Cycling from Frontera Corozal to Bethel - Guatemala Border
On this day of the PanAmerican bike tour, we officially entered Guatemala to continue the cycling adventure. Here's my bike touring blog from the day.
Frontera Corozal Lancha to Guatemala
(Blog post written Mar 1 2010)
I didn't feel too bad, considering the amount of kilometres cycled the previous day, but that said, another long day wasn't on the cards either. Today though, we first had to cross from Frontera Corozal Chiapas (Mexico) over the river to Guatemala.
Oliver and I left at about 08.00, and headed first to immigration to be stamped out, which proved to be swift and efficient. Then, it was down to the river, where we needed to get a lancha over to the Guatemalan side.
They wanted four hundred pesos to take us directly to Bethel, or just seventy pesos to take us straight over to the other side... Option 2 it was then!!
It was a bit of fun loading the bicycles onto the lancha, and the actual journey over to the other side took less than ten minutes.
Then, a not so enjoyable carrying of bicycles and trailer up the embankment, and then we hit our first road in Guatemala. And quite a rough and hilly thing it was too!
Bethel Guatemala
That it took us two hours to cover just 15 kms was probably not the greatest morale booster on what was an outrageously hot day, but we arrived in Bethel before lunch.
Asking around, we eventually found a Hospedeja (El Rodeo - class) for 80 Quetzales for the night. Then, it was just a matter of relaxing the afternoon away, and trying to avoid the heat!
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Dave is a UK travel writer living in Athens since 2015. With 20 years of firsthand travel experience and over 80,000 km of bicycle touring across six continents, he's been blogging at Dave's Travel Pages since 2005. Every guide is based on places he's actually been.
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