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A quick taster of Mayan Belize in San Ignacio

We extended our trip by a few days, changing our flight to go home from Belize. This had the dual benefit of avoiding two flights to get us to Mexico City, and having a couple of days exploring Belize. Whilst most people head for the Caribbean coast and popular dive spots, we went to San Ignacio, near the border to Guatemala. We barely scratched the surface of this country, but saw some incredible Mayan sites.

The bus to Flores – all large ‘luggage’ gets strapped to the roof

We set off from Saraguate Hostel in Guatemala, arriving into Flores by an easy bus journey chatting to a couple we’d met at the hostel. We got a tuk-tuk across to the bus station and were immediately whisked away to a minibus ‘colectivo’ heading to the Guatemalan border town of Melchor de Mencos. Our bags were flung on the roof and we grabbed the back seat. We set off, pleased to have the whole back row to ourselves. This was very short lived as we then stopped back in the main market and the bus began to fill up. Our bags were then properly strapped onto the roof along with various other bags and a child’s bicycle.

We set off at a good pace, picking up the occasional person, even when I thought we couldn’t get many more people on board the driver kept stopping! We then came to a grinding halt for some roadworks. We sat in the still hot air for about 45 minutes, dripping with sweat and unable to move much in the crowded bus. Our driver seemed to anticipate the length of wait as he stopped in a shady spot, with a large gap before the end of the queue in front of us. Eventually we managed to get moving again. It turned out the road was in the middle of being dug up for resurfacing, there were no traffic lights, no signs, and no one really controlling the traffic, you just had to get into the moving convoy and go! We drove right through the road works whilst they were laying sand and busy working around the traffic.

We made it safely to the border town and were directed to walk across the bridge to cross the border, at this point we hadn’t actually done a border where we had to show our own passports since leaving Costa Rica! We changed our final Guatemalan notes with a guy on the street just before the border. It’s so much easier to do this now when you can just check the rate on your phone and work out if you’re getting an OK deal or not. The border crossing was very smooth and we were soon in Belize.

Tikal – Mayan temples and a lakeside home away from home

We’d originally planned to get to Flores via Semuc Champey (roughly halfway overland) however, as we were nearing the end of our trip, spending more time in Atitlan than originally planned meant that we needed to go straight there. It’s amazing how three months disappears! Flores was another must-do for us, it’s the nearest big town to access the Mayan ruins of Tikal.

Tikal – very much worth the long journey!

Guatemala is a large country, and Flores is up in the top corner, this meant either a 10+ hour shuttle or a flight. Our experience of Guatemalan shuttles so far has been that while they get you to your destination far more quickly than the local buses, they are not nearly as comfortable as any of the long distance buses we took in South America. The idea of a long (possibly overnight) trip on a minibus really didn’t appeal, so we decided to book our first flight since landing in Panama!

The flight wasn’t going to be a magic shortcut however, as we we still in Lake Atitlan, so the journey would start with a boat ride from Santa Cruz la Laguna, to a short (3 hour) shuttle from Panajachel that would take us directly to the airport in Guatemala city.

On the day everything went to plan. In fact, it went so well that we got to the airport before midday for an 18:30 flight. The airport at Guatemala city isn’t huge so we just had to find some seats and wait until check-in opened at 16:30. We’d brought sandwiches made with the last of the excellent bread, cheese, and hummus that we’d found in San Marcos and took advantage of the free WiFi to edit the blog. We had planned to check in, and dump our bags then grab an early dinner airside while we waited for the flight, however after we went through security we realised that we were in the domestic area consisting only of seating and a single, broken vending machine.

Luckily we always have some snacks on us, so we ate the last of our snacks before boarding. Soon enough we were touching down at Aeropuerto Mundo Maya Internacional. We’d booked a few nights at the Saragüate Eco hostal and the owner Ivan had come to collect us in his old Mercedes.

Downtime and boat-hopping around Lake Atitlan

Lake Atitlan in Guatemala is firmly on the tourist trail, it’s a large lake in an old volcanic crater, a beautiful place surrounded by hills and volcanoes. It was great to go and spend a few days relaxing there after climbing Acatenango.

For most of the time we spent there it was very cloudy, so we didn’t get the amazing views and bright blue water that I’d read about. Regardless of the weather, it was still a great place to explore, relax, and recover.

