So long, and thanks for all the fish!

There are generally 2 types of journeys in life, one that has a defined ending, a destination that denotes when the action of progressing has been completed. Some way of knowing that you have accomplished what you have set out to do. The second type of journey is one that has an undefined ending in terms of time or destination. In this type of journey we simply tend to go along for as long as we can making the most of every experience and savouring the time spent on the journey. I guess that life in general would fall under the second category.

Unfortunately for me, my journey through Central America is firmly rooted in the first type. Much as i love travelling and the thrill of seeing new places, experiencing new cultures there is a limit to how much time can be spent away from home and the general responsibilities of life. Having the chance to take 10 weeks off has been awesome, something for which i am very grateful and i'll look back on the trip with fondness in the years to come. Great people in Central America, interesting food and cool sights. I still need to check out Nicaragua and El Salvador but that's a trip for another day.

One way to round off a finite trip nicely is to save something interesting to do for last. There are a few Blue Holes around the world. Egypt has one which i was lucky enough to dive many years ago. I see that Jamaica has one, albeit in a river. Belize also has one, although they call theirs the "Great Blue Hole". Belize has the second largest barrier reef on the planet and their Blue Hole is part of this barrier reef. Google it, the pictures are amazing, better than i can offer here. The thing is huge, 300m across and 108m deep. Apparently it was a sinkhole and strangely enough there are stalactites jutting down from a ledge at 40m.

So Friday morning at 5:15am we are assembled at the dive shop for breakfast which is included as part of the package. Unfortunately diving this site is very expensive due to the travel time and logistics but at least you get breakfast AND lunch included and unlike many dive-shops that I've visited, the food with these guys is excellent. People really are not at their best this early in the morning, i always smile at the grumpy faces. Me, i'm one of those terribly annoying happy early morning people after many years of getting up at 4am to go on game drives in the parks in South Africa. Early mornings rock for me!! Anyway, grumpy people aside everyone is looking forward to heading out to the site.

Interestingly enough for Central America this dive shop's boats leave on time, exactly on time! 6am we head out for the 2 1/2 hour journey to the dive site. The weather is perfect and the sea is completely calm. Being within the barrier reef helps a lot to keep the conditions perfect and the boat chugs along merrily with 18 divers and a few staff on board.

So calm

Forrest en route

People tend to sleep on these early morning trips so you end up with a deck load of sprawled out bodies everywhere. It's really funny when someone starts snoring, especially when it's a lady! And i thought i snored a lot... Being the irritating early morning person i am i tend to fidget and wander around the boat trying to see everything even with a book to read. I spent most of my time upstairs next to the captain looking for dolphins and whale sharks. I did manage to find one dolphin so it was time well spent, and i got to catch the last few rays of the trip.

Eventually we get there and it's time to kit up and jump in. There are 2 dive profiles at the blue hole, deep at 40m and shallower at 26m. To be honest i'm not sure why you would go shallow as the dive-shop limits both dives to 30 minutes so go deep and see the stalactites! The limit on recreational diving is 40m so lets just say that for insurance purposes we went to 40m. I may have gone a bit deeper but let's leave it at that for now. Jumping in you swim a few metres and then you literally go over the edge into the blue hole and it's over a 100m down. I think that if the visibility was gin clear it would be a cool experience, similar to what we had in Indonesia a few years ago where the island we stayed on had a 1000m drop off literally a few yards from the beach. Unfortunately as we were the last group at the blue hole, the previous divers had stirred the sides up a bit so it was not as clear as i would have liked it. Still great nevertheless. Free-falling down to 40m feels a bit like skydiving but slower. It takes a couple of minutes to get down there and you always run the risk of nitrogen narcosis or getting narked. Nothing serious but always worth checking out for as people may do strange things.

Diving at 40m

The stalactites

At this depth you only get a few minutes before your dive computer starts complaining at you so you have to make the most of it. The stalactites are amazing and you can swim between them. Unlike normal stalactites however, these ones are covered in barnacles so you can't get too close. Look but don't touch as they say! So after the allotted 4-5 minutes of bottom time we have to make our way slowly back up to the top. There is not much else to see in the blue hole, it's more for the experience and to be able to say that you have been there, done that!

