Hello all! It’s been a long while since we last posted and so much has happened. I’m writing this blog post in an internet cafe on the tiny Caribbean island of Utila, looking out at the rain. It has been raining for 10 days. Without stopping. And we are trapped on this island as ferries don’t depart in bad weather. I guess you could say it’s a good time to spend an afternoon in an internet cafe. But I digress, when we last wrote we were on our way with Danish Simon and Kira to Flores, Guatemala.
Flores is another one of these tourist towns, built to accommodate visitors to the ruins. Not a very nice place to hang out. We found ourselves a super friendly hostel and spent a day washing our clothes and enjoying being out of the jungle heat and humidity. The following morning we woke up at 4am to take a shuttle to the ruins. We had grand plans of bushwhacking our way in around the backside, as in recent years the entry fee for the ruins has increased dramatically. It is a new development that there are two prices for most goods and services in Guatemala: one for locals and one for tourists. The sign at the ticket gate unabashedly states that the entry fee is 5 times (!) as much for ‘foreigners’ as it is for locals. Now I actually have no problem with this line of thinking as, yes of course the locals should be able to afford to see their own local heritage. What I’m opposed to is the fact that ‘foreigners’ are expected to pay such ridiculously inflated prices. I would be fine with paying twice or even three times as much as locals, but I think they’ve really taken it too far. Regardless, our plans to slip through un-noticed went sour and we ended up ponying-up over $20 each to get in. There were two reasons that we chose to wake up at such an ungodly hour: you arrive before most of the other visitors and get some quiet time to contemplate the amazing, ancient city and you are much more likely to encounter wild life. In Palenque we heard monkeys howling in the distance, at Tikal we saw them swinging through the trees, curiously following us. It was wonderful! We also saw Toucans perched in the trees. If you are connected to my facebook you can check out a short video I took from the top of Temple #4 that captures the haunting sound of those monkeys howling. We spent the whole day wandering through the very impressive ruins and didn’t manage to see everything. The 16 square kilometer area of the park only represents a very small percentage of actual ruins. When you climb a temple and look out over the Jungle you can see countless pointy and abrupt hills that are actually unexcavated ruins… this place is huge! Once we had seen the ruins there was not much left for us in Flores so we left for Antigua.
Antigua is a beautiful colonial city nestled in the mountains at an elevation high enough to render the climate cool and dry. It reminded us a lot of San Cristobal De Las Casas in Mexico only a little smaller scale. We found a sweet happening hostel that included the best hostel breakfast we have found so far. It was a fun place to stay where we made many good friends. We found a little bar called, “Cafe No Se” (or “Cafe Don’t Know) that featured a cozy-artsy atmosphere and impromptu live music. There is an antique refrigerator door hung inconspicuously on the wall. Curious visitors are rewarded when they try the handle and find the door functions as an entrance into yet another smaller bar featuring locally made mescal… cool!
One of the main attractions that brought us to Antigua is the opportunity to climb Pacaya, an active (magma!) volcano. What a crazy experience. We hoofed up this crazy, volcanic moon-scape where every step forward slides you half a step back and leaves you with pumice in your shoes. Once we got to the top, we were walking across a field of solidified lava flow. Through cracks in the stone you could see an orange glow and feel an intense heat. There was a 6 foot-wide river of magma crawling it’s way down the volcano a mere 10 feet away from where we were standing. Hikers have been known to descend the slope with melted shoes. Naturally, Kira and I had made the climb with a few liters of fuel and our fire gear on our backs. There’s no way I could turn down the opportunity to fire dance atop an active volcano! With crowds of people, the wind and the close proximity to molten rock, it was definitely the most difficult and dangerous fire show I have ever done. But wow, what an experience! The way I see it, there are two original energy sources that created all life on this planet. One is solar and the other is thermal. It was truly amazing to dance with the incredible heat and power of our planet. Plus it made for some pretty good pictures.
Our original plan was to spend Christmas in Antigua and hopefully find some sort of meaningful volunteer opportunity. Sadly this didn’t work out. Not a single one of the organizations I contacted for volunteering returned my emails. We were feeling a little anchor-less in Antigua as it was not giving us the Christmas we had been hoping for. After a couple of rainy days spent at the hostel we came to a decision: We would head back to Lake Atitlan, Guatemala to surprise our friend Farrah (who runs a hostel there) and Rael (who returned to San Pedro to work for Farrah at her hostel after the festival). We knew that it was a friendly place with people who would be happy to see us. I’d be lying if I didn’t say the lovely hostel kitchen had something to do with our change of plans. After all, a hostel kitchen with a functional oven is a rare find indeed. We had visions of a Christmas potluck with friends and fellow travelers in a place we knew was a little magical. We were welcomed with open arms, excited hoots and big hugs. It felt good to be back. There was a great group of travelers at the hostel (of course!) and we proceeded to plan a potluck-style Christmas dinner. Paul and I were invited over to a local Guatemalan family’s house for a traditional meal on Christmas eve. We even got to participate in making the tamales for dinner. It was a lovely experience to be welcomed into someone’s home like that. After dinner Christmas eve turned out to be quite the party complete with DJs, fire-dancing, great animated conversation and sparklers set against the beautiful background of a still lake reflecting stars. Lovely. We spent Christmas day cooking a feast fit for any king. I am utterly amazed that over 20 people from all over the world, managed to cook food items in one tiny kitchen and it all went off without a hitch. We had coconut rice and beans, mashed potatoes and gravy, deviled eggs, roast chicken, tostadas, traditional German kartoffel salad, homemade cake… all this was shared in the hostel’s beautiful jungle garden aglow with candles. I think we made the right decision about where to spend our Christmas. When it was time to leave on boxing day we said our goodbyes to Danish Simon as he decided to stay behind and work for Farrah at the hostel.