Our first night was spent in the hub town of Panajachel, as we knew we would arrive too late to get further out onto the lake after dark.

Guatemala is a large country, and it seems to be easiest to travel by shared shuttle as there aren’t direct public buses to many towns on the tourist trail. The downside of this is being at the whim of the shuttle company and driver for timings. Our advertised two hour shuttle ended up being three and a half hours, arriving after dark and dropping us off quite a walk from our hostel. The driver insisted our hostel was a short walk down an alley and he couldn’t take us further. It turned out he was being honest, it’s just that he had translated the name of our hostel The Friends, into Hotel El Amigo. They both existed and were about 15 minutes walk apart, which felt a long way in the dark with our big bags and aching legs!

Hiking the Acatenango Volcano

One of the essential experiences in Guatemala for the adventurous is to summit Volcan Acatenango. I’d first heard it suggested as far back as Panama (with Alex knowing two colleagues who have climbed it as well) and it has been firmly on our plans since at least Nicaragua.

View of Fuego (left) and Acatenango from Antigua

Acatenango itself is just under 4000m (13000ft) at the summit and hasn’t erupted since 1972. So far it’s just another volcano in the many volcanoes of Central America. What makes Acatenango interesting is that it is joined to Volcan de Fuego (Volcano of Fire), an extremely active volcano that erupts regularly and had been erupting since early March. It’s also not without danger, as an eruption in 2018 killed hundreds and hiking the optional last climb up Fuego itself can be somewhat controversial due to the potential risk. While Acatenango is comparatively safe, as recently as 2017 six (poorly equipped) hikers died of hypothermia as the camps are just below the summit and regularly drop below freezing overnight.

The hike itself is yet another challenge, starting at 2400m (7875ft) ascending to the basecamp at 3700m (12140ft) in one day.

Easter in Antigua: our unplanned visit to a world-renowned cultural celebration

We can smell the incense, the corn cooking on the grill, the sugary sweet candyfloss stacked up high above the head of a street seller. We can hear bells ring out from churches, sellers call out their wares, hand-pushed ice-cream carts rattle and jangle as they pass, and people chatting to each other in excitement everywhere you turn. I’m watching my step to not trip on the cobbles, and not step on the sawdust decorations. On every street people are offering things for sale, asking would we like to buy a palm leaf bouquet, or a candle in the shape of a pilgrim, or how about some delicately embroidered cloths or hats or shoes?

Antigua Guatemala was probably the busiest and most colourful place we went to on our trip. Semana Santa, or Holy Week, is the week around Easter and is a very important celebration in Latin America. We’d already seen processions and preparations in El Salvador, but nothing on the scale of Antigua. Semana Santa in Antigua is actually on the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage List, and attracts visitors from all over the world. We had coincidentally managed to time our arrival for Palm Sunday, having carefully avoided being there for what we thought would be the busiest time over Easter Weekend. It was quite an incredible experience.

Ruta de Flores – A trip through rural El Salvador

The Ruta de Flores is a chain of pretty towns in El Salvador not too far from Santa Ana. Each town has it’s own character and must see activities and people spend anything from a few days to a few weeks exploring what the area has to offer. We had opted to base ourselves in Juayua in the middle of the route.

We caught a taxi from our hostel in Santa Ana to the bus station, to board an old American school bus that would take us on two hour journey to Juayua. We got to see even more brightly and eclectically decorated buses here, and managed to perfect our pronunciation of the destination town sufficiently to find the right bus on first ask of one of the friendly locals. The bus ride went quickly as it wasn’t nearly as busy as we experienced in Nicaragua, and before too long we were checking into Hostel Doña Mercedes in Juayua which was small and family owned. We decided to walk around the town which was small, pretty and very quiet. At the weekends there is a locally famous food market and it comes to life but in the week it was just a pretty rural town. We found a proper pizzeria in the evening where we had probably the best pizza we’ve eaten on this trip. I did mention this when we paid to the man who I presume is the owner and he seemed quite unmoved, I think he understood me, maybe he’s just accustomed to hearing this night after night from the string of tourists who kept all five tables filled the whole time we were there.

Exploring Santa Ana – Mayan ruins, thermal waterfalls, and volcanoes!

