Currently we are staying in Guatemala City, at an apartment kindly loaned to us from a family friend. The map has been updated, but we still need to post the pictures we have taken in the last few days. More on our experiences in Guatemala City to come (don´t worry we have been very safe here)!
First, we wanted to catch you up on our visits to El Estor and Lanquin. After staying in Poptun on the organic farm, we were faced with a choice of taking an easy two bus rides to El Estor or going to straight to Lanquin, which may have involved catching several buses and a pickup truck at some point, so we decided to take the easier day. A lot of Guatemalans we talked to also recommended El Estor, and we were not disappointed. The town is relatively small, although large enough to have everything we need and enough going on to be entertained. It is set right on the largest lake in Guatemala, Lago Izabal. On a sunny day, you can see across the lake to the foot hills that rise on the other side. However, most of the time we were there, the clouds dissolved into fog, creating a very hazy, yet beautiful view. We splurged and for an extra few dollars a night we stayed right on the lake, enjoying the view from the huge porch outside our door.
One of the best things about El Estor is that there are almost no tourists. People there were extremely friendly and even curious about us. Because of their proximity to Belize, a few people we met actually spoke English, including our favorite local, Reese, who cooked up some excellent Churrascos (beef cooked over coals, served with beans and onions, and as always, tortillas). As you can imagine, we got to know him pretty well, $2 dinner including a drink! While in El Estor we also visited El Paraiso, a hot spring/waterfall. We thought it was a waterfall with a near by hot spring, but in fact it was a hot spring that was a waterfall. The water was so unbearably hot that you could not even sit under the waterfall. Rather we found a nice pool were the hot water from the fall mixed with cool river that joined it.
Following El Estor we wanted to head to Lanquin where we heard that there are amazing pools and caves. We had heard from locals that there was a 3 hour direct bus there, that we could pick up in the town center. We confirmed this several times. As we soon found out, there is no 3 hour direct bus; it is actually a 6 hour journey with a bus transfer. However, we both agree that the bus ride alone was one of the most interesting experiences we have had to date. The entire 6 hour drive was made on a 20 seater bus with about 40-50 people. The road was rough and crawled up and down the mountains, passing tiny villages. Most houses we passed were one or two rooms and made of wood planks or raw concrete. Tourists must not ride this route often, as we attracted some curious attention on the bus. In particular, a little girl about 8 years old was fascinated by Kendra´s white legs and blue eyes.
In Lanquin we visited a bat cave, as many of you have already seen the pictures. It was not as scary as you would expect and all of the bats managed to exit the cave without getting tangled in our hair. But you can check out the pic above of Rich eating a giant cave spider! Ok, so he didn´t really eat it, but he came closer than you would. One afternoon we tubed down the river that exited the cave. The beginning of the rainy season has been fierce and the water level was quite high. It was not the relaxing tubing experience we are used to in Illinois. Rather, you had to spend the entire time trying to keep from getting dragged to the edge of the river where you would be whacked by overhanging trees. Adventure tubing.
The highlight of our time in Lanquin was our visit to Semuc Champey. Semuc Champey is kind of a natural anomaly. There is a huge rushing river at the bottom of a canyon. It goes under the ground into a cave and reappears half a mile later. While the river is underground, small streams from the hills feed a serious of calm pools sitting above the cave. The pools were crystal clear, although from high up they appear a vivid blue. The water was clean and cool. Fish swam around in the pools, nipping your feet. Overall we had a wonderful relaxing day swimming around. Getting to Semuc Champey was also fun as it involved a 30min ride in the back of a pickup truck or cattle truck. We opted for the pickup truck.
Okay. Finally, we have been able to upload Rich´s pictures. They are fully updated through Lanquin (and the incredibly beautiful Semuc Champey - more info in our next post). We have been in Guatemala almost 2 weeks, having spent most of our time in the north and eastern parts of the country. The northern and eastern areas of Guatemala are less developed and more rural. Most tourists are heading to and from the ruins at Tikal. But we lingered a bit longer to take in the beautiful green hills, lakes, and outdoors activities as you´ll see from our pictures. Today, we are in Coban, a medium-sized town, and we head to Guatemala City tomorrow where we have a free apartment thanks to a very generous friend!
