Central Central America

Some of the Copan carvings

It’s been a while since my last post so I decided to split this in two. Last week I finished up my Spanish classes in Antigua. If anyone ever wishes to learn Spanish, I highly recommend the Antiguana Academy.  The last three days of classes were tailored around what I wanted to work on. Since finishing the class, my Spanish has only grown stronger, especially when trying to navigate through some of the most dangerous cities in the world but I’ll get to that later.

Reyes

            After finishing my last class, I was invited to visit with the aunt and uncle of Tracy (Ryan’s new fiancée if you’re out of the loop).  Mario and Paige founded Campos De Suenos (Fields of Dreams), an organization that provides for the children of Santa Maria. Every week almost 600 children from 0-19 years old come streaming into the community center they built. The older children (meaning possibly 4) helped bring their younger siblings in the center for a nutritious lunch.  The program does a wonderful job and every child had a huge grin when they marched out of the Campos De Suenos center. If you’d like to learn more or donate your time and money to a great cause then take a look at their website http://camposdesuenos.com/

These guys loved having their picture taken. 

After spending a brief night in a hostel in Antigua, I jumped on a 4AM bus to Copan, Honduras. I reached Copan around 12 in the afternoon. After dropping my bag at the Blue Iguana Hostel, I trekked over to the Mayan ruins with a couple fellow travelers. We explored the Mayan ruins for a couple of hours. I had a tough time calling them ruins as they were in spectacular shape for buildings built over a millennium before. The intricate carvings that decorated the tombs, homes and pyramids were spectacular. There were thousands of unique carved bricks that told the stories of the various kings rise and fall in Copan. Throwing ourselves a thousand years in the past took a toll on us so we went and grabbed a late lunch at a spot that was decorated with license plates from across the US. I suspect many of them came from chicken buses. The rest of the evening was spent exploring Copan and resting up for travel.

Mayan Ruins 

            The next morning, Friday, I boarded a bus that was headed to Tegucigalpa or as the locals pronounce it Tegoo. Unfortunately the bus line did not run straight through to Tegu, instead it went through San Pedro Sula which added hours and a tad bit of danger to the trip. San Pedro Sula is the most dangerous city in the world so I was happy to take the bus out of there to Tegu, the 4^th most dangerous city in the world. While I can’t say I ever faced anything in those towns that was any more dangerous than Boston at night, there is still some tension that you could be one of the 3 people murdered each day. Apparently much of the violence stems from gangs that began in Los Angeles and then members were deported back to Honduras.

            After arriving in Tegu at 9pm I paid too much for a cab which proceeded to take me to a hostel that shared a name with the hostel I was looking for. I settled for a dark dingy room, as I just wanted to get off the streets at that point.  After a few hours of shuteye I hoped back on a bus for the second leg of my trip through Honduras. After 12 hours and 1 boarding crossing, I made it to Nicaragua. I thought I would have grown tired of all the long bus rides but so far I don’t mind them. I think the reasoning behind that is this sort of romanticized Wild West vision I have as I roll into a new town after ten hours crossing through farmland. I’m sure the novelty will wear off once I reach South America and the buses take twice as long just to reach the next major city. I spent the night in Managua where I had some great pork and watched a UFC fight with some locals.

CHurch in Granada

            Finally, after a brief 45-minute bus ride, I reached Granada. Granada is a classic colonial city located on the northern shore of Lake Nicaragua. I wandered about the town and found Backyard Hostel, a great place with a pool and some noisy parrots. Backyard Hostel was my base for the next three nights as I explored the markets and colonial buildings that Granada had to offer. Amongst the random casinos and restaurants that the town had adopted, were the old colonial churches and fortresses each well maintained and bright. Granada seemed to be a crossroad for backpackers on their trips a many people seemed to be on their last leg of their trip. I met some great people in Granada but sadly had to move south to Ometepe, an island in the middle of Lake Nicaragua. After reaching the lake today (Wednesday) I spoke with a local who recommended a great little hostel on the wind swept beach of Santa Cruz. Next on the agenda is hiking a volcano and bathing in springs, so if my life doesn’t get any more difficult then I should be updated the blog from the beaches of San Juan del Sur.

