Living up in the jungle, in a remote village, Qeq'chi' spoken, 2 hours from the nearest ATM or supermarket, it can be a challenge. Well not so much when you have everything at your fingertips, friends who become your family, hostel which is a home, a range of pets, colleagues who are awesome and the landscape of dreams. It went so well to start with although i never really felt like i was 100% settled there. I should have but never did.

The puppies settled in well. They were named Cash - male and Luna the female. Luna lived with me and chris and Cash with Thomas until about 4 months old, then they had a cage built outside for them with shelter from the elements of course. Training was going well. The dogs both had completely different personalities, and showed great potential guard dog qualities.

I worked the bar and reception which was in the same area so multi tasking came into play. It was a 6 day week and day 7 was generally spent there anyway so we all felt like we didnt have a day off. that was home, we had nowhere else to go so stayed, and 2hours 1 of which was on a terrible track to get away from Lanquin seemed an effort!

Best way to chill...Tubing. I hated it to start with and was scared to do it, but got dragged along a couple times and got used to it. Beers on a river going with the flow literally was pretty cool. in the sun. nice.

We had a river at the bottom of the property which i took the dogs to most days so they learnt to swim and get sticks out of the current.

Semuc Champey was 45 mins by truck along horrible roads, a great place to go and explore the natural beauty guatemala has to offer. i love it there.

it was a good life, but was soon over. I lived there for just over 4 months, but unfortunately when my relationship ended with Chris, i gave my notice in and left a week later alongside 2 of the 3 other bartenders.

Although i left heartbroken about having to leave the dogs and my home, i did take one amazing thing away. Friendship. I became especially close with fellow volunteers there, Lozz, Mandy and of course Dieter Pop. Dieter is the last Mayan Jesus (or so he thinks with a drink inside him), Mandy Pop was the coolest girl ever, and Lozzie Pop the craziest girl who is also my rock. She helped me through my last week and helped me come to terms with what had to happen and i dnt know what id have done without her. She was mandys replacement in July. I missed mandy a lot. she was awesome to hang out with, although we didnt do it enough initially. Dieter is one of a kind and like a brother to me. also somewhat of a rock to each other. I love my Zephyr Family.

After I left Zephyr I headed to the Pacific to get my head clear and decided to head back home for Christmas and be with my family. It was time, I had been living it up abroad for 18months. I flew out of Mexico, having visited Flores and Tulum on the way, and flew via Belgium. I landed in London 8th October and had never been so excited...no one knew I was coming home. I turned up at my parents and knocked on the door at 9:30pm, much to their surprise.

End of Part 1