Well well well Guatemala, you were a surprise.

Originally this country was not on our list of destinations, mainly due to the advice from various sources within the UK saying ít has one of the highest violent crime rates in the world, and the bbc even going so far as saying that Guatemala is on the verge of being a failed state.

However after numerous people told us to visit, we decided to find out for ourselves, and it turned out to be a beautiful, stunning country with lovely friendly people.

I suppose we were taking precautions (no night travel, taking small amounts of cash out with us and not flashing expensive stuff about) and we detoured around the outskirts of the notorias Guatemala City which did look abit dodgy. But we travelled around the North, all the way down to the Southern highlands and across to the Honduras boarder and we constantly impressed by the country and its inhabitates.

Some further observations of Guatemala :

1) Guatemalas are CRAZY drivers, they will always overtake at full speed on a blind bend. A few times we ended up having to swerve back into our lane to avoid a head on crash.....only to repeat the manouvre at the next (10) blind corners.

2) Daves favorite sweet in Guatemala award goes to ´Dalmatian bars´which, well look like a dalmatians but are more tasty.

3) The food is up there with Mexico, all extremely tasty (but more expensive than we expected) The usual tasty Latin America stuff (Tacos, fríjol, tortillas etc) but also some nice stuff to remind us of home (The Zephur lasagna!!)

4) Lots of great fun hostels and lovely hotels, Hostel Los Amigos and Zephur stood out, mainly because of the excessive drinking that occurs everynight!

5) We stayed with a lovely family for a week which was a great experience and nice to get under the skin of a country and see how things really are. The meals served up by our temporary Guatemalan mother were all delicious, the kids where great fun (although tiring!) and was nice to stay in one spot for 7 days and just settle in.

6) Met loads of nice travellers while in Guatemala. The two fun Canadians kept appearing all over the country, as well as the Israel couple. You meet them in one place, then hundreds of miles away a week later and you bump into them again. Also was great to bump into two very nice Slovenians who we enjoyed a great meal and lots of beer in Antigua (Hi guys if your reading this, and thanks for buying us the drinks!)

7) The local beer is called Gallo, and its is awesome.....the best we have had so far. Must try and get some in England (somehow?)

8) Experienced an earthquake while in Antigua. We were sitting in an internet cafe when everything started to move. Was the strangest thing feeling the earth move back and forward under your feet. Dave and Emily both looked shocked, which the locals seem to find amuzing.

We guess it is common here and thought we had experienced a tremor but the next day we discovered that 4 earthquakes with the strongest at magnitude 5.8 hit a town 40 miles away from us with devistating Consequences to both life and infrastructure.

9) Overall we took in mountains, Islands, Temples, Lakes, Volcanos, Family, Spanish lessons, waterfalls, limestone pool, earthquakes and ancient colonial towns.....not bad for 3 weeks.

So spent 3 weeks more there than we intended, now we have to get a move on through the next 4 countries to get to Panama City by 1st November!!

Now off we go to explore country number 4 - Honduras !