molinos where we are staying and the owner, Luis, took great care of us last weekend and again today, providing airport pick-up, dinner transportation, the whole nine yards. So, last week, Sunday morning we all three caught a local direct bus to Copán Ruinas where we checked into our home for the week--Casa de café. For me, the week has been drapped in luxury, starting with the accomodations. We had a wonderful view from the yard area of the B&B, were served a delicious breakfast every morning, had our own private room with maid service, all the agua pura we could drink (which was a lot), plus two very friendly and entertaining Inn keepers (the son and nephew of the couple that own the place, the couple themselves are on vacation right now in Ecuador...). Copan Ruinas is a very mellow, tranquile, (touristy), cute and clean place to be. It was the perfect choice. We went on Monday to a Macaw bird park a couple of kilometers out of town where we were given a wonderful tour, talked to birds (had them laugh at us acuatlly, the birds I mean), and then swam in the stream running through the park. (We also returned the next two afternoons to swim here, since it was so hot and our tickets were good for three days). Tuesday we went to the Ruinas of Copán, the ancient Mayan city driving most of the tourism in the area. We found them quite interesting but wished the US $15 we paid to get in would have let us come back the next day also, we think we would have appreciated them even more--the tour the first day, experiencing it ourselves the second...but you can´t have everything I guess. The best day of the week was Thursday when we took a trip with a tour company that included an hour ride in the back of a pick-up up into the mountains where we went to a large coffee finca, had coffee with the duena of the property, were given a tour of the production area of the finca, then went to another section of the finca where we took a little walk to a waterfall and then a horseback ride through the country (galloping half of the time!), we were then fed this delicious homecooked meal of comida typica, stopped at the hot springs on the way back to town and returned to town in the back of the truck under the moonlight...ironically enough, we forgot the camera...
I´m sorry to do this, but I´m a little pressed for time right now (and typing on a sticky keyboard, so it´s taking longer), other things we enjoyed were playing (hours) of cards in several different locations, eating at nearly every restaurant (it seemed) in town, one night of salsa dancing, a quick morning trip on a chicken bus to a nearby village much less polished by tourism, a butterfly/orchid park, gin & tonics while watching the sunset, dealing with the stifling heat and humidity common to these parts, walking around town, and just enjoying each others company!
For me, I have been most struck by the fact that Honduras seems more expensive than Guatemala-at least as a traveler, and could also see the direct affect of tourist money coming into Copán, most prices have gone up 50-60% in the last two years simply because of us foreigners...also, it´s been funny getting used to the higher number values things cost in lempira (100 lempira VS 50 quetzales or 5$), but I´m getting better. Overall, I´ve had a great time sharing a week of my reality (even though it was a week of high living for me) with my mother and am even more excited my sister will be stayin another 2 weeks. We are planning on going to the Bay Islands/beaches tomorrow (for my birthday...) and are also hoping to be able to take a tour of the wild, unpopulated jungle area of Honduras called La Moskitia, wish us luck. There are like a million other things I could say or write, but I have to go!

Relaxation and a new country

Whoa, well the last one and a half weeks has been both the shortest and longest of my trip so far! I can hardly believe that it was only about 10 or 11 days ago that I finally left Xela for the last time with all of my possesions on my back. I headed to Lago Atitlan and found myself in a little village called Santa Cruz a la laguna at a hostel called La Iguana Perdida. There really isn´t much to do there except do nothing...I did luck out though, the night I arrived was the second night of the three day feria (sort of like a county fair...) of Santa Cruz so some of us from the hostel went up to the village that evening to watch some of the festivities and one of the coolest firework shows I have ever seen. I wish I had had my camera. There were normal fireworks (being set of mere feet from large crowds of people mind you) but the main show was this large tower decorated with writing (blessing the patron saint of the town) and some artistic renditions of goblets and crosses. The bottom level was lit on fire, lighting up the words that then went through a phase of color changing and different firework tricks and just when we thought it was about done, it lit the next level of fireworks, sort of like a mousetrap contraption. This went on for 20 minutes! Like a mousetrap show of standing fireworks, it was incredible and very hard to explain...I hope I´ve done it a bit of justice...

On Friday I went back over to Pana to go paragliding for the first time in my life. The guide I went with was this totally wacky, energetic German/El Salvadoranean rasied in Guatemala and Germany...he was a blast. The paragliding was amazing, although my stomach didn´t think it was the best thing ever, but it was totally worth a bit of nausea the rest of the day! The only unfortunate thing about the whole experience is that the views weren´t as spectacular as normal because the whole week that I was at the lake it was very hazy (which is very unusual) so the normal, crystal clear view of the volcanos surrounding the lake was non-existent. I guess we can´t always have everything though...

