hanging out in San Ignacio

This morning my mother was feeling sick, so we got to sleep in and then hang out in our room. Our hotel here has internet, so I got caught up with all the latest Michele Bachman news. Then we had to switch hostels, but then she took a nap so I got to hang out some more in bed. Vacation from my vacation!

In the afternoon, we walked around the town toting bottles of Gatorade. San Ignacio is tiny. We pass by a wall topped by broken pieces of glass (to keep out intruders?), a wall painted with facts about HIV, and a cement staircase leading to nothing (beginning and ending in someone's front yard). We also see hawks circling in the sky suspiciously.

On one end of town, we walked through the cemetery, which is the saddest cemetery we had ever been in. Rectangular cement crypts lie around haphazardly, in various states of upkeep, many of them painted and even more of them looking like they survived a hurricane. Some family crypts stand open and hollow, their gaps littered with garbage. There is only a foot worn path down the center of the cemetery; the rest is overgrown the grass and weeds. I spot a giant iguana sunbathing on a rock and it slithers underneath as we come near. This makes me more uneasy for what other creatures are hiding behind all of the cement?

On the opposite side of town is the Belmoral River. It is shallow and wide and surrounded by grassy banks and big, leafy trees. We spy a perfect spot to lay out, but as we get closer, we see two men shepherding a stray opossum away from their food cart. So we cross to the exact opposite side of the river and the opposite side of the bridge and lay out our sarongs and take out our books and spot a magnificent rainbow and remark that THIS is what we've been lacking the entire trip, this peaceful, grassy spot to lie down and relax--

--And then it starts to drizzle.

Thank goodness it was a light drizzle and lasted only ten minutes. For the rest of the hour, we got to rest and enjoy the spectacular scenery and the soothing sounds of cars bump-bumping over the wooden bridge. I read a book about two old Alaskan Athabaskan Indian women who survive a harsh winter. This is one of the prettiest rivers I've had the pleasure of sitting by.

Soon it is near sunset and we go back to our hostel and I attempt to take a shower but the hot water shower head switch is so confusing that we can't figure it out and I end up just washing my feet in the cold, cold water. It is while trying to figure out the shower that I notice the toilet lid has been secured in place using a Sharpie marker instead of a screw. You probably have to see this to believe it, so of course I took a picture. Then we visited a pharmacy and bought tons of drugs. For dinner I had the same vegetable soup as last night and IT WAS THE MOST DELICIOUS VEGETABLE SOUP I HAVE EVER HAD!

Yaxha and border

Today we go to Yaxha, pronounced “Yah-SHA,” some more Mayan ruins about an hour and a half outside of Flores. Our taxi driver is playing the Billboard hits from 1986. What a great year! Pretty much every song that comes on I have as an a capella recording.

Yaxha is lovely and pretty opposite from Tikal. Mostly because it is supremely empty. We walk ourselves around in a counter-clockwise direction (the book tells us to) and climb a few pyramids to get a nice view. Many pyramids have not been excavated yet, but you can tell they are pyramids because the dirt and trees are piled into a tall, triangular mound. This park would be amazing if they fully excavated everything and you would be able to get a much better sense of what the city-state was like. Alas.

It is really hot and humid and my knees start hurting after the eight thousandth flight of stairs this week.

We had to return to Flores in order to retrace our steps and cross the border, even though that added another 4 hours to our driving time. We ate lunch at a lovely lake-side restaurant where the tables were painted bright colors and had glass and pottery mosaics on the walls. It took forever to get the bill because our waiter (the only waiter) disappeared and a sad man on crutches who we thought worked there could not for the life of him locate the receipt pad, the pens, proper change.... it was like a black comedy.

Several things happened on our way to the Guatemalan/Belizian border:

• We took a collective taxi bus with real Guatemalans
• We sat in the front seat
• Food sellers came on and off the bus at the bus station
• The windshield is completely cracked
• The bus (van) is overfilled with 25 people plus the driver
• We go through loud and busy Santa Elena
• My mother almost loses her prescription sunglasses when they fell out the passenger window right before we left and she didn't notice
• The driver uses the same hot yellow microfiber rag to wipe off his dirty dashboard and then wipe off his sweaty face
• We meet some guy named Edwin Garcia from North Carolina/Guatemala who is a bit too friendly for my taste and invites us to stay at his house the next time we visit the country

Finally we reach the border and walk through immigration with little fanfare. We take a taxi to San Ignacio, which is bustling with life and with ENGLISH. Our hotel, Casa Blanca, is essentially a Motel 6 level place, and our exclamatory reactions to the clean floors, fully made beds, and clean bathroom indicates that we've been staying at places well below our station. For dinner I have red beans and rice, fried plantains, and the best vegetable soup I've ever tasted. Crazy dreams again.