The Blue Hole

The lunch break island

The dive boat

As we had three dives for the day after the second one we stopped off at this most amazing island for lunch. Perfect white sand, crystal clear waters, huge iguanas wandering around, red footed booby's nesting and mosquitoes the size of Lancaster Bombers in the mangroves! At least they left us alone on the beach but get into the small jungle on the island and man, it was mosquito central. The coolest thing about this island however is that you can camp on it. Needless to say that option has entered my bucket list and we are definitely going to camp on that island sometime in the distant future, regardless of the blood-thirsty hordes of king sized mosquitoes. Getting there will be interesting but i figure that one could always hop a lift with one of the dive boats.

Anyway, after the third and final dive it's time to head home. Again we get the deck body sprawl as now most divers are really tired so everywhere you look, dudes are spread out on the decks. Forrest of course is back upstairs with the captain looking for sea-monsters but unfortunately on the way back there were none.

Final Sunset

And that i'm afraid is it. After an amazing 10 weeks i find myself back in sunny Atlanta merrily job-hunting and adapting to life back in the real world. It will take a while to get back to normal but I've done it before so i have no doubt i can do it again. The first week is generally OK but the second week is tough as that's when reality dawns. The remedy is simple - start planning the next trip!!!

Peru and Ecuador, here we come.......

Hasta Luego

Andrew

You better Belize it!

So after a busy and interesting stint in Guatemala the time has come to head off into Belize, the fifth and final country on this whistle stop tour. It's strange how at the end of a trip in a specific country you are able to look back with a different point of view as to the one you started with. When I arrived in Guatemala I thought that it would surpass Honduras in terms of how much I would enjoy the country. Looking back I can safely say that Honduras just pipped Guatemala in terms of overall friendliness. While Guatemala has incredible scenery, I think that the people in Honduras are simply the best of the bunch! They definitely make the place great.

Heading into the border between Guatemala and Belize you get to see a large sign right next to passport control - "Welcome Prince Harry". Clearly we are now entering back into the realm. The queen is on the Belize bank notes, signs are mostly in English even though people here drive on the right hand side of the road. Heading towards Belize city from the Guatemalan border you get less and less in Spanish and more in English.

Belize city is a strange place. Calling it a city in the first place is a bit generous. I think that there are only about 70,000 inhabitants and in the center there are no office blocks or high-rise buildings that I can see. There are streets called "Regent Street" and "Marine Parade" but they are very shabby and broken roads even with their fancy names. A dirty river splits the city and is used by local boats for a transport route. People here speak a very strange dialect with an insane Carribean accent, almost impossible to understand. Drinking seems very important here and many people seem smashed most of the time. The restaurant next to my hotel had a large table of very jolly toothless wonders hammering back the local beer and having the loudest conversation ever! At one point they loved each other, next one dude wanted to bash the other dude with his walking stick over some inane argument and then they all loved each other again! Crazy place.

Walking down the street this dude on a bicycle, smartly dressed rides up to me, stops and says "Good afternoon sir. I have the very best marijuana for sale, would you like some?". Wow, a dealer with panache! Further down the same street a middle aged woman stumbles over to me, "Excuse me sir, I love your hair!". What the heck, this is getting crazy. Of course I thanked her and then ran away. A little further on in a different street, a cab driver who had parked at the side of the road pipes up, " Hey buddy, I have some really hot girls for you. You wanna come along and see them?". Needless to say I ran away even faster from that proposition!! What happened to the good old days of being offered t-shirts and key rings?

Caye Caulker is a tiny island off the coast of Belize where we are staying for 8 days. It's claim to fame is it's proximity to the famous Blue Hole dive site as well as super chilled island vibe and decent sunsets.

Good place for cheap beer

Pleasant sunset

It's a really cool island as many of the restaurants still have sand floors. Rastas rule here and walking down the main sand street you see loads of them swaying to the reggae beat inside their heads, amply assisted by the special brand of home rolled cigarettes they all smoke. You hear music almost everywhere and people seem really happy, even if most of them are smashed on the local rum. There is a brand called a Travellers which seems to be big here. Locals as well as visitors alike make ample use of the myriad bars and restaurants on offer. Another huge bonus is that it is lobster season here now. It's as if i've died and gone to crustacean gourmet heaven! The lobsters are huge and stupidly cheap, not like London where you need to sell a kidney to buy even a small malnourished specimen. Here the lobsters leap onto your plate, begging to be eaten, for a nominal fee. Needless to say, I will be doing my best to ensure that no lobster is left feeling unwanted!