For now, since it´s been a while since we´ve updated, we´ll give some info on our first 2 stops in Guatemala, then we´ll update further in another day or two.
From the moment we left for our trip, we talked to other travelers about the ruins at Tikal. Everyone we talked to said they were some of the most spectacular ruins you can visit. Scores of travelers come from Mexico, Belize, and Guatemala to visit them. Most stay in the town of Flores, a built up, touristy city on an island on Lago Peten (¨Lago¨ means ¨lake¨!). We decided to forego the city of Flores to go to the more tranquil lakeside town of El Remate, it´s very quiet and closer to the ruins. We had incredible views of the hills and of the lake from our room.
We visited the ruins from El Remate, leaving incredibly early in the morning, 5:30, in order to get there when the park opens at 6:00. We also decided to save some bucks and work at our own pace by not hiring a guide. This is debatable, but when you get to spend 30 minutes alone at the top of Temple 4 instead of 5 minutes with a big group of gringos, the decision feels justified.
We were in no way disappointed. Tikal, like Palenque before, sits in a very dense jungle. The park is enormous! When you enter, spider monkeys swing off the branches over your head as you walk the paths to the main plaza. Crazy looking birds hoot and holler and fly everywhere.
You have to walk quite a ways to get to the Gran Plaza, but it´s worth every step. Enormous Mayan temples seem to appear from nowhere out of the thick jungle, and a big grassy plaza with temples on all 4 sides surrounds you. We were there early in the morning and there were only a handful of other visitors there, much unlike the cattle-herds at the ruins of Tulum and Palenque. The temples at Tikal are the most impressive we´ve seen.
You can climb most of the temples, and the views are amazing. Don´t believe us? Check out the top of Temlo IV:
From the main plaza, we spent another 4 or 5 hours wandering around the enormous National Park seeing temples and building complexes. We hiked through beautiful trails in the jungle to every set of buildings we could find. Our legs burned from climbing uneven temple stairs and we sweated our faces off in the jungle heat, but Tikal was certainly one of the highlights of our trip, and definitely the most engrossing Mayan temples we´ve seen.
With not much else happening in El Remate besides Tikal, we decided to take off. We can´t tell you how many backpackers completely skip this entire region of Guatemala. Most zip between Tikal and Antigua in the west, a few go to Rio Dulce to take a boat trip up the river and catch the ferry to Belize. But we´re in no hurry, so we decided to make a couple of stopovers.
Our first stop was the fairly unremarkable, though purely Guatemalan town of Poptun. About 2 miles from town is a beautiful organic farm and working ranch called Finca Ixobel. We thought it would be full of backpackers like us, and there are some, but mostly it´s a nice vacation spot for Guatemalan families.
Finca Ixobel is quiet and sits in the hills near Poptun. You can hike, cave, and swing in the many hammocks. In our 3 days there, we hiked through the hills to a beautiful cave where we wandered and took in the rock formations. We also hiked an enormous mound called ¨The Pyramid,¨ where it was so steep you literally have to pull yourself up using trees and roots. On the way back down, the Central American rainy season unleashed its full wrath upon us and we got completely soaked! The pics are great, and it was really a ton of fun.
The other highlight about the Finca was the food. It´s a working organic farm, and there´s an onsite restaurant where you eat all your meals. They use all of their own ingredients to cook and make amazing food, and for incredibly cheap prices. We ate like kings and queens and really dug it. In Guatemala, we´re back into the realm of tortillas with everything, so it was a nice change of pace!
Currently, we chill in Coban, then on to Guatemala City to live in a local apartment in one of the city´s nicest neighborhoods. Will be able to watch the Stanley Cup Finals, so don´t fret! Very excited to get into the Western part of Guatemala, with its volcanos and mountains and cooler temperatures. We intend to stay in the region a few weeks so many more updates to come, but we´ll make sure to catch you up on El Estor and Semuc Champey soon!
We´ve been in Guatemala now almost a week! We have had a bit of a problem with our memory sticks for the computer, so we have not been able to upload pictures. We´ve also been in some pretty rural areas so far, so internet connections have been spotty. In the next week, we hope to be in some bigger cities to upload our pictures and give a full update.