Flores

Arriving in Flores in the late afternoon, it seemed as if we had stumbled upon paradise. A room with electricity full time, a lake spread out before us, lots of little restaurants with tables on the patios, people strolling up and down the “boardwalk,” people even swimming off of the dock, and a rooftop deck with hammocks and tables and chairs on which to hang out and feel the breeze. The weather was lovely with the humidity cooling off as the sun set over the water. Birds were going crazy squacking and flying back and forth between the rooftops and a tree right next to our room. I had a dinner of nachos at one of the lake-side restaurants and used their internet before we settled into bed for the night. A little bit uneasily, as the mattresses were definitely marked by bedbugs. (I am an expert in these matters.)

The next morning, I felt like being lazy again and spent some time reading in the hammock on the roof before Jody pulled me away to make arrangements. It was overcast and slightly misty and I really didn't want to do anything other than sit and stare at the water. Feeling exhausted, I followed her around the tiny town until I was overwhelmed by making decisions and returned to the hammock to read and photograph the sunset for the rest of the afternoon and evening. The clouds are really incredible. I had two hours to myself for the first time on the trip and the loud birds kept me company. My mom hired a boat by herself and floated around the lake until it was past dark.

It is at this point in the trip that eating and making arrangements has become a real chore. How often at home do you sit down for a full three meals a day? Spending so much time thinking about ordering and waiting and then focusing on eating gets really tiring. I know this sounds like a real White Whine, (aka First World Problems), but it's true. In cultures that still have large family meals, you only sit down to one or two together. All I want is a peanut butter and jelly sandwhich that I pay for first and then eat mindlessly while walking or sitting on my bed.

I was still feeling really down so I made a phone call which I usually never do while traveling because it feels like cheating. I started crying as soon as I finished dialing but they were happy tears and I felt much better afterwards.

Tonight is the last night of Chanukah! My mom has extra candles because we skipped a night or two in the middle, so after the first set of candles goes out, she lights them again.

I fall asleep instantly and have vivid dreams. I am blaming it on the malaria pills.

Tikal

Omigod, guys, this place is just my wet dream. Ancient stone ruins hidden amidst the jungle. We watched the sky get lighter and lighter from the top of a pyramid temple and walked around the park in the early morning mist. After a quick nap, we did it all again in the sunshine. There are no words. I'm just going to attach my favorite pictures.

Day 6

Today was transit day. Pretty boring, but a welcome rest from all of the walking and plenty of time to take catnaps. We had a three hour, bumpy, windy shuttle trip to Antigua. We ate some great food in a little garden of a restaurant and my mom bought eight million more Guatemalan woven scarves. Then we got another shuttle to the airport. Here, they confiscated my precious Israeli sunscreen and were total dicks about it but when I started crying and the supervisor came over, he let me pour some of it into a smaller bottle and take it onto the plane. My mother took her entire toiletries bag, which was comprised of tiny bottles of this and that and was probably four times the size of a ziplock bag. Airline security is theater here as well. The flight was uneventful and we luckily found some other travelers who had already booked a shuttle to Tikal, so we joined them. When we arrived here, we had exactly one hour of electricity before the generator went off. We hurriedly showered and got our stuff ready for our FOUR FIFTEEN A.M. SUNRISE TOUR tomorrow. (In six hours.)

San Marcos walk

Despite previous declarations that we were going to finally rest, we ended up spending the entire day walking/hiking around Lake Atitlan. We met Antonio, the leader of Juevenes Maya, a young man who leads nature and cultural tours around the area to benefit the local community. We also recruited three other tourists to go on the hike with us: Josh, who we met in the courtyard of our hotel as he emerged from a shower and assured us that he could get ready in 5 minutes, and Leora and Gabriel, a newly married couple from San Fransisco who we met the night before while eating pizza and watching Spanish Home Alone. It was a happy coincidence that we saw all of them right as we were setting out on our hike, as it was much livelier with 5 of us, plus we now had the benefit of Leora's fluent Spanish. Plus we are all Jews, and Jews like other Jews.

