Guatemala bound ...
Part 1....arrive safely and soundly in Mexico City, after an epic cross country taxi ride in Cuba to catch our Varadero to Mexico flight. Why, you say? (Read the previous post!)
Leaving the Mexico City airport to the hotel we needed to stay overnight in, we first buy a ticket for a 'Safe Taxi' that will take us...the taxi fares are paid according to the zones they need to go to....so, we shell out $230 pesos (approx $23 Can) to get us downtown.
As we pull out of the airport, we discover the hotel is a minimum 40 min ride away, and that's before the massive traffic jam we find ourselves in, just as airport traffic merges into the city freeway! Yikes!
Being flexible sorts, although neither of us does yoga, we go to Plan B. Yvonne spots several hotels right beside us and literally across the street from the airport...(we fly out the next morning, again)...she asks the taxi, if it is possible to check out these hotels?....
.....Si, no problem! our driver replies, as he drives off the freeway and around the block. First hotel is full, 2nd hotel has rooms! Yes! Check in and say adios to our taxi! Total time from airport to hotel...about 10 min! OK...we paid way too much for that ride.....but, we can walk into the airport to catch our next flight. All good!
Hotel is safe, clean, has a restaurant and is unbelievably quiet to be next to 8 lanes of crowded freeway and across from the airport...( we can see the tail end of planes making their way down runways from the lobby!)
Next morning, we walk across the freeways and 10 minutes later are checking into Interjet!
We land in an eerily quiet and deserted Guatemala airport...still without local currency, we look for some 'cambios'. We pass customs without problems and look for cambios...none around! Seems the cambio is on the other side (back through customs)... We ask, no problem...customs wave us through and we get some Guatemala $$$ (quezal). Head back through customs and waved through.....
The beauty of carry-on is that we are in and out 2x before luggage from our flight is even on the carousel.
Find a shuttle to Antigua and we head out for the hr+ ride.
....in Antigua....on a Friday night.... not the best plan... as it is a pretty popular getaway for locals from Guatemala City.
We do find a pretty decent, clean hotel just off the main plaza and yes!!! right over the disco! Our luck with loud music and sleeping continues!
Antigua.....spend a few days chilling out....catching up on sleep, jet lag, and long cab rides, flights etc.... A beautiful city that is nestled at the base of a semi-active volcano... do we see smoke???
...famous Antigua wine bar.....
Vendors can be found at every street corner and in between selling anything from food to lotto tickets. Some very pushy and others not.
Antigua is not quite at the San Miguel de Allende, Mexico level of popularity yet! But, it has a large North American population residing here.
The city survived a major earthquake, was virtually abandoned, then, slowly recovered residents and energy.
Numerous colonial style buildings, cobble stone streets, parks, plazas, shops, vendors make for a great energy....
It is a place, one could be stuck in...much like the Twilight Zone!!!
After a great weekend of music at bars like Fridas, and Snugs, and even the Tropicana youth hostel (hey, we get around with our new friends), we have recovered our mojito..and decide to climb a local volcano - Pacaya.
The hour long ride....turns into 2 hrs, as we fight a major traffic jam... 2-3 lanes turn into 4-5, as cars, vans, chicken buses (remodeled American school buses with freight truck engines and cab) and motorbikes, all look for any advantage to squeeze ahead by mere metres....
This is the shark....and the tuk tuks are the Nemos....really, tuk tuks are cute just a little tight for long legs!
....finally, get past the cause....a semi has flipped over on a corner, spilling its load and forcing lane closures...
We arrive at the village where all hikes to the Pacaya volcano start from...
Pass by young kids selling walking sticks and horses used as taxi rides. We decline...the taxi! We hike 2 hrs up to the lookout on a pretty decent pathway that starts as cobblestone/cement, but soon is loose volcanic sand....
...the cloud cover doesn't change much during our hike up... we can only hope it will burn off....but, no such luck when we reach the lookout...pretty socked in, foggy with clouds blowing around...
We descend into the crater where the lava rock lays strewn from the last big eruption in 2010....desolate, windswept, black rock surround us....much like the Antarctic might be, but, instead, black, rocky and virtually lifeless..there are hopes of greenery poking through in places...goes to prove, you can't keep a good life down.....
