I Saw a Guy with a Shotgun Riding a Bicycle
No lie. I wouldn't be surprised if he had his finger on the trigger.
I belive I last wrote from Flores, after the strange meeting with Sterling and a great Brit named Botz (short for Ian Bottomly), who is now about 45 but was previously in a punk band in the 70s. Also met a travel writer for The Guardian newspaper in London, who had some great stories from Central and South America.
I took a day trip to Tikal, to visit the Mayan ruins. Jungle covered towering stone structures, with birds and monkeys everywhere. Pictures worth more than words here.
Leaving Flores, I took a bus through extremely twisty roads to the town of Coban. Arriving at mid-day, I had heard that there was a large orchid farm a bit outside the city. I took a taxi to the base of a large hill, and walked up a steep muddy road to a nursery on the hill. I was immediately greeted by about 1,000 Monja Blanca, an orchid and national flower of Guatemala. In total, the farm had over 8,000 orchids of various species, and a number of other flowers. Despite my poor Spanish, the owner arranged for a personal tour, explaining all the different types of orchids (flowering, nonflowering, micro-orchids, etc). Fantastic.
Back in town, I swung by a local coffee farm to sample some of their world renowned Guatemalan coffee before settling down at the hotel.
In the morning, after an interesting conversation with the night watchman at the hotel about having paid already the night before, I caught a bus back through the highlands to Guatemala City. Arriving a little after noon, I asked some taxi drivers where I could catch a bus to Panajachel, on Lake Atitlan, but everyone seemed to think that there was only one bus, which had left at 8am. Thinking that couldn't be right, I stopped in at Hotel Fenix, my hotel the first night in Guatemala (which happened to be around the corner), to ask the owner if I had in fact missed the bus. The wonderful woman who owns the hotel made some phonecalls, and determined that all of the shuttle busses had left or were full, but I could still catch a chicken bus until 3:30.
The chicken bus is a phenomenon in Guatemala that I may never understand. First, picture a bus that might take sleepy school children in America to classes each morning. Add a wild paint job, say firetruck red or avacado green. Slap on enormous decals of reading ¨JesuCristo mi amor¨ or ¨Jesus, El Senor,¨ add a luggage rack on top and ladders on the sides, and you might get the idea. The bus driver usually works with a partner, who has the job of shuttling people on and off the always moving bus. The travel books warn against such buses, calling them dangerous and unnecessary. I say for a couple of cents to just about anywhere you can't get a better ride.
Jumping on a chicken bus to the Lake, I knew I was in for an interesting ride. Traveling into the mountains, the fog in the cloud forests quickly became quite thick. Still, the bus roared through narrow streets, crossing the yellow line to pass cars and trucks at every opportunity, honking loudly. At one point, we can to a downhill slope where a long line of traffic was stopped. Apparently there had been an accident somewhere on the road ahead, but the bus driver wasn´t about to take that for an answer. On a road only big enough for about one lane of cars, the bus crossed the dividing line and into oncoming traffic, darting between trucks, vans, and other oncoming buses. At one point the fog was so thick that all you could see was about 10 meters of road on either side, and headlights coming on quick from the front. To make things more interesting, guard rails in Guatemala are almost nonexistant.
After speeding down the hill passing hundreds of stopped cars, we arrived at a point where men were carrying crates of potates from up over the cliff to the right. Rolling closer, I saw that a truck full of potato crates had toppled over the edge, spilling the contents all over the landscape. Speeding past the scene, we continued toward the west.
It turned out that the bus did not go all the way to Panajachel, my destination for the evening, so I took another small bus to the city of Solola, where a giant market was in full swing at the city center, near a towering church. From the vantage point of the hill, you could easily see the lake in the distance, flanked by three separate volcanos.
Walking out of town, the signs read 7 km to Panajachel. After about 1 km of walking, I met up with an Italian couple also making their way toward the city. Through a mix of broken English, Spanish, and French, we got to know each other well by the time we were a bit outside the city. Stopping to get a fabulous view of the lake from the side of a cliff, we were offered a ride in a pickup down to the city proper. There in town, we parted ways as I made for a hotel.
After purchasing an enchilada, taco, and a donut from the local bakery, I walked down the docks to enjoy the meal. The volcanoes are a powerful sight against the red hues of the setting sun. As I was about the eat the donut, I heard someone call ¨Ben-ya-min,¨ and saw none other than the Italian couple. The man is a fireman, and apparently they were staying with the other firemen in the town of Panajachel. They have traveled all around Central and South America, but thought that Argentina was the best, or at least offered the widest variety of scenery.