LEORA AND GABRIEL ARE GREAT!!!

Our hike took us on a road around the lake, passing through several Mayan pueblos and producing stunning views of the surrounding volcanoes. We passed wild coffee plants and go to taste the bean – it's sweet like a fruit before drying and roasting! We also ate some guava fruit and avocado off of the trees next to the road. Yum! We also saw a mountain shaped like a person's profile and a cave that Antonio said was used by Mayan priests for animal sacrifice. There was a lot of bougainvillea and many houses made from adobe bricks. It was a peaceful walk save for the little, red tuk-tuks that zoomed by every few minutes.

We stopped at a park/beach where there were dozens of Mayan families picnicking and swimming together. Here we learned that Lake Atitlan has risen five meters in the past two years, due to heavy rains and flooding. We could see houses and trees along the coast that were submerged up to the roof. This maybe explains why there was no place to sit next to the lake and hang out – all the previous docks and patios were underwater. We got some ice cream which was gross and headed to the next town for lunch...

...And had an intense conversation about health care reform and the constitutionality of mandating health insurance and how the government sets up challenges in the private sector to reward innovation. Someone remarked that the Republican presidential candidate field seems full of exaggerated versions of real people. Josh told us about how he just finished consulting on a project in which a company was rewarded for creating a light bulb that is 15 times more efficient than the ones we use today. You will see it at Home Depot next year.

Finally, we reached San Pedro. The first stop was at a coffee production yard, where we saw piles of coffee bean in various stages of production: husks, raw beans drying, and roasted beans. All of these were spread out in someone's yard. Second, we walked through the town and watched a bizarre costume dance performance which I can only presume was in honor of Christmas. Mayan families were gathered around a town square watching dancers while pop music blared loudly. Each dancer was wearing a costume that seemed completely unrelated to the next. There was a Smurf, a cowgirl, a football player (American football), a duende (magical elf gnome of Latino folklore), Shrek, an old man, a pirate, Zorro, a clown, and old lady, a soldier, the Hamburglar, a police officer, and more. As if they bought every single costume that was available in the past five years and wore them all together. They were all wearing masks that matched their outfit, which made it all the more creepy. As we walked out of the town square, I saw a vendor selling firecrackers with pictures of Osama bin Laden on them.

Eventually, it was time to leave, so we boarded the boat back to San Marcos and arrived just as the sun was going down. Even though I did not lay out and be lazy at all, I got plenty of sunshine all day long and got to see Mayan culture as well. For dinner, we ventured out to the famous Aculuux, but it was closed, and we could only admire its recycled glass windows and trimmings by flashlight. Instead, we went to El Fe where our crooked hostel owner Paul was also an owner and my mom has Sag Aloo and I had a pasta dish with papaya and spinach sauce. It was freaking delicious.

San Marcos de la Laguna

Well, our hopes for a lazy and relaxing day were UNREALIZED. We spent the first half of the day in transit and the second half of the day walking back and forth.

Our shuttle to Panajachel picked us up at our hostel right after breakfast. The driver tossed our packs onto the roof (yikes) and we spent the next three hours driving up and down and across mountains to get to Lake Atitlan. Along the way we passed hundreds of dried up corn fields (Maya proudly call themselves “People of the Corn”) and hundreds of little Mayan children on the side of the road hanging out and waving at our van. We're not sure why they were there in the first place. Some whole families were sitting there, on patches of grass on the edge of a cliff next to the highway, women all bundled up in their colorful huipas and skirts, often times holding babies, children teeny and ruddy cheeked and standing apart from the adults. In some cases, small children were walking beside the road by themselves. We wondered if maybe it was because it was Christmas eve and no one had school? In any case, we must have passed a group of waving kids every thirty seconds and each time we attempted to take a picture through the window. Jody did not get a single shot of the children but did get several splendid shots of blurry foliage. (She wants you to know that she DID get a picture of our shuttle driver peeing when he stopped in the middle of a hill and disembarked without announcement.)

In Solola, we passed by a crazy regional market going on – even more women in embroidered shawls/blouses/skirts-- and lots of traffic. We finally got to Panajachel as the sun was overhead and yay! Warmth! But we needed to find a bank with an ATM, so we had to walk up and down the main drag first. Two banks wouldn't let us in but luckily we found an ATM with policemen stationed right outside. Then boat taxi (“barco publica”) all the way to San Marcos, which took almost an hour because our boat was so overloaded and dipped deep into the water so we had to go slow.

