Tikal and Flores and homeward bound

On Monday morning, at quarter to 4, T and I were collected from our distinctly downmarket hotel (C & B were staying in a rather lovelier one elsewhere), and driven to the airport in Guatemala city. At half six we got on a plane for possibly the shortest flight I have ever taken, to Santa Elena, Peten, where the ruins of the mayan temples at Peten are to be found.

After getting up at half past 3, I wasn't really in the mood to embark on a 4 hour tour of the ruins. But this was all part of a pre-arranged package, and I couldn't really pull out without looking like a miserable spoil sport. The place is so hot though!! I honestly couldn't believe it. I didn't see a thermometer anywhere around, but it must have been getting towards 40C, and being the jungle, the humidity was intense.

On Tuesday morning we were woken to the eerie sound of howler monkeys, and got to the gates of the park for 6am. This was much better - it was so much cooler. We climbed to the top of temple 4 and watched what would have been a sunrise if it hadn't have been so cloudy. Nevertheless, it was amazing up there. We looked down on monkeys playing in the trees, green parrots and toucans. It was lovely! It was another one of those things that probably would't be allowed if it existed in the uk - 40 metres up on worn stone steps, and sitting atop an ancient Mayan temple. It was cool.

After a morning of eating, drinking and sweating, we were picked up by another bus and brought here, to Flores. Flores is a town that sits in the middle of lake Peten on a tiny island. It's quite pretty, but has a slightly strange atmosphere, there are many hotels, restaurants and tourist shops, but today they are completely deserted.

Today the number of insect bites on my body is 72. I think that this is a personal best for me. Just typing this sets me off itching. They vary from 7cm splotches that look a bit like a bullseye target thing, to the normal white lumps, to these tiny ones that I have all over my calves and even THE SOLES OF MY FEET! That grow little yellow heads on them when I get hot. These are the most agonising. I am horrified at the prospect of sitting on a 13 hour flight tomorrow which these things.

For this reason I have declined to go and look at more mayan ruins in another jungle with the others. They set off at 7.30 this morning, and I retired to my lovely, air-conditioned hotel room WITH BATH!!!! Like, I haven't even seen a bath since I left the UK. I have spent a real leisurely morning by myself, which has been lovely. I ventured out for a coffee at another hotel (but left when the people at the next table started to talk about contract killers), and have otherwise spent the morning sitting in my bath of cool water (heaven) and dancing on my bed to MTV, singing into the remote control like a 15-year old. It's been great!

I have 2 hours to kill until (if my spanish performed correctly) the driver who is taking the others from the jungle place to the airport, comes to pick me up. I told him I was ill and begged him to do this. I hope he turns up. Our flight is tonight at half 5 back to guatemala city, and then we'll travel to Antigua, for our very last night in Guatemala.

I can't really believe I'm leaving for the UK tomorrow. It's such a strange sensation, it feels as though our leaving party was only yesterday. In a way it was, that was the last day I spent in my other life. It feels like I stopped time in Leeds, and stepped out and went to Guatemala for another life while that one was on hold. When I go back it will be hard to believe that almost 6 months have passed, and that everyone else will have been getting on with things. It will be summer for a start. Weird!

So I guess I'm coming to the end of this blog too. Thank you for reading! It's been fun to write, and something I'll be able to look on with fondness.

If you would like more info on any of the things I've written about here, just drop me an email, and I'll do my best.

Hilary

Antigua

Lordy! I had to think for a minute there to try and remember where I am. So much travelling in the past week, with no more than one night staying in one place.

We left San Marcos by boat for Panajachel (Pana to the locals), where C and B were treating us all to a night in an outrageously posh hotel. Swimming pool overlooking the lake, hammocks, amazing rooms, enormous gardens, outrageously priced bar and restaurant etc. I really like Pana. It's main street is full of stalls selling the traditional weavings, and we spent many a happy hour wandering up and down, honing our haggling skills. I bought loads of pressies, and some for me too!

For lake Atitlan pictures (not mine!), click here:
http://www.travelsinparadise.com/guatemala/atitlan/index.html#pa270037atitlanflowers

Then yesterday morning, we jumped on a bus bound for Antigua, and here we are. Of all the places that don't really feel like that Guatemala I know (San Marcos, Panajachel) this is the least Guatemalan. I keep thinking I'm in some swanky part of Europe somewhere. There are trendy coffee bars and restaurants everywhere, enormous shops selling really fine quality things. No beggars or people with missing limbs, the grinding poverty of Guatemala seems to be hidden here. The buildings are all colonial and beautiful, painted yellow or white. Each has an immaculately kept courtyard inside with flowers, trees, water features and shimmering fairy lights. You can find whatever you want to eat, and you don't feel like a freak being a tourist. It's all very very strange for me.