Tomorrow it´s off to San Pedro, by boat across the lake.
I belive I last wrote from Flores, after the strange meeting with Sterling and a great Brit named Botz (short for Ian Bottomly), who is now about 45 but was previously in a punk band in the 70s. Also met a travel writer for The Guardian newspaper in London, who had some great stories from Central and South America.
I took a day trip to Tikal, to visit the Mayan ruins. Jungle covered towering stone structures, with birds and monkeys everywhere. Pictures worth more than words here.
Leaving Flores, I took a bus through extremely twisty roads to the town of Coban. Arriving at mid-day, I had heard that there was a large orchid farm a bit outside the city. I took a taxi to the base of a large hill, and walked up a steep muddy road to a nursery on the hill. I was immediately greeted by about 1,000 Monja Blanca, an orchid and national flower of Guatemala. In total, the farm had over 8,000 orchids of various species, and a number of other flowers. Despite my poor Spanish, the owner arranged for a personal tour, explaining all the different types of orchids (flowering, nonflowering, micro-orchids, etc). Fantastic.
Back in town, I swung by a local coffee farm to sample some of their world renowned Guatemalan coffee before settling down at the hotel.
In the morning, after an interesting conversation with the night watchman at the hotel about having paid already the night before, I caught a bus back through the highlands to Guatemala City. Arriving a little after noon, I asked some taxi drivers where I could catch a bus to Panajachel, on Lake Atitlan, but everyone seemed to think that there was only one bus, which had left at 8am. Thinking that couldn't be right, I stopped in at Hotel Fenix, my hotel the first night in Guatemala (which happened to be around the corner), to ask the owner if I had in fact missed the bus. The wonderful woman who owns the hotel made some phonecalls, and determined that all of the shuttle busses had left or were full, but I could still catch a chicken bus until 3:30.
The chicken bus is a phenomenon in Guatemala that I may never understand. First, picture a bus that might take sleepy school children in America to classes each morning. Add a wild paint job, say firetruck red or avacado green. Slap on enormous decals of reading ¨JesuCristo mi amor¨ or ¨Jesus, El Senor,¨ add a luggage rack on top and ladders on the sides, and you might get the idea. The bus driver usually works with a partner, who has the job of shuttling people on and off the always moving bus. The travel books warn against such buses, calling them dangerous and unnecessary. I say for a couple of cents to just about anywhere you can't get a better ride.
Jumping on a chicken bus to the Lake, I knew I was in for an interesting ride. Traveling into the mountains, the fog in the cloud forests quickly became quite thick. Still, the bus roared through narrow streets, crossing the yellow line to pass cars and trucks at every opportunity, honking loudly. At one point, we can to a downhill slope where a long line of traffic was stopped. Apparently there had been an accident somewhere on the road ahead, but the bus driver wasn´t about to take that for an answer. On a road only big enough for about one lane of cars, the bus crossed the dividing line and into oncoming traffic, darting between trucks, vans, and other oncoming buses. At one point the fog was so thick that all you could see was about 10 meters of road on either side, and headlights coming on quick from the front. To make things more interesting, guard rails in Guatemala are almost nonexistant.
After speeding down the hill passing hundreds of stopped cars, we arrived at a point where men were carrying crates of potates from up over the cliff to the right. Rolling closer, I saw that a truck full of potato crates had toppled over the edge, spilling the contents all over the landscape. Speeding past the scene, we continued toward the west.
It turned out that the bus did not go all the way to Panajachel, my destination for the evening, so I took another small bus to the city of Solola, where a giant market was in full swing at the city center, near a towering church. From the vantage point of the hill, you could easily see the lake in the distance, flanked by three separate volcanos.
Walking out of town, the signs read 7 km to Panajachel. After about 1 km of walking, I met up with an Italian couple also making their way toward the city. Through a mix of broken English, Spanish, and French, we got to know each other well by the time we were a bit outside the city. Stopping to get a fabulous view of the lake from the side of a cliff, we were offered a ride in a pickup down to the city proper. There in town, we parted ways as I made for a hotel.
After purchasing an enchilada, taco, and a donut from the local bakery, I walked down the docks to enjoy the meal. The volcanoes are a powerful sight against the red hues of the setting sun. As I was about the eat the donut, I heard someone call ¨Ben-ya-min,¨ and saw none other than the Italian couple. The man is a fireman, and apparently they were staying with the other firemen in the town of Panajachel. They have traveled all around Central and South America, but thought that Argentina was the best, or at least offered the widest variety of scenery.
Tomorrow it´s off to San Pedro, by boat across the lake.
posted by Benjamin at
9:01 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home