The next day I chose to move to another village on the lake called San Marcos that has this reputation for being a very laid-back, ex-pat, hippy, spiritual, relaxing place. It was gorgeous (and just a little larger than Santa Cruz, which I appreciated). All the hostels and restaurants are along the lake in this little pathway jungle and the whole place just speaks of peace. I mostly just hung out and did nothing there for 5 days. (Although, take it back, 4 days, I went to the market in Chichicastenango-2 1/2 hrs one way on bus- from Pana on Sunday. It is supposedly the largest market in Guatemala...I wasn´t actually too impressed, although I´m glad I went because I would have always wondered if I should have if I hadn´t...). I spent most of the week with a couple of girls from England that I met in Santa Cruz (they then left for a three day trek with the same trekking company I went with) and then they magically showed up in the same dorm room I was staying in in San Marcos. It´s amazing how often that happens, running into people you´ve already seen before somewhere else. They were a lot of fun though and we just took it easy, eating a leasurily breakfast everymoring, did a little yoga, got a massage, went swimming to this beautiful spot along the lake where there were rocks to jump off of (one about 30ft, the other 15ft...I only managed the lower one). The water in the lake was just beautiful to swim in; a very mild temperature, crystal clean, and extremely bouant. It reminded me of swimming in very salty ocean, how you float without needing to tred water, but without the aweful salt flavor! One evening I was lucky enough to meet a few people who had befriended a "local" (he ran/owned a restaurant but is a german/columbian who grew up in Germany, so many fun combinations!) and we all had a fabulous homecooked meal at his house that evening and just enjoyed the company we were with.

I finally dragged myself away from the lake on Thursday (along with the two gals from England) and headed for Antigua. I was there less than 12 hours (am planning to go back sometime in June or July before leaving, because it is supposedly a neat city to visit, although packed with gringos...) Ironically enough, although I had less than 12 hours, I ran into two of my more favorite people from ICA in Xela (that I had already said goodbye to mind you) which was fun, we caught up on travel adventure stories a bit over coffee last night before I went back to the hostel only to get myself up at 3:30 in the morning to take a shuttle bus to Copan, Honduras where I am now currently writing you all from. I´m staying here tonight and then going to San Pedro Sula tomorrow to collect my mom and sister from the airport so we can come back and hang out here for the next week. I´m beyond excited to see them. So, yeah, I guess that´s the "this is where I went and what I´ve done" marathon for the last little bit here. Can you see at all why it´s felt very short and long at the same time? It still feels a bit strange to know I won´t be seeing my regulars in Xela anymore, but it seems right. Like I said last night over dinner to my travel companions, I was starting to feel a little bored with Guatemala, so it will be good to do a little bit of Honduras and then go back to Guatemala where it´s familiar, a little break I guess. The one thing that I wish didn´t seem to be true is that it appears I will be speaking, listening to and overall being surrounded less frequently by spanish as I find myslef in more of a typical travel/backpacker role hoping around the country. Everyone just speaks English, even a lot of the hotel clerks, tour operaters, waiters...the irony of traveling in a Spanish speaking country I guess. The truth is, I´ll still be around it more than at home, but I´ve just gotten so used to getting to practice everyday, I miss it a little!

OK, as scattered as that is, I think that´s it for now. I feel like I´ve been on the computer for 2 hours or something with all the e-mails and blogs and stuff I´d been putting off...guess that´s not too bad though. Oh! one more thing that makes me angry is that I don´t get a stamp for Honduras! I mean, I´m here, but you´d never know it by looking at my passport...the reason is, that my Guatemala stamp includes Honduras and Nicaragua under the same 3 months (why I had to go to Mexico for the passport renewal), so whatever country you enter in is the stamp you get even if you go to all three. Man, what a hit to passport stamp collecting! (and a bit of an annoyance too for the long term traveler I suppose...especially if you are in Honduras because both Costa Rica and Mexico are far away...)

Crossing the Mexican border...

So, after my hurried afternoon of a week ago, I set of early last Tuesday morning with a friend from ICA (Alicia) toward San Cristóbal, Mexico. The original impetus for this trip was the fact that I needed to renew my passport before the 13 of May and wasn´t going to be out of the country until the 18th-plus, thanks to the CAFTA agreement, it no longer "counts" as leaving the country if I go to Nicaragua, Honduras, or El Salvador from Guatemala...only Mexico, Belize, or Costa Rica. Anyway, I´m so glad I had an excuse that made me go check the place out! The day of travel there was long, 10 hours overall, about 8 1/2 or 9 on a bus (4 different buses and one taxi), but overall, uneventfull. It was incredible to me how different this city was than Guatemala (or Mexico in general). The difference could be felt crossing the border. The streets and roads were a million times cleaner in Mexico, the buses smaller, more economical, comfortable and efficient. Even the terrain was different. Driving back to the border from San Cristóbal on Sunday, it struck me how I could see Guatemala approaching as the mountainous volcanos drew nearer.

