 We
swapped cars and headed for Tikal
with the slowest driver I’ve ever encountered. As we entered
the national park, the driver came out with the usual bullshit about us
having to pay some extra for no readily explainable reason. My Spanish
wasn’t quite good enough to tell him to go and fornicate with
himself, but he seemed to get the message. The last few
kilometres were a bit silent! We dumped our crap off, and then due to a
series of minor logistical errors, Mark had to go to Flores to use a
cash machine, so I wandered around the site. What a beautiful place! It
was after two when I started , and I barely saw a soul there. It was so
nice to sit on the temples and look out at the surrounding jungle and
only hear the noise of monkeys and parrots rather than a hundred loud
tourists. Quite magical. Mark got his money ok, and we had dinner with
a Swedish couple who were sound people.
Got up early the following day to see the sunrise from one of the
temples. It was quite misty, but still very good. Had another wander
around the site, and then got ready to leave for Flores.
After Flores, I decided to make a change to my plans, and headed for
Rio Dulce. The bus was halfway between a ‘chicken
bus’ and a normal one, but as there were only ten people on
it, it was an easy ride. Arrived in Rio Dulce at 2.00, but the were no
boats available to take me over to Livingston, so I booked one for the
following day, and stayed at a place called Bruno’s, which
acts as a sort of hub for yachties and backpackers.
Wed 8th, and the water taxi to Livingston was a bit bizarre to start
off with. It did a cross between a site seeing trip, and pick
ups at other places before returning to the dock where we started, to
sit for no readily explainable reason for a further ten minutes before
heading off. The journey along the Rio Dulce (Rio means river by the
way!) was quite good, with the gorge walls covered in greenery, and at
one spot, a thermally active area with hot pools. On arrival at the
town of Livingston, only reachable by boat, I booked in at the Hotel
Rio Dulce. If it was described in a guidebook, it would
probably read something like ‘has rustic charm’, ie
pretty basic. However, the room was nice and airy, with a hammock
outside, and if you could ignore the fact that whenever you walked
upstairs the whole wooden building shook, or that the water came out of
the showers in a dribble, it was fine. The humidity
had all but disappeared due to a couple of big thunderstorms, which was
a welcome relief.
Livingston itself was so small, that it’s barely
worth describing. In a way, it was similar to Caye Caulker in Belize,
especially with the laid back attitude of the people. There was one
main street, which consists of a collection of restaurants, hotels,
souvenir shops and pharmacies.
In all, I managed to spend three nights there, doing nothing but
swinging in my hammock, getting some sun and eating in
restaurants…Yes, it’s a hard life! I watched
Guatemala play Costa Rica on T.V. in one of the cafes, and Guatemala
lost 3-2 in the last minute which was a shame. Good to see that
football fans reactions are the same the world over though.
Quite a few little things happened to make the stay enjoyable. A guy
wandering around blowing a conch shell and getting women to dance to
the rythmn, another guy dressed in red robes and carrying a staff, who
obviously thought he was some sort of priest. The usual collection of
oddballs and weirdo’s who are my fellow travellers, some of
whom were interesting to talk too, others only interesting to look at.
There was one older guy from England who had travelled through Africa
who had the sort of stories that make me want to do this sort of thing
forever. Oh yeh, forgot to mention my first encounter with the
Guatemalan hot water system. It basically consists of a few electrical
wires taped ineptly to the end of the shower head, which then somehow
heats the water as it passes through. It looked reasonable enough, and
for the first few minutes it performed wonderfully. However,
just as I was washing my testicles, there was a gigantic
explosion, so I stuck to cold showers from then on!
When I moved on, Sat 11th, I caught an early boat to Puerto Barrios,
and then managed to grab a bus going to Chiquimula. Guatemalan bus
journeys are quite odd, because they never really have a start point or
time as such. The bus will usually sitting there with the ticket
collector shouting it’s destination for fifteen minutes
before it’s due to depart. Then, the guy that’s
been asleep across the rear seats will move to the front and start the
engine as the hint for everyone to get onboard. You think that
you’ll be off relatively soon, but really it’s just
a ploy to get fifty people in a confined space so that they can sweat
together for fifteen minutes. Then, the bus pulls forwards six feet,
before suddenly stopping so that the ticket collector can go and buy
his breakfast (obviously , there was no way he could have done this
before.) Then, it starts off again, only to stop in the middle of the
road whilst the driver talks to the driver of another bus coming in the
opposite direction. And all that without the general lack of road
rules, consideration for other drivers and badly tuned in radios
blasting out music on full volume makes for an enjoyable trip! By
the way, UB40 seems to be the most popular band in Guatemala,
as wherever you go, you can guarantee it will be playing
somewhere.
This travelogue continues into Honduras
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