For now, just know we´re safe and having a great time in Guatemala! We´ve already visited the gigantic and important Mayan ruins at Tikal, gone caving and hiking in Poptun, and are now in El Estor hanging out by Lago Izabal. The map has been updated for you to follow.
Miss everyone at home but having a great time! Talk to you soon!
(Rich's pictures updated as much as possible! The map will have to wait but will be updated when we can.)
Hey there folks. We left Mexico on Cinco de Mayo and have spent the last 8 days in beautiful Belize! Forgive us for leaving Mexico on Cinco de Mayo (we know!), but it's really only a big holiday in Puebla and in the US.
Anyway, we never originally intended to go to Belize . Since we are travelling for so long, we are on a fairly strict budget, and relative to the other countries we are going to, Belize is a budget buster. In fact, we spent about 60% more per day in Belize than we did in Mexico. But we felt we would have cheated ourselves if we didn't spend a little time here, so we decided to do a short stint in Belize. We spent 5 amazing days on an island called Caye ("key") Caulker and in 3 more a laid back town near the jungle in the west of Belize called San Ignacio. We never expected to go to Belize but are very glad we did.
Tomorrow, we are heading to Guatemala where we hope to spend at least a month. Guatemala is cheap (and very safe actually). There are tons of outdoors activities including hiking and caving and rafting. They also have cheap spanish language schools and we plan to do at least a week of spanish classes, hopefully with a homestay with a local family. First, we are heading to the steamy jungle in the north to see the ruins at Tikal, which are some of the most spectacular in all of Central America and everyone who's seen them has raved about them.
Before that though, we wanted to give you a summary of beautiful Belize.
Our first stop was Caye Caulker where we spent 5 days. Caulker is a laid back carribean island. There is a great mix of local culture and travelers there. The locals are a mix of hispanic and african descent, and the peace-love rasta men are friendly and fun! The island is palm trees and sandy streets. The barrier reef is about a mile off shore and the breeze blows from the reef onto the island and cools everything off. There's an eclectic mix of bars and restaurants and cafes, but mostly it's very small. You can walk the whole thing in an hour easily. You can watch the sunset from the north end of the island where a rastafarian man will chop up a fresh coconut for you with a machete, stick a straw in it, and you have fresh coconut juice!
Our highlights from Caulker include snorkeling the barrier reef where we saw sting rays and sharks, coral and fish and swam in some of the warmest water ever. Endless hammocks. Meeting local people including our friend Javier, Rich's 16 year old running partner and our good friends at the hostel. Watching the NHL playoffs (and battling the Canadians!), playing trivia, and sipping caribbean beverages at Lloyd's sports bar. And definitely the laid back, no hurry pace of island culture.
San Ignacio is a small town in Western Belize not far from the Guatemala border. The people here are some of the friendliest we've met so far, very warm and welcoming. Like on Caulker, they are a mix of hispanic and african descent, but the rastafarian/Jamaica-like culture is not as prevalent here. The town is small, only a few main streets, but there is a beautiful river that cuts through and two big bridges. The market is good and there are tons of outdoors activities around, including some smaller Mayan ruins.
Our highlights from San Ignacio have been the super friendly people, a canoe trip down the river and swimming in the cool water, staying at a really nice relaxing guesthouse, and visiting the Mayan ruins of Cahal Pech with some really cool friends we met.
One other great thing about Belize has been the food. We were fairly tired of tortillas and cheese in Mexico (dear lord no more tortillas please!), and in Belize, we were really able to try some awesome local food. We have eaten some great Jerk Chicken, stewed chicken, grilled red snapper, rice and beans with everything, and some amazing BBQ with potato salad. Some of our pictures will give you an idea.
All in all, Belize was a great experience and we feel a tad guilty leaving so soon, but it was great to visit and we're excited for Guatemala!
Over these last few days we have finished up our journey on the Yucatan Peninsula, seeing a quite few interesting places and now we are heading off to Belize tomorrow. We did not visit some of the more well known Yucatan beaches, such as Cancun, Cozumel or Playa del Carmen, as these would break our budget and are loaded with American resort tourists. However, we wanted to share a quick update with you of what we have done since our last post.