Alicia and I took it pretty easy and just enjoyed the city for most of the time. I´ve been told that it is similar to Antigua in terms of being an old colonial type town and I really liked the feel of the place. Compared to anywhere I´ve been in Guatemala, it felt down right mellow, clean, and uneventful. There are 5 or 6 churches in town, several parks and open public spaces and it was very pleasant to just walk around or sit and people watch (although, we were disppointed at the lack of good ice cream in town, I guess I´m being spoiled by Sarita´s here in Guate). One day we had lunch at this place called Los Amigos (recommended to us by one of the workers in our hostel) whose entrance we almost missed because there were no signs and just a small door. Behind this however there was a very large room bustling with activity, 5 or 6 TVs playing music videos and many locals drinking and eating. I think it is really the first time that I´ve been somewhere (or eaten somewhere) where I felt like the only gringo around, like I was in a local hangout. The popularity I believe is due to the 2 for 1 deal on beers every day plus all the food you can eat for 30 pesos-and they really mean all the food you can eat. They just kept bringing us more and more stuff! At first, some chips, then peanuts, then a little meal, then fajitas, then guacamole...we weren´t sure how to make it stop!! It was definitely probably one of my favorite eating experiences on the trip so far though.
One morning we took a (guided) horseback ride to a nearby pueblo (San Juan Chamula) where the locals practice a very interesting combination of Catholic, Mayan and other beliefs. The church floor was covered in pine needles and idols of saints lined the walls, with candles lit everywhere. Here they believe that Saint John is more important than Christ and his idol held the upermost position in the church. People make chicken sacrifices all the time to cure diseases among other things. Also, we couldn´t take any pictures because the locals believe that if a picture is taken of them, they have been robbed of their soul...all in all an interesting experience. Plus, the horseback ride was probably the best ride I´ve ever been on (and yes, the number is limited) and the best part is that I was hardly even sore afterwards!

We were a little disappointed on Saturday (Cinco de Mayo) to discover that the town could of seemed to care less. I had been given this impression before-that in some ways Cinco de Mayo is a bigger celebration in the states than in Mexico, and everyone we asked confirmed that. I think it is maybe celebrated a bit more up north, and San Cristóbal is in the center of Chiapas that has a love hate relationship with Mexico anyway...but, alas, we came up with no crazy Cinco de Mayo stories, although we were in Mexico for the event.

After all that, I am now back in Xela for truly the last time, although I´m not sure that is really hitting home. I´m ready though and am getting more and more excited to see my mom and sister in Honduras. Sometimes the realization hits me that I´ve been down here for almost 3 months, living in a completely foreign country that now feels a bit like home. I realize that I speak a different language at least 50% of my day, find it normal to buy things like soap, shampoo, and food at an open air market, look forward to having beans and eggs for dinner (because that´s what it always is), and am no longer phased by the watered down, unexciting flavor of the instant coffee everyone drinks here. I own 2 pairs of shoes, do my own laundry by hand and hang dry it (50% of the time I guess, when all 10-20 items I own-counting socks and underwear etc, are dirty, I pay a Lavendaria to was everything). I pay to use a public computer and sometimes go days without checking my e-mail. I have no cell phone, walk everywhere, and when it´s too far to walk, I takce a chicken bus. i think in Quetzales when I spend money (rather than converting to US $) and even found myself a bit taken aback at the "high" prices in Mexico (While others we met raved about how cheap San Cristóbal/Chiapas is in comparison to the rest of the country). There is even a part of me that almost likes ranchera music nowdays and I don´t remember when I ever heard anything other than reagaton, salsa or merengue in a discoteca...Cobblestone streets, women selling handmade goos on the street, shoeshinners in the park, fireworks early in the morning to celebrate birthdays, street dogs, bus fumes...all of it seems so normal and natural and am often shocked to realize that I feel this way. There are of course things about here that still strike a dischordant string somewhere internally like everytime I see someone carelessly toss a plastic bottle out a bus window or drop a wrapper on the ground as if the nature has a maid or the catcalls on the streets when I walk around ("Hola gringa, tsst-tsst-" "Esatás hermosa" "ch-ch-ch" etc), but even these things I´m used to, even if I don´t like them much. Aren´t we human beings amazingly adaptable creatures? Honestly, I sometimes worry about readjusting to America when I go home...they often say culture shock is worse coming back than going...

Anyway, I have to run, I´m late for dinner (eggs and beans anyone?) but, in Guatemalan fashion, I´m guesssing it is being served late also...


Completely unrelated to anything here, I just finished reading a book called Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides that I thought was fabulous is anyone out there is looking for a good read.