Beach side lobster shack

The main drag

Am bushman souvenir shack(see his sign)

There is still some damage from the recent hurricane and even on the dives today we could see some damage to the corals and the reef. People are working hard in true Carribean fashion to repair things and get the island back on track, 1 person works, 5 watch and shout instructions. The person working gets tired, drinks rum, eats rice and beans, work ends for the day! At this rate it may take a while for things to return to normal. Gotta love life in the Carribean.....

Dodging the restaurant touts here is great fun too. Telling them you have already eaten just prompts them to say, "Read this menu so you are prepared for tomorrow. Better to be prepared mon!". One other dude just shouts at you, "Follow the arrow mon, follow the arrow!". I guess I best follow the arrow then, shall I?

Diving the Blue Hole on Friday. Should be a fitting end to the trip, closing out with a big adventure. Hopefully there will be loads of sharks, probably not too many lobsters as I would have eaten most of them. Anyway, best I go and find this arrow to follow....

Hasta Luego

Andrew

There be monsters in them hills........

The thing about mosquitos is that they have been around longer than we have. They have had eons to perfect their art. We on the other hand are still new at all of this jungle existence, especially those soft skinned versions of us who hail from the likes of England and Europe. I remember many years ago Karen and I stayed in a Malaysian municipal holiday resort in Southern Borneo for a few days. This place was about as welcoming as a crematorium, dark, somber, damp and rather unsettling. It was however in a national park well known for great wildlife sightings, especially proboscis monkeys which are a bit of a specialty in the area. The thing about seeing the wildlife, you needed to walk into the jungle to get any sightings. So off we duly went, into the jungle, looking for the monkeys, Tigers and anything else we could find. We did however not have any bug spray! We lasted exactly 6 minutes at which we point, we turned and ran for the meshed in safety of the hut we were staying in. The armadas of the spawn of Satan liberated us of vast quantities of the precious red stuff, and I don't mean decent Bordeaux!!

Keen to learn from that experience I decided to use a layered approach to my mosquito management while in the Guatemalan jungles. 100% Deet as the base layer, arms and legs and neck. 50% Deet spray as a constant top-up to counter the effects of sweating in the 90% humidity and 35c heat and then 35% Deet cream for ears and face. Flying hypodermic needles, bring it on! Hacking through the Biotopo Cerro Cahui next to El Remate on the banks of the Peten Itza lake in northern Guatemala it seems my cunning plan works, for exactly 20 minutes that is. Mosquitos if anything are persistent and they WILL find the 1 square centimeter of non Deet covered skin and they will ALL pile in at the same time! Aaaarggh, man it hurts and then itches for ages, not cool. I wish I could drink a Deet cocktail and then sweat out pure Deet afterwards, heaven knows what that would do to my innards.

Views from the mosquito trail

The reason why I'm here is mainly to visit Tikal, possibly the most impressive of all the Mayan complexes in Central America. It definitely is the most visited site in Guatemala and the setting in the jungle is superb. Many of the temples and pyramids have been left as they were found, still covered in jungle growth, trees and earth. Some of the temples stand at 60m high and more and tower over the jungle. The whole site is vast and you could spend days wandering around marveling at the awesome stone work done by the Mayans over 1000 years ago. Walking between the temples for distances of kilometers in some cases, you are in typical jungle, surrounded by incredible bird life. This place is tailor made for twitchers, as long as you can handle heat, humidity and mosquitos!

I signed up for the Tikal sunrise tour where you are collected at 3:30am and then taken to the site where you climb temple 4 to a height of about 55m and you watch the sunrise and listen to the jungle come alive. Up at 3am, duly off at 3:30 we all get to the site entrance at 4:30. It's quite a walk in the dark to temple 4 past the other temples and pyramids. Man this place is amazing in the dark, you can feel the history, so cool! Grey somber rock structures all around you, hemming you in. Those Mayan dudes knew their stuff!