While staying in Valladolid, we took a day trip up to Rio Lagartos to see the flamingos which nest there. Unfortunately, it is flamingo low season, and the trip up there was a bit more adventurous than we orginally anticipated (missed busses, bus detours to completely different towns, and so on), but lots of fun! After all of that, we were very thankful to actually see some flamingos, a hundred or so. Almost as enjoyable as actually seeing the flamingos themselves, was the hour long private boat ride out to the preserve, which brought back great memories of boating on the Illinois river, except of course the lack of smell and the clear water.
After Valladolid, we headed to Tulum, which is famous for their amazing beaches and Mayan ruins set right on the water. We definitely agree that the beaches are amazing, soft white sand, warm clear water, and gentle waves. We did spend one glorious afternoon on the beaches. However, the town itself was overrun with tourists from larger resort towns. This held even more true when we went to visit the ruins. The ruins were not particularly spectacular, but they were nice next to the water. However, the whole experience was less magical as you were herded through the complex like cattle. We were even asked at one point what tour bus number we were with. To make matters worse, the hostel we stayed in, although it looked great on paper (free breakfast, hot showers, bike rental), was kind of dirty and rough around the edges (no toilet paper, cold showers, busted bicycles).
Needless to say, we decided to spend more significant beach time in Belize where we have heard of an island 1\2 a mile long next to one of the best snorkeling spots in the world. We head there tomorrow after a holdover tonight in the border town of Chetumal.
Our time in Mexico has been great, although somewhat shorter than we imagined. We feel like we had quite a variety of experiences with food, climate, and culture. It has been a great country to get our travel legs established as the people have been generally friendly and helpful. We have also learned alot more about the Mexican culture which we experienced in Chicago, but did not really fully grasp. For example, when you see the pushcart ice cream vendors on the lakefront in Chicago... those kinds of carts are everywhere in Mexico. There are a lot of little things like that you notice when you travel.
Overall, we are excited to keep moving and are looking forward to the very different and unique culture Belize offers in Central America.
(Rich´s photos from Merida and from Valladolid so far are up! Map updated to include tomorrow´s day trip.)
We are currently in Valladolid, a smaller town on the Yucatan Peninsula (though still Yucatan´s 3rd most populous). Merida was a cool place but we were hoping for something a little more laid back and less touristy and we found it. We´re also in an outstanding hostel here with a great kitchen that we´ve taken full advantage of.
Valladolid, besides the main intersection, is quiet and charming (to use adjectives pulled straight from our travel-writing thesaurus). It´s very clean, the buildings are painted in pastels, the Zocalo is tree shaded and beautifully lit at night, there are several great town squares, and there´s a boulevard that´s cobblestoned and walkable. We´ve enjoyed taking walks and sipping good coffee and just hanging out in a quiet place with not too much to do. It´s a nice change of pace from the big cities and also from the beach and jungle. Come to think of it, we´ve covered quite a few different terrains so far on our trip: cities, weaving villages, mountains, ruins, beaches, jungles, towns.
Today we ventured into another terrain: caves. We visited what´s called a Cenote (say-no-tay). Cenotes are naturally formed undergroud pools of water. They are open here, and in many places on the Yucatan and in Central America, for swimming and very tame cave exploration.
We visited a Cenote today called Dzitnup. We rented bikes from a local shop and rode 30 minutes outside of town along a bumpy trail to the cavern, paid a fee, and crawled our way in. Our unmentionables hurt a lot from the bumpy bike ride, so no better way to relax our muscles than by jumping into the cool water.
We´ve experienced so much heat here in Mexico, it was amazing to get into the cave and experience the cool temperature. The water itself was refreshing too, crystal clear and incredibly clean. Even though it´s Saturday, it wasn´t very crowded and we were able to swim a lot. We chased some of the black fish around too who were very used to human visitors and who you could almost grab with your hands.
Inside the cave, there were stalagtites and stalagmites (can´t remember which is which), and bats flying around on the ceiling of the cave. There was a single hole at the top from the outside and the sun showed through and there was this crazy light spot in the water. All in all very beautiful and we had a ton of fun biking to and from the cave. We also were able to explore a few nooks and crannies of the cave, though at some point in our trip we hope to do some more serious spelunking.