Nebaj to Todos Santos

Wow! So I just returned this afternoon from by 6 day trek with a tour group here in Xela. It was absolutely amazing! We only hiked 4 days (the other two were traveling/bus days) but went about 35 miles in all and were up in the highlands of Guatemala walking through some of the most remote villages. It was so worth it! I am/was definitely not in tip-top hiking shape, partly just because it´s been a couple of years without backpacking due to knee injuries and stuff like that, so parts of the trip definitely hurt my legs (but, like always, was totally doable) and I am quite exhausted right now, but the good kind of exhausted. I was also really glad not to be sick because I was sick again just a few days before leaving for the trek, but other than a car sick episode on the first day, had no problems (and felt really sorry for the couple other members of our group who got sick, I can´t even imagine!) We visited this highland cheese factory, took a traditional tamskal (basically like a sauna but with a fire in a little brick building outside...it´s the way that the locals bathe) ate beans and rice, hiked through villages where spanish is not even spoken, stayed at a house of a local man who told us his story about the civil war (the campesinos in this part of the country basically found themselves stuck between the guerrilas and the military, siding with either meant the other side would kill you, but one had to choose sides...the reality is that most of them knew or cared less about the politics...), made some new friends, aquired some sore muscles, summited the highest non-volcanic point in Guatemala, took a dip in a freezing highland stream (almost on par with snow melt streams in Driggs), and saw a lot of pigs. Probably more than that too, but it´s hard to recap everything quickly!!

So, I´m taking off again tomorrow morning (henceforth the need for efficiency and speed) for San Cristobal over the Mexican border with an ICA friend and another gal from the trek. I think I´ll be there 4 or 5 days and then will be heading back to Xela for the last time (I believe). I had an unfortunate realization last Tuesday as I packed up my things for the trek, discovering that someone in my house had, likely over the last 2 weeks, stolen the equivalent of $190 U.S. dollars from me. It was, partly my fault because I had stopped leaving my door locked at all times, but am also nearly 100% sure that the guy who took it is one of the pensionistas in my house who has a sketchy reputation around town and has had problems consistently with my host mom (she actually kicked him out earlier this month, telling him he had to be out by May). I confronted him, but of course he is going to deny it...Anway, live and learn. It makes me sad that even in a place where I felt safe and trusting, I was taken advantage of, and although I really can´t imagine that anyone else in the house would have taken it from me, there will always be that tiny tickling of a doubt...plus I´m $200 shorter, which isn´t a ton of money, but down here, it´s worth a lot more. I decided not to tell the Spanish school though because I don´t want my host mom to stop recieving students (it´s basically how she feeds her family...) and since there have never been any problems with her house before hand and the person I believe is guilty is leaving the house...still, what a crumy thing to have happen (although, it made me glad most of my $ was in traveler´s checks, that way only the cash could be lifted, along with a few of the quetzales I had already converted from the checks...).

Life is good! I´m really glad to be feeling better and it seems like it is working out well the way I am weaning myself off of my Guatemalan home and it also feels like time to be moving on. In just three weeks I´ll be seeing my mother and my sister in Honduras! Yay! Until later...

Leaving Xela...supuestamente

Well, after returning from my Semana Santa weekend, I was scheduled to take off on a trek that following Wednesday. I however, was feeling tired and not exactly ready-excited to take off for a 6 day hike two days after returning, so changed my reservation for the 25th of this month. Turned out that was a good decision because I finally decided to pick up some stomach amoebas (after 2 months of no problems...) and spent all of Thursday out of comission, took the medicine, killed the amoebas, but still was sick all weekend. (Although, I figured out if I just don´t eat, I normally feel functional, however, anorexia doesn´t seem like the best cure either...) I went back to the doctor who said that my stomach was probably just having a bad reaction to the drug, because it´s aparently pretty strong, so she sent me on my way with a perscription for an anti-nausea drug and another drug to help re-balance the PH in my digestive system and grow good bacteria. Unfortunately, I´m still not back in tip-top shape, actually, I´m more in see-saw shape, I think I may go back to the doctor again today. So, supuestamente, I am leaving on Wednesday morning for a 6 day trek..we´ll see.

Other than battling nausea and stomach bugs, I decided to take some more Spanish classes but at a different school (one that my host mom used to work with). I took 15 hrs a week (3hrs/3days) and that was really perfect. By the end of my second week I was getting sick of my teacher because she kept showing up late and stuff, but overall, I think more classes helped. If anything, it is just great for me to have to sit and speak to someone for 3 hours, or listen. Plus, I asked this time to not really do much grammar or anything and that was much better. The thing is though, that non of my friends here really know that I´ve gone to lessons and I can´t talk to them about it because my host mom could get in trouble with ICA if they were to find out I´m going to school somewhere else. So be it. Other than that I´ve sort of just been hanging out-either spending the time in bed, the internet cafe, central park or a coffee shop (with ICA friends...playing backgammon), or at home with my host mom and those who come eat at my house. Really nothing too interesting in terms of grand adventures. The last couple of weeks there has been a new student in my house from Norway, Helene, who is super fun to have around. On Saturday I climbed the volcano Santa Maria again with the school, mainly because I haven´t hiked in 3 or 4 weeks and am headed off on that trek...it is such a killer hike though! Plus, I had thrown up 2 hours before we left so was a little queasy in the stomach all the way up. We didn´t have a view at all, which was too bad, but made me glad I´d gone earlier when we had such a fantastic view. Then, yesterday (Sunday) a group of us thought it would be nice to go to the hot springs (my third trip) and took the bus to Zunil and then rode up in the back of a pick-up truck to the Fuentes. It was definitley nice on the sore muscles! I, unfortunately, got sick on the way back (I´m really getting sick of this being sick thing!), came home and spent the rest of the day/night in bed. Whatever, guess I´m in Guatemala.

