In a nutshell, Guatemala was great!
I got a friend to drive me up to LAX on her way to a Muay Thai fight, and then waited a LONG time for my 1am flight down to Guatemala City on Spirit Airlines. I think I was literally the only Caucasian person on the flight down; people definitely kept looking at me like "are you sure you're in the right place?" but no big deal. I landed in Guatemala City - which, I noted from the air, is a lot greener than expected - went through customs and got my passport stamped, worked my way through the international arrivals hallway, and then found myself dumped outside with the taxis which was not exactly where I wanted to be, since I had a domestic flight to Flores to catch. I explained my dilemma to a taxi driver and he pointed me to the main airport entrance, so I just walked through the parking lot and up a ramp and went back in that way. I made my flight to Flores with no problem; the airplane, however, was perhaps the smallest I've ever been on. :)
Once I got to Flores, I still had to figure out how to get to Tikal (which was ~1hr away). For one person alone, it could've cost as must as $40USD if you were stupid. I made friends w/a couple people and we split a minibus for $10USD/person - which was still expensive, but I didn't want to wait hours to find the only other transportation I'd heard about. Fortunately, the little bumfuck airport in Flores had a bank / ATM and I was able to get some Quetzales; I'd been unable to do so back in Guatemala City. (It was also fortunate I'd brought a "backup" ATM card with a VISA logo. My primary card has a MasterCard logo - and wasn't accepted in Flores.) Anyway, I make it to my little hotel in the jungle at Tikal - after driving through landscape with free range horses, having to stop for suckling pigs to cross the road, and going through an armed checkpoint into the park. I think they must've upgraded me since it was low season in the jungle (i.e. rainy season), because I got a whole three-bed bungalow w/ceiling fan, private bathroom, and covered porch w/a hammock to myself. It was cute and surprisingly bug-free, but the place only had electricity for a couple hours a day (10am-1pm, and 6-9pm) so you were still definitely in the jungle.After crashing on my bed and falling asleep to monsoonal rain, I woke up near 4pm and decided to go for a wander in the park to see some Mayan temples and watch the sunset. I bought my entrance ticket (50Q) which was also good for the next day, since it was so late in the afternoon. I then went way out in search of Temple VI because I didn't want to be around other people. Walking through the jungle entirely by yourself as it gets closer to dark is definitely something; the jungle comes ALIVE with sound the darker it gets and the howler monkeys (which I wasn't convinced could even be monkeys based on the creepy sound they emit) were getting closer and closer. Alas, after all my sweating to get out to Temple VI, it wasn't really that impressive - d'oh! - and I decided to find my way out of the jungle before it got completely dark. [Later, I read in my guidebook that lone females have supposedly been raped out in that area – but guidebooks contain a lot of often unnecessary cautions, so who knows. It seemed fine to me.]
The next morning, I was up and in the park as soon as they opened at 6am. Unfortunately, it was the wrong time of year to watch the sunrise from atop a temple - as it was already up(ish) by the time the park opened. Still, there's really no one in the park at that hour and all the birds and monkeys and other critters are most active then. Plus, there are just no words for climbing a Mayan temple in the morning mist and having absolutely no other human around. Just me. Just that experience. I'll never forget it. I hiked through almost all of the ruins, which was definitely a task as it was murderously hot and humid by 6:30am. Eventually, I made it out of the ruins and just laid in my hammock for the rest of the day.The next day, I intended to go back into the ruins again but just couldn't bring myself to do it. I was pooped and just slept underneath the fan until I had to check out and take my little $5USD collectivo back to Flores. A collectivo is basically the same as a minibus/van, but one which they cram lots more people into. How many people can fit in a collectivo, you ask? Well, I can vouch for at least 18! We threw our luggage on the roof rack and were packed in like sardines. It let us out at the entrance to Isla Flores (the island of Flores) and I ate lunch with an Italian woman working in Panama before we shared a tuk-tuk back to my motel in Santa Elena and she continued on to the airport. I could've stayed on the island of Flores, but I had an early flight and wanted to be able to walk to the airport. Unfortunately, while the motel seemed okay initially, I wound up fending off giant cockroaches that started climbing the walls after dark. I half-dozed with every stinking light on, until I got up and left for the airport. Oh well. (But I swear - they had more bugs than their sister hotel in the middle of the jungle! And roaches really creep me out for some reason...)
My flight back to Guatemala City was only interesting in that the security people confiscated my nail clippers and rounded tweezers (because I was so obviously going to hijack the plane w/my tweezers!), in that I met an American GI (who's Guatemalan) who lied and told me my Spanish was really good, and in that our plane was a normal-sized jet liner. I didn't think an airplane that size could fit on the runway, but I guess it did. Hands down, though, it was the steepest/sharpest takeoff I can remember. Once back in Guatemala City, I decided to ask at the tourism info desk how to get to Antigua (since, frankly, Guatemala City looked a bit sketchy and I didn't want to take chances w/safety as a solo female traveler who's not fluent in the local language). The woman at the desk directed me to a shuttle/minibus service where I paid $10USD for the ~1hr ride to Antigua. The more we wove our way through Guatemala City, with its erratic drivers, bizarre streets and vehicles belching smoke at every turn, the more I realized paying for a shuttle was worth it.
Antigua, itself, is a charming old colonial town (that used to be the capital back in the 1700's) surrounded by three volcanoes. It's beautiful. Much to my amusement, it's also apparently popular on the hippie-wannabe backpacker circuit. I wonder, sometimes, what others think of "Americans" if that's all they see of us. As a rule, I have no problem w/either hippies or the wannabes (I mean, shit, I went to college in Eugene!), but I just don't enjoy people who's sole motivation to travel is only to go out and get pissed/stoned/whatever every night - and nothing else. But, I digress.
On my first full day in Antigua, I stumbled on a once-a-year Catholic procession just as it was starting. I couldn't get a lot of info about the procession; however, I understood that it was related to the body of Christ. There was also something about how everyone goes to church on Sunday, but nine Sunday's were special - but I didn't really understand that because the procession happened on a Thursday. (D'oh! - rudimentary language skills from compulsory elementary school Spanish decades ago in NM!) Aside from that, I really just spent my time in Antigua relaxing. I shopped a bit, ate a bit, watched people in the park, visited the old ruined buildings in the city, got invited to Mass, etc, etc It was great and relaxing :) If I hadn't gotten royally sunburned during the religious procession (drat that closer-to-the-equator sun!), I would've gone on a volcano trek to Pacaya - but I knew better than to climb a volcano and roast myself on lava rocks at that point.I then got a shuttle/minibus from the hostel back to the airport in Guatemala City ($8USD), caught my flight but only slept maybe 30min out of 5.5hrs, landed at LAX and took forever to get through customs (where I, curiously, got a US stamp in my passport - WTF?), met a Guatemalan guy who offered for me to go home and crash at his place in Van Nuys after he learned I'd also come back from Guatemala (a non-sketchy offer more in keeping w/the notion of Guatemalan hospitality - though I still declined), caught the Flyaway shuttle from LAX to Union Station sometime after 1am, got to Union Station around 2am and actually found an Amtrak employee so I was able to buy a ticket down to Oceanside on a bus that left at ~3am, arrived at the OSD transit station at ~5am and called my mom to come pick me up. Oy. I was tired, but it was nice watching the sun come up in Oceanside. Each time I go away and come back, I realize how blessed I am to live where I do. It's beautiful, here.
That said, if I can find another amazing fare to Guatemala City on Spirit, I'll definitely go again... (However, I may very well travel with a small amount of Cipro in case I run into travel-stomach-funk issues again. That was no fun!)
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