Hi!

Before I write what weve been up to we wanted to describe the daily events and objects that make our lives entertaining/miserable at the moment, to give a better picture of what daily life in Central America (or at least Guatemala) is really like.

Firstly, The Showers; these appear, upon first glance, to be rather odd yet functional hot water bathing devices. Each hotel owner nods vigourously as we ask if there is Agua Caliente, but we now know this is a lie. Although I havent actually deconstructed one, i am fairly certain of how they 'work'. Firstly, a trickle of water passes within a few inches of a tealight candle, providing all the necessary heat anybody could need, whilts the air from the candle wafts into a kazoo to make a faint buzzing noise, the sound the aforementioned hotel owners use to 'prove' the shower works and of course, yes, is very hot indeed. I am no Da Vinci or anything but im fairly sure this is exactly how they work.

Damp; what would hotel rooms, bags, pillows, towels and clothes be without this? we have literally no idea anymore.

The Music; every single song has the exact same 3/4 beat - a cross between dancehall, crunk, tribal drumming and a faulty metronome, awful. This is then coupled with an accordian (!?), some terrible casio keyboard sound effects, anmd either a knock-off of celine dion or enrique iglesias. Always pumped out at full capacity of whatever speakers the bus/market stall has to offer.

Pillows; these were all purchased in bulk in the 1930's and have collected dust mites ever since, to the extent that they are now almost too heavy to pick up. I am trying to ration my antihistamines but am down to the last couple already!

Guns; everybody has one. Orange juice delivery? sawn off shotgun to oversee it. Burger King? A guard with a pistol. Bank....? three guards all with AK-47s. Why not?. The owners of the weapons are, after al, responsible 14 year olds. A toilet attendant the other day at a bus stop had a shotgun, as apparently toilet paper is really worth protecting.

Food; always, always, always, tortillas with every single meal. Including breakfast, and cake. Maybe not cake, but everything else! they are tasty, although kate doesnt think much of them which is proving to be problematic as we have had them every meal for the past 2 weeks. Usually you always get guacomole (good), onions, buttery rice, salsa (always unbearable spicy, and occasionally tasting like cigarette buts depennding on the commedore in question), and some sort of meat masquerading as beef, but that actually tastes like it might well be horse/goat/tourist or....

Dogs; every self respecting small town has at least twenty stray dogs in order that nobody has to endure a boring peaceful nights sleep, but instead can enjoy being kept awake all night by the sound of them fighting, howling, and popping out puppies like somebody is about to discover castration.

Buses; i neednt say anything more than this; the twelve seater minibus we rode this morning contained 28 paying customers, a driver, a drivers helper, two sacks of animal feed, and a bundle of firewood.

So...

after Panajachel, we travelled by Microbus to Lanquin, north of Coban. Here we explored the Grutas de Lanquin - a system of underground caves stretching 3 kilometres into the earth. We stuck to the section with a string of dim lightblubs to lead the way, about 45 minutes walk into the caves. The caves are home to thousands upon thousands of bats (more later), so as we walked we became more and more aware of the squelching underfoot and the brown stuff covering the handholds in the rocks. Guano (bat poo, gross!). I later discovered some actually in my beard, which owing to a lack of bathroom mirrors or hot water for two weeks had become pretty overgorwn! The caves were spectacular, very scary though, especially when we saw a small sign near one particularly dark area that read Altar de sacrificio - we clambered a lot quicker after that! They were really hot, and the air was very thin so after an hour and half in there we were totally exhausted. We went back to the hotel for a bit, then returned at dusk for the real reason we ahd travelled all this way - the bats coming out of the cave. There really were thousands of them, flying at extremely high speed. Loads of different species, including vampire bats we have since found out. Batgirl Sandham was in her element watching them with her little torch! They really were amazing, like being inside a David Attenborough documentary.

Yesterday we were supposed to be going further north to some underground pools, but owing to more extreme downpours they were flooded and so we could go in, so we decided to head for warmer climates, caught a bus back to Coban, then got as far as possible before nightfall. Which happened to be the worst town in the world. El Rancho. Basically just a roadside slum only exisiting in order to sell truckers torillas. We got a room at the only hotel in town (never a good sign), and it was total hell on earth. Hot, holes in the roof, flithy sheets, BLOODSTAINS on the walls, and worst of all; our first run in with cockroaches (deathcount had reached 5 by this morning). We lay in bed not wanting to move a muscle incase any part of our skin toched the bedclothes (thank god for our slik sleepsacks!). The 'get to sleep quickly then it will be over soon' plan was easier said than done due to all the noise from the road and the paralysing fear that there were more cockroaches waiting to attack us as soon as we fell asleep. Needless to say we arose early and were on the road again this morning by 7am sharp. Five buses, around 250 miles,&2 overtly corrupt immigration officials (requiring a bribe to stamp our passports at the border) we have now crossed the borded and have arrived in Copan, Honduras.