So, the plan from here is my trek, then San Cristobal in Mexico with and ICA friend, then (hopefully) to the amusement parks south of here to visit my friend Emily from home who will be there for work, then Lago Atitlan for a little while, then off to Honduras to meet my sister and my mom who are flying in on the 19th. Yay!!! My mom will spend a week with us in Copan and then my sister will stay with me for another couple of weeks. Time is just flying by! I am feeling a little sad to know that I am finally at that point where I will be leaving Xela for good (for the most part); It´s been home for the last 2 and a half months!!

Semana Santa!!

Well, Happy Easter to all! The easter bunny missed me down here though, oh well, life goes on. So, basically since I arrived here in Guatemala, it seems the whole country has been preparing for Semana Santa. I wonder what they will do now that it is over? I went with my friend Alicia to nearby Lago Atitlan for the weekend. We spent a couple of nights with a few past ICA friends (who now have a house in Panajachel while they work at a nearby nature reserve) and then another couple of nights across the Lake at a town called Santiago, soaking in the culmination of Semana Santa.

First, Panajachel.
Pana is a VERY touristy town and has a large population of American Ex-pats along with Guatemalan hippies. It was actually a bit of a strange place for me, largely because so many of the tourists weren´t extranjeros--they were Guatemalans. Apparently the lake is a popular getaway for people from the capital and is almost a the spring break location for a lot of the college students here in Xela. It was definitley strange to me how easy it was to pick out the local tourists-I mean, foreigners are easy, they usually are caring a backpack and have very white skin...but almost the only difference between the extranjeros and the locals were the lack of a backpack. I can´t quite explain how strange this was to me. Most of Guatemalan tourists were very light skinned, carried around digital cameras and were wearing ¨Panajachel¨shirts purchased on the main street so as to better remember their trip once they returned home. I mean, I know one of the problems facing Guatemala is the intense estrangement of the Mayan population (that counts for nearly 50% of the population here) but something about this weekend really drove in the fact that there are clearly two different groups here. Extranjeros aren´t the only people in the country that come from privelage--the Mayan women on the streets targeted all tourists equally as possibly being interested in a traditional Mayan shawl or bracelet. Anyway, enough of that. I´m not sure I explained that well, but it was definitely something that made Pana very strange to me--I think especially because I spent two days across the lake in Santiago where almost the entire population is Mayan and many people there don´t speak Spanish, only the local Mayan dialect. Something about that contrast really hit home.

So, we spent Wed. in Pana and then came back early Saturday morning from Santiago and went to the Nature reserve with our two friends Nieka and Davy. It was a gorgeous little area, although in reality not a very large reserve. We did walk around though and took a ride on the zip-line, which was absolutely gorgeous and way worth the few extra Quetzals. I mean really, how often does one get to fly through the air overlooking a beautiful natural lake surrounded by three volcanos in Guatemala?

Santiago:
So, the Semana Santa celebrations...as I mentioned before, Santiago is nearly entirely Mayan and it was the first place I´ve been where almost all the men also wear traditional clothing, which was quite neat. We stayed both Thursday and Friday night, periodically walking around town to see what new developments had occured next to the Catholic church. We sort of accidentally ended up sitting through a 2 hour Mass Thursday afternoon. We went in to look at the church after lunch and figured all the people pouring in just had something to do with the special weekend, after a few minutes though, we were pretty much trapped in the center of the church watching mass begin...I couldn´t understand most of what went on, partly because half of the service was in Mayan (I can´t remember how to spell the local dialect, I think Tju-something). It was definitley me and Alicia (and a few other unsuspecting extranjeros) sticking up above the Mayan congretaion..
The main stuff happened on Friday. All around town the locals had constructed these gates decorated with pine needles and fruit and starting Friday morning began constructing these elaborate alofombras (carpets on the street made of sand or something like that depicting different images) on the path outlined by these gates. This work went on all day and the results where incredible. At three in the afternoon, the procession began at the church where a very large...I´m not sure how to describe it, maybe a casket with Jesus in it? began being carried through town. This procession started at three and ended at 6 AM Saturday morning. Very slow moving...But, they just marched over the alofombras that had taken all day to construct and a crowd of people followed the procession all through the night...
Ok, I think I am getting a little burned out on typing, so you are probably getting a little burned out on reading. Anyway, I´m sure I missed a ton like always, but it is imposible to include everything!

Black sand beaches of Monterrico

Can there be anything much better than eating fresh pineapple? Yes! Eating fresh pineapple (papaya, coconut and watermelon too) for lunch with friends on a black volcanic sand beach in Guatemala!