5:40am and there are about 30 bleary eyed tourists up on temple 4 waiting for the sunrise. Did I mention that it is rainy season here? Unfortunately no sunrise, only thick mist. HOWEVER, I do have a great video which includes the awesome sounds of the jungle waking up. You have gotta hear the jungle! Unfortunately the bandwidth here in Belize is too low for me to upload the video. I'll do it in the final blog post from Atlanta.

Early morning view

One of the pyramids 

View over the site

The Jurassic park noises in the background of the video are Howler monkeys. They are insanely loud
and can be heard for miles. The close ones that you can hear were at the base of temple 4 and they had bombarded us with monkey poop as we walked below the tree that they were sleeping in. I reckon they get a strange perverted pleasure in flinging fresh dung at unsuspecting, half asleep tourists. According to the guide it is good luck to get hit on the head by a fresh dump. Not sure I agree with him there!

After about an hour of crazy jungle noises, things become quiet in the jungle and the inhabitants get on with their daily search for food. Hawks, Eagles and vultures prowl the skies, birds forage and monkeys stop flinging dung while pigging out in a Pimiento tree. Nature at its best!

Now, all I have to do is survive the mosquito onslaught whilst checking out the temples and heading back to the visitors center.

I'm sure I can drink Deet, as the Dr Peppers advert says; "What's the worst that can happen??".

Hasta Luego

Andrew

Health and Safety would have a fit!

From what I have seen thus far in Guatemala, there seem to be only a couple of decent roads. The main route through the country from South to North seems like a fairly decent double lane road and then about the last 100km coming into Flores seems OK. Apart from these 2 roads the rest of the Tarmac and dirt in this country is challenging to say the least! Driving a Landy here would be great fun. In South Africa we pay to drive on roads like these, here you get to do it as a matter of course.

The trip from Panajachel (Atitlan) to Semuc Champey will go down in my list of most interesting journeys taken so far. 11 hours in a large mini-bus traversing a crazy high mountain pass, dodging kamikaze truck drivers, covering insanely rough dirt roads and dodging insane dogs that use the roads as living space, definitely puts hairs on your chest. Now, for some reason in this country, speed bumps are the big thing. I'm not talking about small rumble strips. No, we are talking spleen-splitting, cranial-crushing, nose-bleed inducing road mounds of hell designed to smash any suspension when negotiated at a speed faster than 2 miles per hour. Of course the bus drivers only brake at the last second so include rib crushing as you are flung forward against the seat or rail in the bus. Try this for 11 hours and see what your ribs look like! In one town alone I counted 31 speed bumps, I kid you not!!

However, this all becomes irrelevant when you arrive in Lanquin which is the jumping off point for Semuc. The lodge on the banks of the river is sublime, surrounded by mist covered hills holding coffee plants as far as the eye can see. Humming birds flit around doing their daily business while Hawks and vultures cruise the thermals above you. This place is so chilled, people get stuck here for months.

Lodge Restaurant

View from the deck

Casa Forrest

Probably the thing I love most about traveling in 3rd world countries is that all the adventure related activities are really exciting and fun. Safety is always an after thought so you get to do crazy, unregulated stuff. Zip lines look old and tatty, rope swings are frayed and about to break, rock and mountain paths are slippery with no protection and death inducing falls just beckoning. I love this stuff, it is so cool!! So I decide to take the day tour from the lodge, a full day of exploring the large water cave complex, tubing down the river, big swing into the water, a bridge jump into the river and then ending the day in the river pools this place is famous for. Forrest and water, there is a theme here.

Into the caves we go! We all clutch a lighted candle and head into the water, a river runs through the cave. Some parts require you to swim, holding your candle above the water. I discovered my head torch works under-water, so cool. First off we climb up a rope through a waterfall, getting hammered by water as we climb. 2 girls lose their bikini tops, very funny! A little later we get to the pool jump. Climb up a 3m slippery as hell rock face and then launch yourself into the darkness and hit the pool below, preferably missing the rocks on the right which you can't see anyway. What the heck, off I go into the air hoping to miss the rocks. Of course what the local hobbit community forget is that we are tall and jumping into a shallow pool means we hit the bottom, hard!! Thanks goodness my knees were bent otherwise I would have a spinal compression fracture.....