It was also time to say goodbye to Kira, as Paul and I were headed to Utila to learn how to scuba-dive and she was hightailing it to Nicaragua. We had been traveling with Kira for over two months it felt really strange to wave good by to our comrade as her bus pulled out that cold morning. Now we were back to just the two of us again, but not for long. After 2 days of bus travel and yet another border crossing, we made it to La Ceiba, Honduras, the jumping-off point for the Bay islands on the Caribbean side of the continent. After a night in a sketchy hotel we picked up the essential supplies (2 gallons of rum) and caught the first ferry to Utila. I haven’t been on many ferries before, but I doubt there are many out there more sketchy than this one. It kept pulling away from the dock while people were trying to board and we were informed that 40 people had to move below deck or the boat would risk capsizing. But when we finally got underway we were rewarded with warm sun on our faces and blue water below us. It really felt like the Caribbean! From our spot at the back of the boat we were witness to dolphins jumping and playing in the boat’s wake.
Utila is the smaller of the three Bay Islands and also the cheapest place to get diving certification other than Thailand. Certainly on Utila there are many different dive shops and due too stiff competition, they all run a pretty clean show with up to date equipment and really good safety records. We chose to go with a local-run company called “Parrots” that had been recommended by other travelers multiple times throughout our trip to this point. That being selected, we were instructed to read for an eternity the manual guide for open water diving. We had the opportunity to visit with our friends Peter and Susan from Calgary as they were here for their Christmas holidays. It was so nice to catch up with friends from home! New Year’s fell right in the middle of our open-water course which found us reunited with a posse of travellers some from Christmas dinner in San Pedro and some from our Pacaya climb, all merry, all rummed and some with handfuls of fire works to celebrate the New Year. Sam of the San Pedro crew had left his post at Farrah’s hostel (replaced by Danish Simon) and joined us in diving. I will never forget our first confined water dive and the incredible feeling of breathing under water. On or very first open-water dive out on the reef we were lucky enough to swim with a Hawk’s bill sea turtle. It was a unique and beautiful experience, something I have always wanted to do but never expected. The coral reef around here has so much more to offer than I ever expected. The coral itself is a colourful word which until seeing it for myself, I thought only existed on discovery channel. We saw various rays, a giant green Moray eel, a huge dopey Porcupine fish, Trumpet fish, Spiny lobsters, giant fuzzy sea cucumbers clumsily humping their way along the ocean floor and so many other large and small colourful tropical fish. Naturally we were hooked and stayed on to do our advanced divers course. With advanced certification we can do deep dives (up to 40m) and my personal favorite, night dives. When we did our night dive we were privy to a much more busy underwater world as everything was feeding and as we turned off our dive lights, we were treated to phosphorescence lighting up and flashing through the water as we disturbed it. We also got to do a dive down to a ship wreak, creepy!
While all this wonder and beauty was happening below the surface, above water was an entirely different story. The first few days on the island we encountered the infamous Caribbean sun and it’s accompanying heat. However two days into our stay it started to rain. And rain. And rain. And it hasn’t stopped yet. No problem if you can afford to keep diving, but if you are not under water there is precious little to do on this island besides drinking rum in your depressing hostel room wearing your wet jeans that haven’t been dry for at least three days. I swear my feet have started to molder. Sam, Paul and I were ready to leave this island 2 days ago but it turns out the ferry doesn’t run when the weather is bad. And trust me, the weather has been bad. It’s not even warm rain anymore. Our existence can be best described by Bill Murray’s character in the film, “Groundhog Day”. Every day we get up at 5am. Everyday we pack our bags and carry them to the dock. Everyday we are told, “no ferry today, try tomorrow”, then we console ourselves with a large, greasy breakfast and try to figure out what we could possibly do with one more rainy day on this tiny island. Determined to break this cycle we did something crazy today. We chartered a small three seater Cessna. Tomorrow we escape this island in a very small private plane. I foresee tonight’s nightmare consisting of an eerily familiar scene. A scene where we are up early, ready to go with our bags packed and a cheerful island pilot tells us, “no plane today, try tomorrow”. Wish us luck!