At the end of last week I decided (rather last minute) to head off for a week with my friend Tyler to the beach (even though I´d already paid to be in Xela) because I was feeling a little stagnated here, not really working, not really traveling, not taking classes...the change was fabulous! We had a great time just doing nothing for the week. It took about 7-8 hours to get ourselves down to the beach on Monday (via Chicken buses) but as far as public transport goes around here, the trip was really quite smooth. Then we just hung out the next three days, buying fresh fruits and veggies to eat for lunch, swimming in the ocean (getting sundburned...when will I learn!?). Also, two other past ICA students randomly checked into the same hotel as us Monday night and it was a lot of fun to have them there to hang out with also.

In case some aren´t aware, tomorrow is the begining of Semana Santa (easter week) which here is quite a large celebration. All of the kids are out of school, hardly anyone goes to work and there are celebration and religious processions galore. The saying is that all the gringos in the country go to Antigua for the week (reputed to have the best Semana Santa celebrations/processions etc) and all the Guatemaltecos go to the beach for the week...Actually, because of this, I think we picked the perfect time to hit up Monterrico. When we got there on Monday the town felt almost empty but when we left on Friday, there was already a lot more activity and people. We almost got to watch the town transform through the week from sleepy hot beach town to destination of the week. But, that means this next week the place is going to be packed and after that, the beach is going to be filthy dirty etc. So we timed it just right. The beach itself was pretty, but dangerous for swimming. The slope of the beach was quite steep and the ocean was quite greedy, if one isn´t careful, it would be easy to be swallowed up and sent out to see by the hungry rip-tides! Even so, it was fun to play in and we even fit in a few night time swims. (The moon was so bright! And in comparison to Xela, the stars so dim, but I think that must just be due the higher elevation here!) I do think I will likely be finding bits of black sand in my hair for the next week or so though from thrashing around with the surf. It´s a rough life.

So, now I´m back here in Xela which surprising feels a little like home. It was actually quite nice yesterday (after a full day of travel, 10 different forms of transport, a cultural museum on a sugar finca, a random side trip to Puerta San Jose, and a dinner of PBJs on a crowded chicken bus, and more ranchera music than I care to remember...)to get back into Xela and know there was a house with a hot shower waiting for me, being more sure of where we wanted to get dropped off than our (nearly too) helpful* microbus driver did. And then, after showering, Tyler and went out to grab some tacos and ran into a large group of our ICA friends who all greeted us with enthusiastic hugs and smiles. Yes, it´s a large city and I miss open spaces and green sometimes, but really, I think there are worse places to come back to.

As for the next step...? I´m planning on going to Lago Atitilan for 4 or 5 days with another ICA friend this weekend for the Semana Santa celebrations (plus, as a destination it´s relatively close to Xela, so transport won´t be too hectic). After that, I´m debating whether I want to try to stay here and actually volunteer or I may go on a 6 day trek organized by a group here called Queztaltrekers that would leave on the 11th. However it works out, it will be great I think! I´m also considering re-locating to the ¨Lake¨ (the same place I´m going for the weekend) because everyone raves about how great it is...maybe take another week of spanish classes, who knows... Well, I have to run and meet a friend for lunch!


*This is a characteristic of all public transport ayudantes and drivers, normally, its wonderful, you just have to know the name of where you want to end up and they´ll put you on the right bus and make sure you get off at the right time. Sometimes though, it throws them a bit when you aren´t a completely uninformed tourist...

Saying goodbye and bailando!

It was my first week without classes last week and spent my time trying to start volunteering (as I mentioned the orpahange before). Unfortunately, middle of the week the public school teachers went on strike (and are still on strike) so I haven´t been able to investigate the school I was maybe going to work out. And, the orphanage is very disorganized, making me feel a little bit like my time is not being taken full advantage of there! Oh well, that´s Guatemala time/life for you.

Also, for whatever reason last week more than half of the students at the school left, making it a week of goodbye´s (last night here, please come out and dance/party...nearly every night). It was sad to say goodbye to so many people who have been here basically since I have, but also maybe time for a change. Plus, I finally made it out dancing and I love that! I also started taking salsa classes (private) and, while a bit pricy (in terms of Quetzals) still fun. I feel so uncoordinated and clumsy! My teacher has been a proffesional dancer for years, lived in Europe for awhile performing etc...anyhow, having so many people take off has made the school feel practically empty this week because hardly any new students arrived. I´m glad that there are a couple of people though who I get along with well who will be here for another month or so. Also, I think I may head out somewhere for Semana Santa with a friend from here (he´s from the bay area, an ultimate frisbee playing, taking a year off school, almost went to Whitman but ended up at Vasser who understood me perfectly when I said, ¨I don´t do school...¨) and hopefully maybe do some other traveling later with him, although right now our ¨schedules¨don´t match up perfectly. It does make me laugh though how much he reminds me of all those fabulous Whitties out there...I guess small liberal arts colleges do just attract a certain brand of people often..

Wow, I feel like this entry has been quite scatter brained and illogical in it´s flow. Hope it makes sense to everyone! I am thinking about taking a few more hours of classes here from a different school for only 5-10 hours a week because as much as I don´t like the class thing, I think it does probably make a difference in the quality of Spanish I speak. One thing that is kind of neat though is that lately I´ve been feeling more confident in at least being able to communicate in Spanish, even if I am murdering the language! I guess that´s progress of some sort though...