Next up, into the hole of hell. Great idea to push the tourists into a small, dark hole where the river rushes into, tell them you only drop 1m and then swim to the side, all in the dark. I go through, hit the  dark pool, disappear into the deep pool and come back up straight into the water gushing down, breathing tons of water. I'm getting bored of these near drowning experiences! Finally we get to he end of the caves and are given our face war paint to commemorate the fun.

Lord of the flies

Tubing goes well and we are followed by kids trying to sell us beer. My name is Hector, you wanna buy a beer, you can pay later?? My name is Chris, you wanna buy a beer, you pay later, remember my name! And so it goes on, they have their own tubes and follow us down the river, instant delivery service, so cool!

Bridge jump time. The bridge is about 11m high spanning a decent part of the river. I ask 3 times, is the river deep enough, are you sure?? Yes it is deep enough, just watch for the rocks on the left. The thing about guys who jump from decent heights into water, a certain part of our anatomy is at risk of getting bashed by the water on impact. 3 of us jumped, 3 of us were speaking in a higher octave for a while until things settled back in place. Man it hurt!!!

The bridge of pain

After all the excitement we get to chill in the pools and recover from the aches and pains, a really great place to hang out. No beer sellers here though, bummer. Oh, the river swing, suffice to say I have a bruised face, rib cage and left shoulder from hitting the river face first in a leap than can best be described as a brick hitting a body of water at high speed, ouch!

Love this place.....

Hasta Luego

Andrew

Mobile phones don't float...

Lake Atitlan in the Guatemalan highlands is another of this country's highlights and well worth a visit. The lake sits at around 1500m above sea level and is for the most part a relatively clean body of water, as long as you can ignore the ton of litter washed up on it's shores.... There is even a scuba diving outfit here, testament to what the water clarity used to be. Diving at altitude, something different.

Local fisherman

View over the lake

I'm staying in a small village called San Marcos La Laguna which is one of the prettiest villages that hug the shores of the lake. There are 3 volcanos that flank the lake and they are all over 3000m high. The highest is Volcano Atitlan which is over 3500m high. At certain times of the year, the sunsets are sublime, unfortunately the rainy season is not one of those times but the sunrises are quite cool too, we worth getting up at 05:45 for.

This village is one of the alternate therapy hotspots in Central America and boy, are some of the dudes here strange. I thought that Puerto Viejo in Costa Rica had hippies but they can't touch this place. Woodstock, eat your heart out. Every possible type of healing, therapy, mind expansion, thought processing etc can be found here. If you want to get in touch with your inner self, this is the place!

The smile center

The lady who owns the place that I'm staying is from the USA and has been here for almost 21 years and lives in a tree house, go figure.... Different strokes for different folks I guess.

One cool thing you can do here is to rent a kayak and hit the lake. I prefer a canoe as they are more stable but only kayaks are available so what the heck, let's give it a bash. My plan is to paddle out for a while into the lake, grab some shots for the bog and then cruise the inlets for a while. It's been a few years since I was in a canoe/kayak but it's like riding a bike so should be fine. So off I go, dry bag and  flip-flops stored under the small elastic mesh, life vest donned, shades and hat, looking cool.

After about 35 minutes I'm quite far into the lake so decide to grab the selfie for the blog. So stop, turn the kayak, take off the life jacket, open the dry bag, grab my mobile phone, take a photo and promptly capsize the kayak. Now the thing about dry bags, they only float when they are closed, life jackets only work when hey are worn. So as I go over, I barely manage to keep the phone above the water with one hand, there are 3,red images so it did get a bit wet! That hand holds the edge of the upside down kayak and is the only part of me above the water. The rest of me goes under trying to grab the water filled dry bag disappearing into the depths. I just managed to grab the bag fully submerged and stretching like crazy, my dive watch went into dive mode, I was so deep.

Seconds before I flip

As I go over

So now I'm back on the surface being dragged down by the dry bag stupidly clutching the phone. I get some of the water out of the bag, chuck in the phone, close the bag and take stock of the situation. Paddle and life vest have floated away, shades still on, hat gone, kayak upside down. Flip the kayak, put the dry bag back in the mesh, pull the kayak and swim to the paddle and life vest. Put the life vest back on, oh look, it does not work n the water, no strap so it gets stuck below my ears, cool! I can't get back onto the kayak so I decide to swim back to the shore, 100m away lugging the canoe and oar.