For pics of Antigua (again, not mine), click here
http://www.travelsinparadise.com/guatemala/antigua/

We're staying here tonight, and then tomorrow we fly to Tikal, where we can see the ruins of Mayan temples (and possibly get urinated on by more howler monkeys). One thing I'm not looking forward to is the heat, and the mosquitoes. I'm already covered in bites, akin to my flea-ridden first few weeks in Xela (sigh).

Lago Atitlan Trek - Day 3

Up early again. This time to climb for half an hour to the mirador (viewpoint) for breakfast. What we saw took our breath away. Lake Atitlan, surrounded by misty-blue volcanoes, shimmering in the dawnbreak. It might just be the biggest lake I have ever seen, and definitely the most beautiful.

We enjoyed cornflakes and coffee at the mirador, and then packed our bags for our knee-quaking descent to the lakeside. About 2 hours later, we were on the beach and running into the cool clear waters of the lake. Swimming in that water was one of the most wonderful things ever. It was blue and clear, and sandy on the bottom - amazing. Then T and I did our Astanga yoga sequence on the beach, another quick dip, and then it was time for our taxi-boat to collect us and take us to San Pedro.

Lago Atitlan is surrounded by villages on its shores, and each one has a different feel. San Pedro is the party place, where you can find drugs and bars aplenty. It felt quite strange being in such a gringo-ey place. We had an amazing lunch in a gorgeous restaurant overlooking the water, where we watched local women washing their clothes in the lake, and people in boats going about their business.

After lunch we said goodbye to our guides, and hopped in a boat to the village of San Marcos, just across the lake from San Pedro. This place has a totally different feel, and I recommend it to anyone who is looking for a magical place to honeymoon or something like that. All the places to stay are totally beautiful, with amazing gardens and small, wooden or stone cabins. There are exotic trees and flowers everywhere. Even better, this is the place to come if you're into yoga, meditation, and alternative therapies. Not much in the way of partying or drugs here, just the most peaceful atmosphere ever. I was really sad that we had only one night to spend there.

Lago Atitlan Trek - Day 2

We woke up to the sound of one of our guides alarm clock at about half past five, and immediately began wondering about the dogs howling cacophany we had all heard the night before. Our 2 guides, who do this trip every weekend said that they hadn't heard anything like that before either. Curiouser and curiouser!

Today was going to be a long day. We had 9 hours of hiking ahead of us. It started with a long hike on the road to the next village, where we were promised breakfast at a comedor (cafe). But when we got there, the comedor was closed, so we had to make do with cooking up some mosh (cinnamon-flavoured porridge), and moving on. Halfway through the morning we stopped at a gorgeous river and took a power shower. A small waterfall had carved out a seat, which you could manouvre yourself into and enjoy hundreds of litres of water pouring down onto you each second. Apart from almost losing my underwear downstream, much to the entertainment of the other trekkers, it was great. Refreshed, we lay in the sun and tried not to look at the enormous mountain we had yet to climb.

After a sweaty slog, during which we all feared C was going to have a heart attack, we arrived in a large village full of activity and children running everywhere. Clouds drifted around us above, and dust billowed up from below as we walked in between the houses, with colourfully dressed locals waving at us. It was great.

We finally stopped for lunch, and then descended to a river bank which we followed to our destination for the night. A small town just close to lake Atitlan. Here we slept in an enormous gym for the night. This time I put in my earplugs, and slept blissfully through the sound of killer dogs barking outside.

Lago Atitlan Trek - Day 1

After a few beers last night, and the most amazing curry I have ever made (lentil, chickpea and banana!), I got up bleary eyed and emotional to say goodbye to my housemates. Living in such a big group of people has been so lovely, and I'm not sure that I can go back to cooking meals for any less than 10 ever again!!! Predictably, I spent a good hour in tears saying goodbye to everyone!

Then the four of us, T, his brother and his friend set off for the Quetzaltrekkers office for the start of our trip. we took a bus for about 40 mins outside of Xela, and then clambered out in a tiny, dusty village to begin our walk. As always, the weather was gorgeous and we had a really nice walk, climbing steeply up into the mountains and then descending into a small village in the valley to spend the night.

We pitched our tent overlooking some of the most amazing scenery ever, and then settled down to a dinner of soup and pasta, finished with marshmallows roasted over a real fire - Quetzaltrekkers special treat.

We were all suitably exhuasted and went to bed really early. However, sleep was not destined to be ours. At 1am, we were all awoken by the most surreal sound in the world. It seemed like a thousand or more dogs had started barking in unison. They would do this for a minute and then switch to a really strange, high-pitched howling. The sound echoed through the forests and around the mountains, giving the impression that there were thousands upon thousands of wild dogs all taking part. It felt like they were privvy to some secret information, and that this was their method of sharing it with one another. It went on for an hour, and then completely stopped. It was the strangest thing I have ever heard.