Last Saturday we went to the movies for the first and watched Blood Diamond. It was in English with Spanish subtitles. I guess we English speakers are a bit spoiled hardly ever having to watch movies with subtitles! The funniest thing was that there was an intermission in the movie. In mid sentance the movie stopped and the lights went on and at first we were all wondering what happened but then others in the theatre got up to use the bathroom and stuff and we figured it was intentional! Ok, I´m going to go for now!

Tajumulcu, Orphanages, and life in general

This last weekend I went with a group of about 20 other ICA students to climb the volcan Tajumulcu which is the tallest point in Central America (nearly 14,00 ft). It was an overnight camping trip and quite an experience. To begin with, the whole trip was quite disorganized because ICA is not an official tour group. For example, there was no cook stove, the tents would not have kept out the rain, and I´m sure there was no first aid kit with us. That was what I expected though, so was fairly well prepared (and very grateful that I had my own sleeping bag!) and the trip was well worth it. It started out as an adventure when we stopped for breakfast and the director of the school told us that the owner of the comedor we ate at knew of a different, much shorter route to climb the mountain. The only catch being that our private transportation bus could not make the drive up to the starting point. So, the same guy offered to take all 18 of us up in the back of his lage double tire traction truck (with all our stuff) up to the starting point. I´ll post a picture later of this truck, but I still can´t believe we all fit! Also, I can hardly believe there was a road that far up in the mountains! So, after getting dropped off, we hiked uphill for an hour or so to the base camp area about a 45min-1hr walk from the top. Part of the group walked up that afternoon to the top and, although it was quite foggy at that point in the day, the view was still incredible. That night, most everyone nearly froze to death (I was fine, and slept under the stars with a couple other students). Man, I´ve seen stars before, but there is really nothing like start at 14,000 feet. That was incredible. The next morning we got up at 5 am to climbe the volcano again to watch the sunrise. Pretty neat. Plus, now I have bragging rights about having been on top of the tallest volcano in Central America.

Last Thursday I decided to not take classes anymore, although I by no means get all the grammar. I just wasn´t enjoying them anymore and was ready for a change. So, that leads me to the orphanage. I went yesterday afternoon to an orphanage called Hogar Temporal (it is government run) with another friend from the school. We took a hike yesterday up to this little park on top of a small mountain with 28 boys between the ages of 5 and 12. It was exhausting, but a good experience. I get the impression that the volunteer program is quite disorganized, but think I will start working there fairly regularly. It is was pretty incredible how starved for attention the kids were, there was hardly a moment where my hands were not being held by some child and several of the young boys who didn´t know my name would just say ¨Mami¨ when they wanted my attention...

Other than that, life keeps flying by! Today is the youngest daughter in my faily is turning 10 and I was woken up at 6:15 am by the traditional firecrackers outside the house. We are having a ¨refraccion¨this afternoon to celebrate and myself and Paul (the other student in my house right now) took both her and her mother to a Xelaju soccer game last Wednesday as her birthday present. (She is a fanatic fan and had never seen a game in the stadium before!) I´m still trying to track down salsa classes here, but am in no huge hurry. Since I am still staying with an ICA family, I can still participate in school activities etc, which is a nice option to still have. Well, that´s all I have for now!

Descanso (break)

I decided this weekend that I needed a little descanso from activity, so am spending my first full weekend in town all day. It has been a well needed little break so far. Thursday night I went with Lili (my host mother) to a Marco Antonio Solis concert in a nearby village. (I had never heard of him before, but he is a famous Mexican artist who writes/sings love songs and Lili absolutely loves his music). We were going to go in a car with one of her friends, but something came up at work for her friend in the last minute so we had to take the chicken bus down there. I´m not sure if I´ve written before, but these buses are crazy. I think there were probably 75 people on a bus made to sit 36 people (two to a seat). Plus, I tend to be taller than most people here and my knees jam into the seat in front of me when sitting down. I can´t imagine being what it is like to ride the buses being taller! Anyway, we took the bus down the night of the concert and slept over night with the family of one of the full-time boarders living at Lili´s house (going to universidad) who is from San Marcos. It was definitely a whirlwind trip since I had to get back for classes Friday morning, but worth it. I was by far the only person around with white skin...

I believe next week will be my last full week of Spanish classes, but time will tell. I think I may have to continue attending at least one a week if I want to keep living with my host family while volunteering. Apparently the office at ICA isn´t very friendly to students who stay in houses after stopping classes (and I think not so friendly to the host family´s also) We will see though. My host mom said she´d let me stay no matter what but that it would be better if I can sort of keep ICA pacified by being slightly involved with them still. Whatever, it will work out.

So, one of the probably not so good things I discovered last week was Sarita´s ice cream shops ("since 1935"). Why must I have such a soft spot for the tasty treat? I guess overall though, there are worse ways to spend one´s money, plus it costs just enough to be a little expensive :).