One thing I did not notice is how much deep water weed there is in the lake, it grows in about 5m depth and comes up to the surface. I get to the first large growth and stupidly thing that I can stand on it, well no my feet sink through into it, get tangled and I'm pulled back under the kayak, tangled in weed, only one hand above the water, sound familiar?

The only option here is to stop panicking, reverse my course and get untangled which somehow I manage. Not ready to drown just yet! The fisherman on the lakeside near me was getting ready to jump in. Eventually I get to shore, drenched, covered in green water weed and pissed off at my stupidity, stupid kayak!!!

I get back to the hiring office about 30 minutes late so should pay for another hour but the dude in the office takes one look at the bedraggled, weed covered creature from the swamp standing in front of him, laughs and waves me away. One small consolation for almost drowning.....

Well that will be enough water sports for me for now. I think I'll stick to land sports for a while.

Hasta Luego

Andrew

You da man Andres, you da man...

So what does the ordinary person do at 4:15am on a Sunday morning when they find themselves in Xela in northern Guatemala? Why, they get up and go volcano climbing, no reason not to I would say.

After the last attempt at getting the BIG that failed dismally I decide that another volcano, much higher makes sense. It seems that Earl has buggered off to torment some other third world nation and has given Guatemala a breather. The skies have lightened and the cloud base has started to lift, great conditions. Originally I had hoped to climb the highest point in the country but time and budget have worked against me. I have to settle for the third highest, volcano Santa Maria, at a paltry 3772m or 12375 feet for the non metric. Nothing really high but should be a decent lung buster.

Interesting fact about Xela at 5am, very little traffic. Interesting fact about Xela minibus drivers at 5am, due to no traffic they drive like coca leaf chewing Indy 500 amateur wannabe racing car drivers. Everyone knows that you can take a 90 degree corner on a narrow cobbled street at 60 miles an hour, why wouldn't you??? Sometimes traffic can be a blessing as it forces these insane dudes to actually chill out a little bit, not much but something is better than nothing!

After collecting my climbing companions for the day, 2 local dudes and their 2 Italian mates we head off into the dark early morning. Super insane minibus dude gets us there in record time and with squealing tyres we are deposited at the start of the trail. Looking up the valley at the mountain, we all say "That looks quite close", little do we know!

The mountain in question

So off we go, trekking on up the lowlands into the wonderful forest area. One very sad thing about Central America is the insane amount of litter. Literally everything is thrown onto the ground, with absolutely no consideration for the environment. Rivers are used as rubbish dumps, trucks literally pull up to the river bank and dump the garbage down the slope into the river, it is so sad to see. I have purposely not taken any pictures of this as I get too stressed out. I asked the guide today about this and naively said to him that kids should be taught at school not to litter. His response, most of the culprits never went to school in the first place!

Anyway, moving onto something more positive, for once the clouds are keeping away, no rain, lovely sunshine and the views as we climb are getting better by the minute. The Guatemalans apply the same principle to mountain paths as the Nepalis do; "The shortest distance between 2 points is a straight line, regardless of the angle of ascent". The path is literally 1400m of altitude gain, straight up the mountain, no contours or gentle gradients!

On the way up

This route is a hell of a calf buster and you can feel the strain building as you slog your way up. One thing I love about the Italians is their capacity for extreme profanity, rivalled only by the Cape Coloured community in South Africa. The Italian lady who was clearly not enjoying the climb totally turned the air blue with what she was saying, every two steps resulted in another outburst which in my perverted mind I found hilarious! One other challenge we have on jungle/forest trails in Central America is that they have been cut for growth impaired hobbits... I spent the bulk of the climb with my knees in my face, and man I have ugly knees, I never realized how ugly!! Plays havoc on your back too.

After tailgating the poor guide for 3 1/2 hours we eventually make the summit. I'm sure I put the fear of God into these tiny dudes, this large gringo lumbering along right behind them, one of my strides equal to 27 of his, poor bugger. At least I gave him a decent tip to make up for the close following. He gives me a fist bump on the summit and says, "you da man Andres, you da man!". Loving my Spanish name...