El sol, el sol, el sol! All I wanted to do was lay in the sun. Here are the things we did instead of that:

• walked around with our luggage following a young boy who said he knew where our hotel was but really he took up in a giant circle ten meters from where we started and then complained when we paid him only 2 quetzales
• dumped our stuff out and repacked our daypacks
• ate lunch and played cards
• changed into shorts and hat
• checked out the local tour guide to see about hikes for the following day
• walked down to the dock where there was no where to sit
• walked back and forth along the shoreline looking for a place to sit near the water
• walked back to our hotel room to double check something or other
• walked back to the dock and took some pictures sitting on the dock of the lake (yes) but two boys were pestering us
• checked out another local tour guide who wasn't there and his helper only spoke Spanish and I sulked the whole way because it was taking up precious sunning time
• took some pictures of bougainvillea which comes in magenta, orange, and yellow
• made fun of the hippie yoga crowd here who all wear ugly baggy pants and pretend to love each other and are incredibly unfriendly towards everyone else, like don't even smile hello
  

FINALLY we returned to our hotel again and found a tiny patch of grass right next to our room which offered just enough sunshine for me to lay down my sarong and sunbathe. Ten minutes later, the sun set behind the volcano.

-EVENING-

So then I came inside and was sad because I missed the whole day of sun. Jody convinced me to walk into “town” where there was still some sun. This is when we discovered the church – Jody says, “What's 'Benny's videos'?” referring to the Bienvenidos sign above the entrance which was missing an “e.”

We sat down and watched the hall fill up with Mayan men, women, and children. They were all very quiet. The service was a Catholic mass as far as we could figure out, since it was conducted in two languages that we don't speak – Spanish and Mayan Kaqchiquel. Several American Christmas songs were sung in Spanish which I knew because of ACC, like “The First Noel” and “Angels We Have Heard on High.” They did the incense walk down the aisle, several mini sermons, some kneeling, and communion. There were no prayer books. The women and girls all wore the same colorful striped head shawl and I was dying to take pictures the whole time but restrained myself due to church etiquette. Except for one.

After that, we wandered back and forth between our hotel thatched hut and the junk food market (I found Intenso cookies!!!!!!!) and the dock and then we followed some hippie yoga snobs to see where they hung out, then back to our place to watch Home Alone in Spanish and use the internet that wasn't working. I ate a pizza and now we're calling it a night. Hopefully, tomorrow will be sunny again because I have more horizontal aspirations.

volcan pacaya

Holy volcano! We booked a shuttle and a tour guide that takes us to Volcano Pacaya, which last erupted in May 2010. I did not know this fact before setting out, which is probably for the best. On our way out of Antigua, we saw Guatemala City laid out before us in panorama and a pig in the back of a pickup. Guess which one elicited more yelps of joy?

Oh, I almost forgot to mention THE ISRAELIS. After two full days of struggling with Spanish (the only places I do not struggle is when ordering food), Hebrew is so welcome! I do not have to think at all! I hear the Hebrew and it just climbs into my brain and I know what they are talking about without having to go through the translation process. The two guys and girl in the seat behind me are Israeli and I introduce myself and my mom. They are surprised that we can speak Hebrew and even more surprised that I am 30 because they thought I was 16 for the first half hour of the ride. One guy, Gal, has been traveling by himself and he is very friendly and I end up hiking with him for most of the day. I ask him to speak in Hebrew and it is so lovely to be able to answer almost automatically and use the prepositions and pronouns that I keep using by mistake with Guatemalans.

The climb up is hard going. We are walking up lava fields but the lava doesn't harden straight and flat like an asphalt road. Instead, it crumbles into sharp pieces that can cut skin and are incredibly hard on your shoes and unforgiving when you have to walk up piles and piles of it. The path was dirt mixed with lava rocks, and our feet kept sinking into the path and kicking up dust which was a pleasure to breathe in. Not to mention the remarks of the four horsemen who followed us up the entire mountain, pausing every time we stopped to catch our breath or take a sip of water to chirp, "Horse taxi?" or, "Lady yoowanta horse?" We climb over the initial mountain and then pass through a no-mans land of lava field in every direction. There are no signs of life other than us hikers. The horse guys have mercifully left us and the only sound is our feet crunching on the path.