Well, here´s to the new month of March and the adventures waiting to be had!

Me encanta Xela

Hello all! This entry will be short because, although dinner will not be served or likely another half an hour, I'm supposed to be home to eat dinner in 10 minutes and you can never tell around here when something will randomly be on time. The last week flew by quite quickly it feels. There have been several activities with the school and I have made some great new friends which is nice, although sad that they are leaving in a week or so. Oh well, there will be more to come. This weekend I went with a group of students to a finca de cafe (coffee farm) and then to the beach, which was both interesting and relaxing. Then, on Sunday I climbed the Volcan Santa Maria that is 3776 meters high (translation to feet anyone?? I think around 10,000 plus??). It was quite a climb but the view was fantastic and totally worth the pain.

I think every day that I'm here, I fall in love with Xela a little bit more. There is nothing especially phenomenal about it as a place, but there is just something about it that I enjoy greatly. Right now, I think I will be in two more weeks of classes (including the current week) and after am going to try to find an orphange or school to volunteer in for awhile (I think, plans are fluid at this point though). I'm not greatly looking forward to a third week of spanish classes, but I greatly need to review everything and will not get to subjunctive until next week, plus, 5 hours a day of private lessons can't be hurting anything, even if it feels a bit tedious at times. That's all I have time for right now! Love to all that expect love from me and to the rest, take care!!

First Week!

Wow! I've almost been here a week! I definitley don't feel like I know or am able to speak/understand anymore Spanish than before, but I don't think I'm supposed to. I'm glad to be taking classes, if anything, it is 5 hours a day that I am forced to do things only in Spanish and that sure can't be hurting. I'm starting to feel a little settled in here. I've done a lot of walking around the city and have a good rudimentary idea of where things are--the main market, central park, the banks, bus stations and other less important things like bake shops and cemetaries.

I have met a few new friends (through the school, I.C.A) and spent the last weekend exploring the surrounding area with a New Yorker name Mina. We went to a local soccer game Saturday night and I got a kick out of the two 14/15 year old boys walking around with a video camera and jackets that said "prensa" (press) on them...a little different quality than game in the U.S.! (and, last night, on the news, sure enough, there was footage of the game!)

Sunday Mina and I caught a "chicken bus" (old school busses used for local transportation that are painted crazy colors) to a spot about an hour out of town. I don't know how it was possible to fit as many people on that bus as we did. Three to seat, people in the aisles, luggage on top...and the bus "coordinator" still managed to collect fare from everyone, incredible! Anyway, from where we were dropped of, we walked/hiked up to La Laguna Chicabel which is a lake that sits in the top of an inactive volcano. Despite being a very uphill/downhill type of hike, it was totally worth it and gorgeous. We got lucky and the clouds didn't roll in as early in the day as they usually do, so we had a decent view and sun most of the day. A perfect end to the trip was getting offered a ride in the back of a pick-up truck down the last 1/3 of the hike all the way to San Juan (a village much closer to Xela) so that we didn't have to endure the return chicken bus for as much time as on the way there.

Overall, people here are very friendly and helpful. There are definitely a visible number of Gringos here, but it is not to hard to be in a place where you are by far the only person with white skin around. Even so, it feels like most people aren't extra interested in me even if I look different (except the children on the busses of course, they'll stare and stare and stare...) The time here has a quality of going quickly and slowly at the same time and, although I have been keeping busy, I feel like I have a lot of spare time in the day that I am not entirely accustomed to, but generally am trying to appreciate all the same.

This week is a week of celebration and carnival centered around Ash Wednesday I believe where people crack open eggs, paint them, fill them with confeti (or other less freindly substances such as flour...) and then crack the eggs on their heads, or other peoples heads...or something like that. I guess I'll find out for sure...plus there is a huge market/carnival on Friday and I have the impression the celebrations will resemble Mardi Gras...the fun I have to look forward to!

It's real!

Well, I'm here!! It hardly seems possible! I managed to get myself from the plane to Xela (pronounced Shay-la), in one piece-granted with a bit of help, but safely. I'm here, ready to start classes tomorrow (there seems some confusion of when I was planning to start, but they're ready for me, so why not?). My host family lives about three blocks away, which is nice. I'm a little nervous what the next 5 months has waiting for me, but time will tell!!

Taking off soon

Well, here is a start, hopefully there will be more as the next few months go on! I am still currently in Orlando, FL ( I have been here since Monday visiting a friend) but will be leaving Tuesday for Guatemala! I am most nervous about getting myself and my luggage off the plane, out of the airport and finding my airport pick up. After that, I figure I will have a bit of guide up until the point that I arrive in my final destination, Quetzaltenango. I'm sure it will work out though.

I will be getting to Xela Wednesday the 14th (happy valentines!), staying with a host family through the weekend, and starting a language school on Monday the 19th. I will be there for at least two weeks with a family, taking classes and then the slate is wide open. I have no plans, no friends I'm meeting and no set itinerary...I'll discover the adventure that awaits as I go! Wish me luck!