After another spine tingling, bone jarring, law-of-physics defying, chicken bus ride, I arrived in Queztaltenango ... or more commonly known as Xela(pronounced Shay-la). I will refer to it as Xela since it's easier to type. Xela is the second largest city in Guatemala and is relatively clean, surprisingly safe, and has all the modern conveniences of any large city including crowing roosters that compete with howling stray dogs at all hours of the night. OK, that...

Today I hiked up Volcan Pacaya, an active volcano that last erupted in 2000. Several years ago, some tourists were robbed on the trail up to the top and now everyone is escorted by a guide and the heavily armed tourist police. In fact, come to think of it, everything in Guatemala is guarded by men with machine guns or shotguns ... this includes the more obvious like banks but also hardware stores and even McDonalds. I met the guide at the travel agency at 6 in t...

Guatemala is by far my favorite country so far and I can say that if you never travel here in your lifetime, you are missing out on a great experience. After leaving the finca, I took an overnight bus to Guatemala city. A girl I met at the finca told me ¨don´t even think about stepping outside the bus terminal without getting right into a taxi¨. So when I arrived, I went for a walk to see what the fuss was all about and actually found it to be qu...

Happy Easter! I am staying at a finca(plantation) called Finca Ixobel just south of the small town of Poptun. Check out www.fincaixobel.com to see more. It is somewhat of a vacation resort for wealthier Guatemalans and a huge international backpacker hangout ... many come for a few days and stay for months. Today I went on a guided river cave tour(cueva del rio) which was just as amazing as snorkeling, only 10 times more dangerous. It started with a difficult 2 h...

Oop´s, while crossing the border a few days ago, I went through immigration, or so I thought. I got my passport stamped but later learned from other travelers that that was the Belize exit stamp. So I had no entry stamp for Guatemala and I am an illegal alien. Apparently, there was a small shack I was supposed to stop at for the stamp but the Guatemala side of the crossing is so disorganized and care free, I walked right past it. I went to the immigration of...