There's even a small store on the caldera... selling knick-knacks made from the volcanic rock, with proceeds going to help villagers who lost homes in the last eruption. National Geographic gave it a thumb's up.....
...after a few more selfies and some roasted marshmallows cooked in a steam vent, it is time to descend...and, still the clouds hung around ...in the shuttle and back to Antigua..
Next morning, we take a bus to the famous Lake Atitlan... once described as the most beautiful lake in the world... Now heavily polluted from sewage and farm waste....we arrive after a 3 hr shuttle ride to the town of Panajachel...one of several towns ringing the Lake... hop on a panga boat and head to the town of San Pedro....
Lake Atitlan is actually a giant, water-filled caldera surrounded by a number of volcanoes ...think of it as a mini Ring of Fire that surrounds the Pacific Ocean....(but, all quiet at the moment)....of course, the clouds cover most of the peaks.
We check out a few places to stay in San Pedro....some not so good, or water logged from the nearly 10 M rise in the Lake level several years ago.....seems several hurricanes dumped huge amounts of rainfall, while an earthquake managed to squeeze the outflow vents ....or so the story goes...
San Pedro is a quiet, chill place, where the vibe is definitely tranquillo - to use the vernacular of the Gringo Trail backpackers...prices here are about a third that of Antigua...food here and in Antigua is top notch, 5 star, international....local dishes hard to come by, apart from street grills... Will not go hungry here!
We share a panga to a neighboring town of Santiago with Matthias and René. Santiago was the site in the mid-80's of a brutal gov't crackdown on the area people....a scorched earth policy was the directive and the mountain villagers suffered greatly...Guatemala, like most of Central America, has dealt with a long, violent and oppressive past... (read Oliver Stone's account of Central America)...
Our guide takes us to a local tribal ceremony - the Maximon. We enter a cement-brick building where 2 men (shamans) sit on either side of an effigy - in the form of a torso of a man... smoke, candles, incense, money, cigar, rum ....along with a spirit-healer all are involved
While not a religious ceremony and not involving any religious or church icons, the Catholic church has called it voodoo or Satan......
...the ceremony begins when 2 locals enter and kneel in front of the effigy...while the spirit-healer chants in Mayan-Indian tongue...
The shamans are happy when Shayne offers 10 Quetzal... just to allow Yvonne to take pics!!!
We leave after 30 min...ride madly back on the tuk-tuks (3-wheeled cars) and return via our panga to San Pedro.
...we leave San Pedro and head to the town of Chichicastengo and their market day....
...as is usual now, weather is fabulous the morning we leave Lake Atitlan....clear volcanic peaks, brilliant blue skies and another ride up/down and over, and even, possibly sideways...
And what a view!!
The road goes from paved, to dirt, to sidewalk wide paved...all the while our driver deals with trucks, semis, chicken buses and tuk tuks... We even encounter one of the cute little guys (tuk tuks) as we zoom along on a sidewalk wide section of road.. poor little tuk tuk is coming down hill on the same narrow section...
.... it quickly gets off and onto the dirt portion, but not before it comes dangerously close to tumbling over the 20 cm high paved section....that's a big step for the stubby fellow! Can't you tell we like these little guys!! Ha!
After 2 hrs we arrive in Chichicastengo and the blocks long market with some 2000 stalls...we are met with a riot of colour, sound and people...in your face vendors...mainly women shouting...
... "Welcome to the jungle", we laugh... ...crafts, clothes, foods, house items, even motorcycles are for sale....
We bargain for a handweaving....we bargain hard, we bargain very hard and think we got a great deal....
Ha, ha. As we walk away...another lady selling the same item offers it to us for 50% lower than we just paid!!!
Eventually, we look for some beers, meet some new friends and a lady who swears that I look just like her boss - Richard Branson...(where has Yvonne heard that before? Ha-ha)... Eventually, we will meet the real RB!
Later that day, we continue back to Antigua... as all roads in these parts of Guatemala head back or through Antigua, it seems.
We find some nice bars, listen to great local music and plot our road trip north to Coban...
Adios for now...
Shayne y Yvonne
Additional Photos....
Hasta luego from Shayne & Yvonne 💗
