Currency:
Guatemala Quetzal

Highlights:
Tikal and the Mayan Splendors

Our Adventure Summarised:
Guatemala - hmmmm, I'm not sure we can really give this country enough credit in a blog as we only spent a very rushed two days here - most of which was spent on a bus so we didn't form the most favourable opinion of this country but at the same time recognize that this probably isn't the most fair assessment.

The long journey started with our very sad farewell to Caye Caulker where we jumped on a very early (7:30 am) water taxi to Belize City (and yes, this time we were smart enough not to get a taxi to the water taxi!). We were anxious to make it to Belize City before our 9:30 am bus - although we needn't have feared since this bus only ended up arriving at 11:30 am so we ended up having some time to explore Belize City. We weren't too impressed with Belize City but as soon as we jumped on the bus and started driving through some of the countryside to Guatemala, we realized that this part of Belize was also really beautiful. Would love to spend a month or so just in Belize exploring the countryside and different cayes.

But back to Guatemala… So the bus we got on was a middle range bus - not quite the chicken busses we had been warned about but also definitely not first class as there was zero air conditioning so we sweltered for 5 hours until we arrived in Flores, Guatemala.

Flores is a lovely city - it's basically an island in the middle of a lake - connected to the next town Santa Elena via a bridge. By the time we arrived, we were all really tired from the long day of travelling as well as Al's American visa waiver dramas (but I'll let Shaun go into details on that in the next blog). We checked into our hotel La Mesa de los Mayas where not only did they attempt to rip us off but also lied about having internet so we weren't very happy with them. We did manage to find our sense of humours again though when Georgie walked into Room #6 instead of #9 (she was holding her room key number upside down) to find a guy sitting on 'her' bed in his underwear. We're still not sure who got more of a fright!

For dinner that night, we set out for a place next to the lake that served pizza (we weren't so keen on the traditional chicken, rice and beans) and were so excited when we found one that we proceeded to order far too much pizza! It tasted just as good at 4am the next day for breakfast though!

You can see our photos here:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=346161&id=713415257&l=56017f71cb

Yes, breakfast at 4am!! Or in Shaun and my case - 4:20 am as I didn't set our alarm properly and we only woke up at the time we were sposed to be picked up for our tour. And what tour may you ask was good enough for us to wake up at this time? Well, funny you say that as a few hours later we were asking ourselves the same question. We had read all about Tikal which is a national park situated about an hour from Flores and had it recommended to us from several different people so we were so excited to find a tour company that was prepared to take us early in the morning and to be back in time for our next bus (2 pm) to Guatemala City.

So you can imagine the scene - the 5 of us at 4:20 am where some were less happy than others - i.e. my lovely husband who really does not function well without his morning shower which of course he didn't have time to take since we overslept! Al was chirping Shaun big time but Shaun got his own back when we got the park in the pouring rain and Al was really regretting his decision not to have gone back to get his rain jacket before we left. V also didn't have a rain jacket as this was one of the items she decided to discard to save bag space before we left Mexico (although to be fair it wasn't really water proof anyway!). So big yellow ponchos it was for Al and V - better known later that morning as the coneheads much to the amusement of Shaun, Georgie and myself (the pictures speak for themselves). V was also gutted that she had ditched her hiking boots in Mexico too - slops + mud = not the best combination!

And then the tour began… And this is where we realized that our expectations didn't really line up with what the tour consisted of. Expectation - arriving directly at one ruin, taking a few photos and seeing lots of animals, no walking, sunshine. Reality - seeing lots and lots of ruins (which looked remarkably similar?!), okay still taking lots of photos cos that's all we have to do on tour, hardly seeing any animals because they were scared away by the rain and LOTS of walking in the pouring rain. On the positive side, the ruins were built within a jungle so it was awesome to walk through the jungle as we weren't able to make it up to Amazon so this was the closest we got. The ruins were built by the Mayan people and although they were very impressive, I think any ruins after Inca trail will forever be somewhat of an anticlimax. And then where was our guide Cesar… He could be a blog just by himself but we won't give him the benefit. Let's just leave it as he really seemed like he was on something as he talked in riddles for six hours!!

So although we all enjoyed the tour in hindsight, there was a fair amount of grumbling that went on on the day. This was multiplied at the end of the tour (11:30 am) when we were so looking forward to getting back to the hotel for a quick shower before jumping on our bus. But no, Cesar disappeared for an hour while searching for our bus drivers. Eventually they appeared and we were on our way back to Flores to pick up our bags before going to the bus station (no time for showering now due to their tardiness). And then Cesar put the final nail in his coffin as he assured us that our bus driver knew he was to collect our bags and drop us off at the station - however, the bus driver knew nothing about it and wouldn't do it. Our 'friendly' hotel called a cab for us but they sent one small car which didn't exactly cut it and we were stressing big time at this stage as it was 1:40 and the 2 pm bus was the last one that we could take which would get us into Guatemala City in time to catch our onward flight to Miami. Thank goodness the taxi driver came through for us and managed to drop off half the gang and come back for the others and we all boarded the bus at 1:58 pm.

You can see our photos here:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=346162&id=713415257
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=346164&id=713415257&l=abd39f853d

Ten hours on a bus. This is not something that should be repeated. And yes, we know people do worse but omigosh, longest 10 hours ever! Luckily this bus had air con and semi reclining seats at least. And then there was our food intake that day… Breakfast was leftover pizza, lunch the worst sandwich ever from the park and dinner was hot dogs we made up on the bus after our only stop for 5 minutes!

Our hotel in GC, Mariana's, was lovely and right by the airport. We had been warned several times about how dangerous GC is so we were very relieved to quickly get in a cab at the station and go straight to our hotel.

After an awesome breakfast at our hotel, they dropped us off at the airport and we sadly waved goodbye to the Central American continent (or Middle American for some)!

Adios,
Lara + Leise