The sun is setting in the distance and the clouds are sprinkled just so. It is so beautiful. We take a bazillion pictures.

At the top there is a small cave that we climb into. It is dark and warm and humid inside. Stepping just a few feet into the earth and it is at least 20 degrees warmer. Here you can see up close how the streams of lava cooled into rock. I took some awesome pictures.

And then at the top as the sun was going down, it got crazy windy and cold and everyone put on their sweatshirts and then just ducked back into the cave for warmth. We huddled there for a while, eating our food and marveling at the warmth (it was like a sauna), but then it was time for the descent. At first we walked alongside the setting sun, but then dusk turned into pitch black and our feet were kicking up lava dust and the headlamp was only so bright and our feet were sinking into the path and it was downhill and we were trying to go fast to just get to the end already.

Our shuttle driver picked us up along with two boys who sat in the way back trunk area and an adult man who may or may not have climbed onto the roof. We passed a candle-lit Navidad procession in the tiny town beneath the entrance to the volcano, and then we were driving down the windy road at twice the speed limit and I was finishing off my water bottles and trying to stay upright as we took the turns too fast and blinked headlights to pass trucks and then suddenly we were home. Legs feeling like jelly and covered in soot from head to toe. Quite eager to take a long, hot shower and excited that tomorrow has been designated "do nothing but lay in the sun at the lake" day.

Good night.

iglesia de santa domingo

Our first step into Antigua sunshine and a mini vehicle parade passed by our hostel! First, a pick-up with two men dressed in gold speaking on a microphone, then, a pick-up decorated in green and red Christmas stuff, and lastly, a pick-up full of balls. Fun!

Right, so the monastery was just like other colonial Spanish complex, and there were several gardens and museums inside of it, but let me tell you just the highlights:

• Seeing a large, colorful parrot type bird
• Being in the sun
• Watching a drip/twist candle being made
• Seeing skeletons in the crypt and then the lights being turned off and then being in the dark with skeletons in the crypt
• Mayan stone art
• More skeletons
• Some skeletons in a glass container cemented into the wall outside next to the garden
• Grass
• Plexi-glass display cases half buried in the ground containing bones. (Catholics are so weird.)(But not the Catholics I know.)
  

Antigua walking day

Guatemalan breakfast! Jody had eggs, frijoles, and fried plantains (which I ate). I had pancakes with fruit. Everything was plated nicely, and we got to eat in the sunny inside patio garden of our hostel.

Then we started our day-long walking tour of Antigua. The historical area of interest is very small, like ten blocks by eight blocks, but our route did some zig-zags and c-curves so that we could see everything. We saw several decrepit colonial buildings that had fallen in a past earthquake, several churches, a water reservoir with built in stone wash basins which are still sometimes used by the locals to launder clothes, and lots of park. Wandering the streets were many Guatemalans hawking necklaces and carved flutes.

One cathedral-- Catedral de Santiago-- was mostly destroyed in a huge earthquake in the 1800s, but the destruction has been maintained and even cleaned up a bit for the sake of tourists who pay to see fallen pillars and a domed ceiling which is missing the ceiling. You can see the brilliant blue sky through giant circles and stand in spots of sunshine below. The brick seams holding together empty air space remind me of the Door of No Return from Harry Potter. One section of the church has been overcome with weeds and grass and it is here that I get to utilize my mini travel tripod and we take our first self-timer picture. It is probably brighter and warmer now than if the building had still been intact. The Spanish were not known for their windows. In fact, when we visit a section which was untouched by the earthquake and is still used as a church, it is dark and gloomy with unlit, vaulted ceilings.


Off to the market! An outdoor market like you see in every country! It starts off with touristy crafts and T shirts near the outside, but as we wind our way into the maze inside, we see all sorts of electronic goods, fruits and vegetables, underwear stands, pirated CDs including Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked in Spanish, and little useful/useless shit that would otherwise be sold in the dollar store at home. We buy some fabrics and are overwhelmed. A highlight is a little girl selling a bowlful of tiny turtles. We also see women making blue-corn tortillas. The dough mixture looks gray and lifeless, like clay. Very unappetizing.