Santa Ana is a small city in El Salvador, a nice place to base ourselves for easy exploration of a few key tourist sites in the country. We booked three nights at a small hostel here and ended up extending by a night as we liked it so much and there was lots to do.

For a change from the last couple of posts, the journey there will not take up the majority of this blog post! There were regular buses to Santa Ana throughout the day, all running from a nice and well-organised bus terminal (Terminal de Occidente) in San Salvador, the nicest bus terminal we’ve been to since Panama. We got a fast hour-long bus from San Salvador, with air conditioning and a proper luggage storage space, and made it in good time to check-in and go out exploring the town before dark.

The on-site hostel manager Eddy was really friendly and showed us around. We got chatting to another guest called Will, a retired police officer from near Wolverhampton. We’d heard Eddy and some other guests discussing a big cycling thing in the centre and we decided to head in and see what it was about. It turned out to be the Tour El Salvador, a multi-stage international cycling race which was finishing that evening in the centre of Santa Ana. As we walked in we got to see some of the women cycling past us to the finish line. There was a very friendly and relaxed atmosphere in town, with people sitting on the street to watch the race and all smiling and greeting us. We assumed this was because of the big event and festivities around it, but over the next few days we realised people in Santa Ana are just really friendly and wanted to say hello.

A Bougie Weekend in San Salvador

The journey from Nicaragua to El Salvador was a little complicated. Have a look at a map of the region and you’ll see that El Salvador doesn’t actually border with Nicaragua at all. The logical route overland would be via Honduras. However, last year the UK introduced a visa for Hondurans, and they responded in kind. Several months before we left I reached out to the Honduran embassy in London about getting a visa, but was told they needed to know exactly when and where we would be visiting. This is pretty impossible to predict more than a few days in advance, let alone a few months! So we almost gave up on the idea of going overland the whole way up Central America. I did some research though and found mention in a blog about a boat that ran a few times a week from Nicaragua to El Salvador without going through Honduras. Chris was initially pretty sceptical about my less than official findings! We’d thought maybe we could fly straight to Guatemala instead. However, from the start of the trip we met people travelling south who had been on the infamous ‘Mario’s boat’ and told us that El Salvador was a must do as it is safe right now and the people are lovely. It definitely lived up to the recommendations.

Discovering Beauty Off the Beaten Track in Jiquilillo, Nicaragua

It’s late at night and dark except for the light of the moon. I’m floating in a kayak in a estuary near a small village in Nicaragua that is well off the tourist trail. I have no phone, and I can neither hear nor see either Alex or our guide.

I realise that I’m totally alone, with no means of rescuing myself, in an unfamiliar country in an unfamiliar kayak.

I don’t panic however because I’m at peace in this beautiful place. The stars are shining, there is an occasional firefly and every time I dip my paddle in the water the disturbance causes a bioluminescence that briefly illuminates the water around me.

I also know that because of the darkness Alex and the guide can’t be too far ahead and if I just paddle onwards for a minute or so, hopefully I’ll be able to catch a sound of their paddles.

I’m the most relaxed that I’ve been on this trip and, although it took a while, I have now firmly fallen in love with Nicaragua

How did it come to this?

Exploring León, Nicaragua: Art and History in the City

Looking less squished than we felt on our second bus ride

We stopped in León, Nicaragua, for two nights. Our journey there was by local buses to cross the country from Granada. Buses in Nicaragua don’t run to a strict timetable, but instead they leave when they are full, but we timed it well with both buses and were not waiting long at all. It was a hot and sweaty journey though, with open windows only letting in a blast of hot air. The second bus was a pretty cramped ride with one of our big bags balanced across our laps, and our small backpacks jammed between our legs. The ride was fairly smooth and fast though, as we managed to get two very new minibuses. After around three hours we were safely in León. We’d decided in advance that we could easily walk the 15 minutes to our hostel, even with bags. This turned out to be a sweaty trek across a busy market under the hot sun. Chris does much better in the heat then me so he did all our navigating as I blindly followed him.

We arrived at our hostel and checked in, we’d decided to go for this particular hostel as it was family run, plus it had a room with air conditioning, ensuite, a balcony, and even bedside tables with lamps. Luxury! Our hosts were a nice family who greeted us warmly and, I suspect on seeing how I was faring with the heat and humidity, went and turned on the air conditioning in our room whilst we checked in and were shown around.