View from the summit

Forrest as fresh as a dead, wilted daisy

Xela from about 3200m

When you get to the top there are loads of locals wailing hysterically and bent over in intense prayer, crying out literally with tears streaming down their faces. I asked the guide about this and apparently this mountain was a Mayan holy place and now in Guatemala there is a lot of mixing of Mayan and Christian beliefs so the folk there are calling to Santa Maria on a Mayan holy site, fascinating to say the least. After an hour it's time to do the trip in reverse. This time it's the knees that suffer but hey-ho, no pain, no gain!

The drive back to the city, calm and sedate!! Bring on the traffic....

Hasta Luego

Andrew

When not to climb a volcano

The premier bus service in Honduras is called Hedman Alas, named after it's 2 founders back in the 50's. It is strange that in such a poor country, you can travel in a business class bus seat for only a few dollars more than a normal seat. The cool thing about these seats is that they are designed for tall people, loads of leg-room and they recline back 150 degrees. PlusBus take note!

Never have I appreciated a decent bus seat more than on the 16 hour trip from La Ceiba in Honduras to Antigua in Guatemala. On paper the trip looks relatively straight forward, in reality it is a tough journey due to terrain and traffic! The insane part, a single driver does the ENTIRE journey, no shifts, no relief driver. Think about that next time you are stuck on the M25.....

Forrest loves the bus

Waiting at the border in Guatemala

So after the bus dude does his magic for 16 hours, it's good-bye to Honduras and Hola Guatemala! Antigua is Guatemala's tourism showpiece. A UNESCO site, it is clean, safe, very pretty and full of tourists either staying to learn Spanish at one of the multitude of local Spanish schools, chilling out and drinking excellent Guatemalan coffee or passing through like me hoping to climb a volcano. The town nestles below 3 big volcanos and on a clear day the views are great. One of the volcanos is active and up until the day I arrived small lava flows could be seen running down the mountain. Now the occasional plume of smoke and ash tells us that the mountain is still busy doing it's thing.

View down the main drag

 The streets are cobbled and almost all of the original colonial buildings where possible have been preserved in their original forms. There are amazing hidden courtyards everywhere along with rooftop gardens giving cool places to chill out and even admire the view. Hell, even Macdonalds, Burger King, Wendy's, Dunkin Donuts and Subway are all hidden away fairly obtrusively , although frankly they don't belong here, the local food is great and cheaper!

The thing about a country with a large number of volcanos is that along with them you tend to get a great dollop of that other seismic event, earthquakes. Man, has Antigua had a tough time of it. Most of the old churches and monasteries are in ruins, smashed down by repeated earthquakes(Henry VIII would have been proud) to the point where the locals stopped rebuilding for fear of the next earthquake or volcanic eruption. What you are left with is a great town littered with ruins mixed in
with great colonial buildings, well worth a visit.

One of the church ruins

I'm in Antigua primarily to climb a small volcano called Pacaya. Now there are 2 main situations when climbing a volcano is probably not a good idea, depending on what you hope to get out of the experience. A full scale eruption is an indication to stay away. Hurricane Earl is probably another indicator, especially if you hope to see something from the top. So heading off from Antigua en route to the volcano it becomes apparent that views may be a challenge. Arriving at the starting point, 1800m above sea level we are surrounded by kids selling walking sticks. Apparently being a grey haired gringo means that you are half crippled and unable to walk unaided, ha, little do they know. Next come the horse dudes, calls of "Taxi!" follow us as we start walking. They continue to follow us for the first hour, hoping that someone will crash and burn so they can grab an over priced fare.

To be honest, the walk up to the base at 2300m is a piece of cake and in true Forrest fashion I left the group behind, they just walk too damn slow!! Once you get a walking rhythm you need to keep it. The view from the top, well no guesses there, thanks Earl.....

Great view....

The Lava shop

I suppose we have to take the rough with the smooth so I'll chalk this one up to experience and a calorie burning exercise. Interestingly enough there is a community initiative up at the crater selling really cool jewelry using polished lava from the latest 2014 eruption. Being convinced that we were going to be robbed, I took no money, bummer for once I would have bought an over-priced souvenir to support their cause. Damn, I must be getting soft in my old age!

If all goes well, on Sunday I'll climb the 3rd highest mountain in Guatemala. Now Earl, please bugger off into Mexico and leave Guatemala alone....

Adios

Andrew