As usual there are a few more pictures on my flicker. 

Antigua y Atitlan

My Spanish Classroom

Well I'm five days into the trip and so far Guatemala has been amazing. I arrived in Antigua on Wednesday afternoon after a long drive from Guatemala City. I am staying with a host family while I take a week of Spanish lesson at Antiguana Academy. So far, my Spanish has improved slightly but for the most part I'm still knocking the rust off my Spanish lessons in high school. 

The host family has been great, I spend most meals sitting with Oledia and chatting in Spanish. The food she prepares has been for the most part delicious, although I'm still not sure if I agree with corn flakes and hot milk. The handful of meals I've had outside the house have been fantastic. I don't know if I will ever grow tired off the tostados and tacos on every street corner. 

Antigua is a great town, surrounded by mountains and volcanoes. I’m almost certain that the unemployment rate is 0% as everyone seems to do some sort of work, from the boys selling sticks for hiking the volcanoes, to the elderly woman who delivers fresh tortillas to your house. Almost every house has a store in the front and I assume they’re open from sunrise to 10pm but I haven’t seen any hours posted. The cobblestone streets are buzzing with cars, tuk-tuks, motorcycles and chicken buses; each driving like a New York cab driver.

After class on Thursday we went for a tour of a macadamia nut farm. While the tour was interesting, my first chicken bus ride was definitely the highlight. The chicken buses are old yellow school buses shipped from the US and used throughout South America for transportation. While the bus may have the shape of the old bus that drove me to school, the similarities end there. Each bus has its own unique paint scheme and features ranging from flashing lights to spinning rims. The bus drivers pride themselves on cramming all of the flashy features on the bus as well as cramming as many people in the bus. We sat seven people across every row of the bus and at every high-speed hairpin turn, we sandwiched someone on the wall. Chicken buses will be one of my main forms of transportation and I’m sure they will be the source of many stories.

Volcano Pacaya

One Friday after class, myself, an Englishman, and an Aussie went to Volcano Pacaya for a hike. Once we reached the lower summit we roasted marshmallows over the hot lava rocks spread across the crater.  Dogs from the local village followed us up and down the mountain hoping to get a fallen mallow. We had hoped to see some lava after experiencing a 5.4 earthquake the night before. While no lava was visible, there were many vents belching steam.

Lake Atitlan and the surrounding volcanoes

A submerged house on Lake Atitlan

Because earthquakes, volcanoes and chicken buses hadn’t been enough adventure for the first three days of my trip, I decided to take a shuttle at 5:30am to Lake Atitlan. The large lake sits deep within a ring of volcanoes and mountains and has five towns dotting its shores. We chose to take a boat from Panajachel to the community of San Pedro. San Pedro has apparently grown extensively over the past few years and I saw why people could get stuck there. The safe and friendly San Pedro was a backpacker’s paradise. Hostels lined the streets, overlooking the calm waters of the lake while the friendly locals were always willing to help us out. We kayaked through houses eerily submerged in the water due to rising water levels.

San Pedro

We decided to blow off some steam after the stressful day of wandering the streets of San Pedro and drinking beers by the pool overlooking the lake so we went to a full moon party. A full moon party is pretty self-explanatory but we took a boat at midnight across the glassy waters to the shell of an old house. As 1am rolled around, the ruins of the three-story house built in the side of the mountain filled up with people dancing to the dj and sitting beneath the moonlit forest canopy.  Following the hours of dancing, we jumped on the first boat to arrive at 5am and returned to

Some graffiti at Lake Atitlan

sleepy San Pedro. After a catnap and a great breakfast, we went and swam in the lake before our boat back to the real world picked us up.

After a traffic lengthened bus ride back to Antigua, I finally had a moment to catch my breath and write this post. If all goes as planned I will be taking a bus to the ruins of Copan as I start my journey south. I will try to make another post next Sunday in whatever country I’m in at the time.

For more pictures look here:  https://www.flickr.com/photos/108668495@N04/sets/72157648810984690/