Then we go to Nim Po't, an indoor crafty market which is quiet and airy and has price tags. Since everything was shelved nicely and items were artfully hung on the wall, I thought everything would be pricier, but we found a lot of stuff that was dirt cheap. Here is where I bought presents for y'all! In addition to little wooden toys and brightly colored woven things, there were walls full of masks, statues of saints, little wooden animal figurines, and little packages of coffee.

Lunch was SO FREAKING GOOD. We ate at this place called La Comida de Guatemala, and we had roasted vegetables and rice. Which is not completely Guatemalan, but! The desert! Fried plantains in mole sauce! Mole sauce made from chocolate, tomatoes, chilies, and cinnamon and sprinkled with sesame seeds. After eating the plantains I basically spooned the rest of the sauce into my mouth until there was nothing left.

Other foods we had along the way included guacamole flavored Tortrix brand tostitos (delish), handmade tortillas from some ladies in a room off the street (kind of bland), chocolate gelt with a picture of a Mayan warrior on the wrapper (tastes just like American gelt), a mini green marzipan pear, and the most delicious little creamy chocolate ball I've ever tasted. We could have bought some avocados and mandarins from the Mayan ladies walking around and balancing those big old baskets on top of their heads, but they were all gone by the time it was lunchtime.


Brief aside: You are not supposed to flush toilet paper here; you leave it in a little trash can in the stall. It means that you can use as much TP as you want, just oodles and oodles and large wads of it if you want and there is no worry that it could clog the toilet! It actually feels kind of luxurious.

After eating we wander around a bit and see a restaurant sign in Hebrew. 'Raelis! They're everywhere! We probably won't run into many of them, though, since they like to go off the beaten path and do things on the cheap themselves, while WE are being safe and sticking to touristy areas and hiring guides, etc. We also find a bookstore so Jody can buy a Spanish-English dictionary and I learn the word “canela” for cinnamon. We organize our volcano tour for tomorrow and headed uphill for a panoramic view of the city. Alas! We were too late. Even though we are near the equator, because Antigua is surrounded by volcano mountains, the sun sets early (6pm) and so it was dusk by the time we were halfway up. It seemed foolish to continue, in light of all the mugging stories, so we turned back. We did pass a random old church facade standing in ruins and weeds right beside a basketball court. That was surreal and reminded me of Ayutthaya in Thailand. Even though this church was at most 500 years old (colonial Spanish), they are so poorly maintained that they look ancient.

When we get back to the hostel, Jody unpacks her bag several times looking for various items, each time fretting and talking to herself. This was the exact same routine that she performed every evening in the Nederlands. My stuff remains in waterproof sacs in my pack except for toiletries and daypack essentials, which I dump on the foot of my bed or the night table. There is no need to unpack since I am basically going to wear the same thing tomorrow. We light Hannukah candles, and I shower and blog.

arrival in Antigua

Landing at the airport was a treat. We swooped over lush, mountainous terrain before glimpsing the City nestled in a bowl of earth, surrounded by volcanoes. My plane bounced upon landing, which added to my exelerated heart beat. There were throngs of people waiting outside of the airport, all standing behind metal barricades on the sidewalk, and they kept erupting into cheers because a giant screen was broadcasting a sports game.

Getting out of Guatemala City was not a problem at all. Our shuttle made its way through tiny side streets and stop lights until we started ascending a mountain on the far side, winding all around it until we were in tropical jungle and then small Antigua. Guatemala City is like any other Central American city, and it was nice to leave it and arrive in Antigua, small and cobble-stoned with colonial Spanish-style buildings painted in bright pastels.

We took a walk around and ended up at the park, where sits a fountain of boobs. This park was very busy, with couples and families eating ice cream and Mayan ladies selling fabrics. I soaked up the sun like I've been living in a cave. We hung around the park for a bit and then browsed some touristy crafts, but we were feeling like zombies so we went back to the hostel and took a nap. I fell into a coma-like repose.

For dinner, we had Guatemalan nachos, which are big on the chips and beans, and small on the cheese. We sat on the 3rd floor rooftop and could see the glowing orange behind the volcanoes in the west get dimmer and dimmer, until it was nighttime and even the birds went to sleep.

We're here!

Guatemala is warm! We saw volcanoes! Everyone speaks Spanish! Our room is really colorful! We have made it to Antigua without being kidnapped, so score one for us! The plan is to go to the park and eat junk food (Adina) and nap (Jody) for the rest of the afternoon. Vacation is great!

rough itinerary

map of Belize

map of Guatemala