Last day in Xela

Well, T's brother and pal have arrived, a strange mixture of UK life and Guatemala life. As of tomorrow, we will become tourists, moving out of our lovely house and away from the housemates, and starting on our 3-day trek to Lake Atitlan, which I'm quite excited about. Although I've hardly done any hiking at all so I'll be monstrously unfit. Nevertheless, it looks set to be a really beautiful hike, with lots of swimming in rivers and then in the Lake itself. Yippee.

This morning we got up really early and stuffed the bloody bookcase into a taxi, and then on the top of a chicken bus to take it to the school. Now that this is done, the school is officially part of a charity that provides books for rural schools and other places like prisons, which means that if all goes well the school will continue to receive support after we leave, and we can make donations from the UK a little more easily. This feels nice, like we've left a little bit of usefulness behind.

We walked back from the terminal at around 6.30, the market was a hive of activity, with chicken buses rushing everywhere, and people unloading enormous baskets of goods from their rooves to sell in the market. There wasn't a cloud in the sky, the sun rose quickly, and Santa Maria was a beautiful blue shadow behind us. Then I saw an enormous mushroom cloud billowing up into the sky - Santaguita, the active volcano just behind Santa Maria had just let go a pretty big eruption, the biggest I have seen since we've been here. I felt a little alarmed for a while, but nobody else in the streets was giving it a second look, so I figured that we were probably reasonably safe. That was 4 hours ago, and the streets of Xela haven''t filled with lava yet, so I think we'll be ok.

Walking round the streets this morning has been quite emotional, it's all so strange to think that in all likelihood, I will never come back here. Much as I would like to, the reality is that there are so many places in the world that I would like to see, and I won't get round to them in one lifetime anyway. So I probably won't come back here. This in turn makes me feel really sad. The teachers at the school promised me that the doors will always be open, and the director of Escuela de la Calle has invited me to the official opening of the new school in August too!

So what else is there to say? It's been a wonderful experience, starting with the loneliness and the feelings of isolation when you can't speak any of the language, the host family, and then moving out into the flea pit. Then discovering that the owner of the flea pit is a psychopath, and hastily moving into our new abode where we have been so happy and put down a few small roots. I am proud of my spanish, and happy with the voluntary work I have done, although I do wish I could have done more. Being in the school, I realise that I should have stayed for a year or 2 rather than just a few months.

I'm also really happy that I did it - just came to live in this random place on the other side of the world for a while. Just to know that I can. It's been great.

Last day at La Selva

Today has been really emotional as we spent our last day at the school.

The children spent the whole of the morning session finishing their posters on the ozone layer, deforestation, water pollution, litter, noise pollution and smog. They were so brilliant, and really enjoyed it. Once again I had to fight back the urge to train as a primary school teacher when I get home!!!!

At the end of the day, T and I received little pressies with a terribly formal speech given by 2 of the children. We were really touched, and will keep our pressies for ever! I always feel so strange when I see children here. It's that knowledge that I won't ever see them again, and I'll never know what happened to them and how their lives turned out. The future of Guatemala is uncertain, although I hope that the atrocities of the civil war will never be repeated, it's hard to know what exactly will happen. There are so many challenges here, and I wonder how they will be overcome. But then, I mustn't underestimate the power of the human spirit.

In the meantime, strikes are continuing to protest against the Central American Free Trade Agreement, and our teacher Olga, is becoming concerned about money as the strikes go on next week.

With only 5 days left in Xela, wandering around the streets has also become an emotional experience. Xela feels like a comfy jumper that I don't want to take off. There's so much here to love, especially the people. I love the people on my bus in the morning to La Selva. There are the man and woman that sit at the back, giggling as though they are lovestruck teenagers, and the man that shouts out every time we go over a bump, there are the other 2 teachers at the school - they were profuse in their thanks for our help today, and promised us that the door of the school will always be open for us. Then there's the driver with his big smile and even bigger leather hat, and his assistant, the guy that's always running up and down the ladder and carrying peoples luggage and livestock onto the roof while the bus is moving! And all the people in the villages that wave at us as the bus chuggs up the dirt road, turning up clouds of dust into the sunshine.

It's going to be really odd to be back in the UK, although part of me is really looking forward to it. I love going away, but I always love coming home too. But before that, we have a week and a half of doing terribly tourist things with T's brother and his pal that are coming to visit us. They will arrive on Sunday, and it will be so lovely to see them. A confusing part of our other lives thrusting into this one! On Tuesday we're doing a 3 day hike to Lake Atitlan, one of the most beautiful places in the world I'm told. After this we are travelling to Antigua, and then flying to Tikal to see the Mayan ruins. After this it's back to Antigua, and then flying home on 14th April. We'll arrive, dazed and confused and very short on sleep on 15th.

Six months gone!