Monday, July 16, 2007

Trip Day 2-Bus Day 2

Day two of the Guatemala country tour with my Spanish school began when we arrived back to the bus after Semuk Champey. The bus had taken a bad mood. I was unfortunately sitting by the bathroom, fortunately by extremely pleasant people, but unfortunately by a now smelly bathroom in a bus with no air con. After 6 hours we were to arrive at an island city in the north for a night of fun and sleeping in a hotel. This did not come to fruition because the bus driver was alerted of dangerous conditions after 3 hours at which point we turned back and took a longer route.

We arrived outside the island city at a different hotel at 8am for a shower and breakfast. Menu: chicken or bistec, beans (frijoles) and rice. Deliciously refreshing.

Moving forward from the stinky night on the bus, now clean and satisfied from breakfast, we arrived at Tikal, the largest most famous Mayan ruins in Guatemala. We hired a guide who ended up speaking in english instead of spanish, dang. But he was well worth it. We climbed around 5 ruins and learned a lot about the early civilization. I took a picture to submit to the Minneapolis magazine on top of one ruin. I can only hope to win the monthly picture submission.

some history of Tikal to follow in a future blog.

After Tikal, we ate dinner. On the menu, chicken or bistec with frijoles, rice and tortillas. This was meal three of the same menu, satisfying but oh how I longed for grilled cheese instead.

That night we did stay at a hotel. Our group filled the entire hotel. So we swam and were merry until early in the morning. After little sleep or food, but two days of great adventures, the pool could not have been better. This mixed with some lime flavored peanuts and chocolate cookies.

The next day we viewed Rio Dolce, a city with an african vibe on a beautiful tropic lake. That was most of the day... due to time and the bad mood of the bus. More later. Time for frijoles and beans!! Or, I hope my host mom has changed the menu!

On the trip I made great friends and memories and loved the destinations. I am happily back in Xela where I will study for up to the 5 weeks I have remaining here. Thanks for all the emails from home. They are refreshing as well.

And..
Happy Birthday to my sister Jenny!! She´s one year older, sassier, and cuter. Big hug!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

There has been very little about footwear recently. My guess is there has been no more flip-flop hiking? This is for the best.

Tell me... did you tube in real innertubes or those fake, thin plastic thingees people use now? I grew up tubing around on real innertubes in a glacier fed river in the ozarks.