Tomorrow we are taking a day trip to a nature reserve called Rio Lagartos, which is famous for it´s Flamingos. We hope to take a boat tour, but it depends on how far down on the price we can bargain with the guides, they tend to be quite expensive. Bargaining is one of Rich´s new favorite hobbies. If we can´t get a boat at a decent price we´ll eat some seafood and enjoy the views.
At 38 days in, we are really enjoying ourselves and are beginning to get into the lifestyle and think of travel as ¨what we do.¨ Hope everyone is having fun at the office!
The labyrinth is seen as a sacred pattern that leads the seeker on a path to its center. A labyrinth is not a maze, there is only one way in and one way out, and there are no dead ends that would make the seeker choose directions.
First, we wanted to catch you up on our visits to El Estor and Lanquin. After staying in Poptun on the organic farm, we were faced with a choice of taking an easy two bus rides to El Estor or going to straight to Lanquin, which may have involved catching several buses and a pickup truck at some point, so we decided to take the easier day. A lot of Guatemalans we talked to also recommended El Estor, and we were not disappointed. The town is relatively small, although large enough to have everything we need and enough going on to be entertained. It is set right on the largest lake in Guatemala, Lago Izabal. On a sunny day, you can see across the lake to the foot hills that rise on the other side. However, most of the time we were there, the clouds dissolved into fog, creating a very hazy, yet beautiful view. We splurged and for an extra few dollars a night we stayed right on the lake, enjoying the view from the huge porch outside our door.
One of the best things about El Estor is that there are almost no tourists. People there were extremely friendly and even curious about us. Because of their proximity to Belize, a few people we met actually spoke English, including our favorite local, Reese, who cooked up some excellent Churrascos (beef cooked over coals, served with beans and onions, and as always, tortillas). As you can imagine, we got to know him pretty well, $2 dinner including a drink! While in El Estor we also visited El Paraiso, a hot spring/waterfall. We thought it was a waterfall with a near by hot spring, but in fact it was a hot spring that was a waterfall. The water was so unbearably hot that you could not even sit under the waterfall. Rather we found a nice pool were the hot water from the fall mixed with cool river that joined it.
Following El Estor we wanted to head to Lanquin where we heard that there are amazing pools and caves. We had heard from locals that there was a 3 hour direct bus there, that we could pick up in the town center. We confirmed this several times. As we soon found out, there is no 3 hour direct bus; it is actually a 6 hour journey with a bus transfer. However, we both agree that the bus ride alone was one of the most interesting experiences we have had to date. The entire 6 hour drive was made on a 20 seater bus with about 40-50 people. The road was rough and crawled up and down the mountains, passing tiny villages. Most houses we passed were one or two rooms and made of wood planks or raw concrete. Tourists must not ride this route often, as we attracted some curious attention on the bus. In particular, a little girl about 8 years old was fascinated by Kendra´s white legs and blue eyes.
In Lanquin we visited a bat cave, as many of you have already seen the pictures. It was not as scary as you would expect and all of the bats managed to exit the cave without getting tangled in our hair. But you can check out the pic above of Rich eating a giant cave spider! Ok, so he didn´t really eat it, but he came closer than you would. One afternoon we tubed down the river that exited the cave. The beginning of the rainy season has been fierce and the water level was quite high. It was not the relaxing tubing experience we are used to in Illinois. Rather, you had to spend the entire time trying to keep from getting dragged to the edge of the river where you would be whacked by overhanging trees. Adventure tubing.
The highlight of our time in Lanquin was our visit to Semuc Champey. Semuc Champey is kind of a natural anomaly. There is a huge rushing river at the bottom of a canyon. It goes under the ground into a cave and reappears half a mile later. While the river is underground, small streams from the hills feed a serious of calm pools sitting above the cave. The pools were crystal clear, although from high up they appear a vivid blue. The water was clean and cool. Fish swam around in the pools, nipping your feet. Overall we had a wonderful relaxing day swimming around. Getting to Semuc Champey was also fun as it involved a 30min ride in the back of a pickup truck or cattle truck. We opted for the pickup truck.
